UNIX/AmigaOS article in A/C Tech -- yech

[Jeffrey M. Schweiger]

In article <20892 at cbmvax.commodore.com> daveh at cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie) writes:
<In article <7985 at jhunix.HCF.JHU.EDU> barrett at jhunix.HCF.JHU.EDU (Dan Barrett) writes:
<
<>	Have you read the article "UNIX and the Amiga:  An Introduction to
<>UNIX, for the Amiga Programmer, Part I" in Amazing Computing's Tech magazine,
<>issue #2?
<
<>	IMHO, this article is terrible.  It is riddled with errors and
<>misconceptions about UNIX.  

  At first glance, I heartily agree!  I almost get the impression that the
author might be better off reading someone else's introduction to Unix, as
opposed to writing one.

<I was under the impression that both Tech Journals, the Amazing and the 
<AmigaWorld versions, would subject any submissions to some kind of expert
<review committee.  Sounds like they screwed the pooch on that one, at least.
<I was persuaded to write an article for the AmigaWorld version, and it made
<me wonder if the original premise of these magazines would really last long,
<especially with two of them launched at basically the same time.  A good
<portion of the people capable of writing really hard core technical articles
<are also generally overextended as it is.

Looking at both of the journals, the AmigaWorld Tech Journal states that it
does make use of a peer review process, but AC's Tech does not.  My subjective
evaluation is that the AmigaWorld entry has a better 'feel' to it.  I recognized
the names of more of the AmigaWorld Tech authors than I did of the AC's Tech
authors, although Jeff Glatt (dissidents software) has already appeared in
both journals.

<In any case, any article full of errors would be inexcusable in Amazing or
<AmigaWorld proper.  In these new tech journals, it's worse.  I haven't seen
<either of them yet, but if such an article made me annoyed, I would probably
<write a colorfully angry letter back to them.  

Get out your pen, Dave.  This article is a bit too much off base.  The author,
Mike Hubbartt, obviously put a lot of effort into writing the article, but I
don't see evidence suggesting a similar effort into researching and 
understanding Unix.  He also managed to add to the confusion in one section
where he discussed Intel 80x86 machines and putting SCO UNIX or Xenix and
MS-DOS on the same machine (to be blunt, who cares, the article is for
an Amiga audience).

<>| Dan Barrett, Department of Computer Science      Johns Hopkins University |
<
<
<-- 
<Dave Haynie Commodore-Amiga (Amiga 3000) "The Crew That Never Rests"
<   {uunet|pyramid|rutgers}!cbmvax!daveh      PLINK: hazy     BIX: hazy
<      "That's me in the corner, that's me in the spotlight" -R.E.M.


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Jeff Schweiger	      Standard Disclaimer   	CompuServe:  74236,1645
Internet (Milnet):				schweige at taurus.cs.nps.navy.mil
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