🚀 go-pugleaf

    Date: Thursday, October 19, 1989  4:20pm (CDT)
    From: gem.mps.ohio-state.edu!sunybcs!gort.cs.Buffalo.EDU!kumard at tut.cis.ohio-state.edu  (Deepak Kumar)
    Subject: Re:  Explorer release > 4.1
    
    	Why don't the TI people read this group and answer???
    	TI promised at IJCAI that Release 6 will be shipped latest
    	by the end of september!! Well....

We do, or at least I do.  I'm not official, but I try to answer anything
I can.  According to my internal sources, Rel 6 started shipping last
week.  Below is my reply to the original question (I had mailed it
directly to him).

    Date: Thursday, October 19, 1989  9:03am (CDT)
    From: Bjorn Victor <Victor at john-jameson.docs.uu.se>
    Subject: Explorer release > 4.1
    
    Lately, I've noticed on this list that people are discussing release 5
    and 6.  This finally makes me ask: Is release 5 or 6 released?  If so,
    when?  If not so, does anybody know when either is planned?

Release 6 started shipping last week.
    
    Obviously, the Swedish branch of Texas Instruments has closed down their
    Explorer group, so I can't hope of answers from there.  The last I heard
    from them was that release 5 would be for microExplorers only, but I
    doubt it.  (We only have Explorer Is, I'm sorry to say).

Why "obviously"?  Anyway, release 5 was indeed microExplorer-only, as
was 4.0 (4.1 was the release for proper Explorers).  I think it was just
stabilisation of the microExplorer stuff;  many of the changes were
back-patched to 4.1 for regular Explorers.  Release 6.0 is a common
release for all platforms.
    
    Please tell me how things work in the US.  Have you received later
    releases than 4.1 for Explorer Is?  Do you get subsequent patches on a
    regular basis?  (The last patch tape I got was 3.2).  Do you get
    informed of existing patches, or do you call/write somewhere to get such
    info?

I really don't know how customers handle things, since I'm a former
developer who's nosy enough to band-transfer new releases directly from
Austin (they share our Ethernet).  The support hotline number used to be
(512) 250 6179 and may still be;  I don't know how to dial that from
Sweden.  You may have to call them for patches, but new releases should
be shipped to anyone with a support contract (or whatever it's called).
    
    "Please Santa, I want a CLOS implementation and an X11 server and a
    faster filesystem and a ...."

Release 6 includes CLOS, an X11 server, CLX, CLUE, CLCS, and other
things.  (The filesystem is still the same, though.)  They work pretty
well -- I've been using this band for some months and use X, CLOS, and
CLUE regularly.  Oh, by the way, these are not official announcements,
I'm just a developer-turned-user with a penchant for answering
questions.

Paul Fuqua                     pf@csc.ti.com
                               {smu,texsun,cs.utexas.edu,rice}!ti-csl!pf
Texas Instruments Computer Science Center
PO Box 655474 MS 238, Dallas, Texas 75265