Re: Looperlative LP1 - current info compiled

[Jeff Larson <Jeffrey.Larson@Sun.COM>]

mark sottilaro wrote:
 > That does indeed sound like a Repeater/EDP killer!

The LP1 does indeed sound like a very promising product.  But before
we sound the death knell for the EDP we need to consider the issue of
"software".

There is an acronym in the world of engineering, SMOP, which stands
for "Simple Matter Of Programming".  It refers to the tendency of
engineers to underestimate the costs of software development and
testing when doing project planning.  As in, "we'll budget 6 months
for hardware checkout, then it's just a SMOP for the OS".

I'm sure Bob's a fine engineer, and I look forward to watching the
evolution of the LP1, but do not underestimate the difficulty of
writing and testing software for a machine such as this, and the
complexity of the software that has been refined over many years in
the EDP.

 From the little information that exists, the LP1 has already begun
departing from the software architecture of the EDP in several significant
ways, and as such, I seriously doubt the LP1 will ever do everything
an EDP can.  I'm not saying it should, it will have unique and powerful
features of its own, but it will be different, and these differences
will be important to some people.

Jeff