THE SONG OF HIAWATHA'S SPECTRUM
by Alexander "Sasha" Volokh, VESOFT
Published by SCRUG Communicator, Feb-Mar 1988.
In the town of Cupertino,
In the green and fruitful valley,
By the pleasant watercourses,
By the great Pacific Ocean,
Lay the lab of Hewlett-Packard.
In the halls of Hewlett-Packard,
All the people daily running;
In the rooms of Hewlett-Packard,
All the employees conversing;
On sophisticated keyboards,
All the programmers are typing,
Faster than the cows stampeding,
Faster than a speeding bullet,
Working on their project, Spectrum.
In this planet's scattered corners,
In the wild and swampy grasslands,
In the snowy, gloomy forests;
Under skies of California,
And in countries European,
And the 48 departments,
The contiguous partitions
Of our Hewlett-Packard's homeland
(And Alaska and Hawaii):
All awaited the 950,
Patiently awaited Spectrum,
Eagerly besought the system.
Still the programmers were typing
On the keyboards of computers,
Eagerly composing Spectrum
And all manners of great software.
But the people bureaucratic
Promising to ship computers
Spent their time with fingers twiddling,
Musing on their coming paychecks;
And imagined appelations,
Different kinds of appelations
For "whatever they were making":
Some would say "RISC Architecture
(Reduced Instruction Set Computer),"
Or "Precision Architecture" --
Some would name it the 950,
Others the HP 930.
Even VESOFT, Purveyors
Of Fine Software in the '80s,
Made their version two point zero
Of their MPE Extended
(Three thousand five hundred dollars)
So it worked upon the Spectrum.
But the stranded HP users
Were frustrated in their efforts
For they all were promised Spectrum,
Speedy, long-awaited Spectrum,
Fast and often-promised Spectrum
Which their HP contacts told them
That "they sent it out last Tuesday"
But they hadn't yet received it.
So the daring Hiawatha,
An indignant Hiawatha,
Came at last to Cupertino,
Entered into HP's office --
Elegant but lazy office.
And he came to David Packard
And he threatened him at gunpoint
With the bullets of his Magnum
(.357 Magnum).
In the town of Cupertino,
In the halls of Hewlett-Packard,
When the elegant computers
Bore the brilliant label "Spectrum",
People hurried with the labels
And the packaging material
To deliver the computers.
Now the planet was elated
And MPEX was selling
(Three thousand five hundred dollars,
VESOFT is selling proudly
To the Hewlett-Packard users) --
And courageous Hiawatha
Finally received his Spectrum.
NEW WAVE -- A BALLAD
by Alexander "Sasha" Volokh, VESOFT
Published by SCRUG Communicator, Aug-Sep 1988.
Published by VENEWS, #10, 1992.
The skies they were shining and lacquered,
And the programmers looked very brave,
Looked confident, happy and brave --
'Twas the day that the firm Hewlett-Packard
Unveiled its great product, New Wave,
Its magnificent product, New Wave.
New Wave worked in conjunction with Windows
(The version two point zero three);
It would function with Microsoft's Windows,
But only two point zero three.
Too long had it stood in the back rows,
For no one had witnessed its might --
For example, its system-wide macros
That could make heavy tasks very light
(It deserved to be brought to the light!)
There were "hot links" between applications
To do many things at a time --
Icons could represent applications
And could save you a whole lot of time.
Here, performance and swiftness were wedded,
Which made integration just right
(And again, HP leads us aright);
In New Wave, ease of use was embedded
To the users' content and delight
For New Wave brought an end to their plight!
Yes, it lit up the sky through the night!
It was written to work on the Vectra
In the language that people call C.
You can even transfer, on the Vectra,
Many programs not written in C.
But alas! the directors of Apple
With evil, not blood, in their veins,
With hate in nefarious veins,
Decided with HP to grapple
And to cause it no end to its pains.
They decided on filing a lawsuit:
They accused it of trying to steal
Their Mac interface -- but Apple's lawsuit
Was just based on "the look and the feel."
"Who cares that the few things we can match,
On the Mac, are the pictures we show,
Are the similar icons we show?
And who cares that our programming language,"
Apple said, "is unbearably slow
('Cause they say that our Hypertalk's slow)?
And we don't care about a third party --
It's just HP's success that we mind!"
Then they laughed, and their laughs sounded hearty,
For they chuckled with evil in mind.
David Packard was in Cupertino
When he figured out what he should do --
For this suit for New Wave wouldn't do.
