Re: XyWhere?

[Bob Brody brody@xxxxxxxx]

Raphael Tennenbaum writes:

> Hi Bob -- I don't know how long you've been on the list...

Rafe, good to see you still in the XyThroes. I haven't been on
the list until just this weekend. Perhaps typical of XyWrite, it
was hard to find (in any ML directory or net index) but stumbling
across a post disclosed some header addresses that I eventually
connected via. Found an archives listing and began reading
previous posts. They read like the mood at an Irish wake without
liquor.

I was hoping to hear some pretty enthusiastic comments about Xy's
evolution and a great Win or OS/2 version. Instead I'm reminded
of the joke taking a swipe at the U.S. Postal service:

   Guy says to the mailman at his door, "You know there's
   a snail right behind you." Mailman replies, "Yeah, I
   know, it's been following me around all day."

Oh well. Lots of stuff out there that offers third-party
handshaking, up-to-date drivers, drag 'n drop compatibility,
plenty of flexibility for working in and among other applications
researching and assembling disparate info into the writing
environment. Unfortunately, a body could wait a lifetime for all
these Xy promises of better things to come and when some finally
do appear, well....

Whatever. C'est la vie. I question if I'd ever embrace the GUI
as an interface if it had nothing else to offer but it's an
incidental price to pay for the profound inter-operable
capabilities across a range of software, as well as one's own
programming. The software available keeps getting better and
better a la state-of-the-art. Welcome to modernity.

What's happened, and has been happening, is not unlike years ago
when we were first stuck with limitedly implemented utils.
Aspiring programmers and pros alike wrote better mousetraps to
upload around. A braindead FIND.COM was extended to a high speed
Boolean search util, and so on. That's much of what I'm seeing
now. The better this or better that utils and mini apps or
applets, whatever, are being written and made available. And
they're cool! :)

Just hang out in comp.archives.ms-windows.announce newsgroup on
Usenet (the newsgroup also has a searchable archive) and you'll
see some terrific shareware available in the Simtel, Garbo, and
other catalogs for download. (There's also a MSDOS .announce of
the same catalogs, as well as respective .discussion group for
requests posting. Similarly, topical indices, such as file
viewers, editors, screen stuff, etc., etc. are available at these
catalogs.)

So it's come as a surprise to me that XyWrite hasn't kept pace,
with apparently *any* platform. What have they been doing over
there at TTG? It's not like they haven't had the time to further
develop it. It's been years already. I don't understand. Are
they on laudanum or something? Well, maybe this new product is
their answer to the modern pc.

Best regards,

Bob