So he said, "sending us a subpoena
Was an action that Apple will rue.
Yes, its heart should be laden with rue!
Those directors must surely be punished
For defaming the name of HP,
And I'll see to it that they get punished
So beware fearless Dave of HP!"
David Packard consulted his lawyer
And then he got up from his desk,
His expensive, mahogany desk,
And he marched in the courthouse's foyer
Where he said, "This is so Kafkaesque!
I know well that I'm here for a trial,
Yet I don't even know what's the deal!"
Apple said, with no air of denial,
"Look and feel! Look and feel! Look and feel!
'Cause New Wave has the Mac's look and feel!
Now your losses will temper your zeal."
David said that the suit had no merit,
And then he called Apple a louse.
But his rage grew 'till he couldn't bear it,
And he aimed and then clicked with his mouse;
In one swoop, double-clicked with his mouse!
So thus justice prevailed over evil,
And Dave uttered many "So there"'s.
HP workers are still fighting evil
And success and good fortune are theirs.
Sasha Volokh is the VP of P (Vice-President of Poetry) of VESOFT. He
tells us this poem is in the style of "Ulalume -- A Ballad" by Edgar
Allen Poe, and offers his apologies to Mr. Poe.
THE UNBUNDLING OF IMAGE
by Alexander "Sasha" Volokh, VESOFT
Published by VENEWS, #3, 1990.
An account of the SIGIMAGE meeting at the Boston INTEREX conf.
(In the style of "The Man from Snowy River" by A.B."Banjo" Paterson)
There was movement down in Boston, for the word had gotten out
That IMAGE was unbundled by HP.
And the vendors all decided not to sit around and pout,
So they got together up on Level 3.
All the wise and noted vendors from locations near and far,
They mustered at SIG IMAGE Monday night.
For it's easier to make a fuss where all the users are,
And where people think that things are not so right.
There was Gary Ho, a technical employee of HP,
And Robert Hill, another HP guy;
And Steve Cooper (of this IMAGE SIG a leader once was he),
And Alfredo, who was also standing by.
Roger Lawson was invited to fill in an empty chair,
And O'Brien (Terry), who sells OMNIDEX.
And Brad Tashenberg of BRADMARK was another person there,
Whose new product has the name of SUPERDEX.
Now the Hewlett-Packard panelists had such a thing to say:
There are rumors going round, which aren't true.
HP isn't killing IMAGE; it's committed all the way.
IMAGE, just like SQL, is what we do.
And we've talked with DISC & BRADMARK about working with their stuff
To make IMAGE's performance have no peer.
And we're still supporting IMAGE (though we think it's kind of tough)
So our users don't have anything to fear.
Then Alfredo thanked HP for all its work with DISC and Brad;
Brad and Terry also thought the plan was swell;
And they didn't think the concept of relationals was bad,
But we shouldn't have to jump to SQL.
Brad thought the best transition would be gradual and slow.
Alfredo said to have an open ear
To Steve Cooper and some other IMAGE experts whom we know
So that all the nice suggestions they could hear.
Every year, SIG IMAGE sent a few suggestions to HP
As to what to put in IMAGE that was new.
One of these, key item updates, on the list would always be
But HP would never want that thing to do.
Cooper said that, next to actions, HP's words speak very soft --
This commitment from HP I don't believe.
For I cannot say that changes have been implemented oft.
I'm concerned about unbundling -- thus spake Steve.
Now Fred White had written IMAGE and was sad, as you can guess.
He said the word "unbundling" was a lie.
IMAGE isn't like a product, but is part of FOS
And that's why you get it when HPs you buy.
But IMAGE, it has always been mistreated by HP
And I wouldn't like to think the end is near.
And I'm working with Alfredo, but in this, I speak for me,
'Cause if not for me, you wouldn't all be here.
And Wirt Atmar had a letter to the people who're in charge
Of the marketing of those HP machines.
The unbundling, he said, was a mistake, and it was large,
Since about the user, HP don't care beans.
It used to be that users, they came first in HP's thought,
And the vendors, then, were happy campers too;
To make pricing-based decisions -- that is not what HP ought!
Engineering plans are what HP should do.
Of the people at the meeting, many men agreed with Wirt
That from under them was being pulled the RUG.
People asked, Why is HP treating us vendors just like dirt?
If we've no time to adjust, our grave is dug!
And another thing was talked about by Larry Simonsen,
Now we're forced to buy HPs with SQL.
Then Steve Cooper was elected as the chairman once again.
I hope this whole affair will turn out well.