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From: t...@masscomp.UUCP (Andy Tannenbaum)
Newsgroups: net.bugs.uucp,net.unix-wizards
Subject: honeydanber uucp available
Message-ID: <616@masscomp.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 14-Feb-85 11:23:59 EST
Article-I.D.: masscomp.616
Posted: Thu Feb 14 11:23:59 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 15-Feb-85 04:21:24 EST
Distribution: net
Organization: Masscomp - Westford, MA
Lines: 65
To arms, to arms.
Sometime around the first of the year, without fanfare,
honeydanber uucp was made publicly available by AT&T.
Honeydanber uucp is the uucp system that many people inside the Bell
System use, and that many of us outside have been waiting for. It's
named honeydanber after it's three main proponoents, Peter Honeyman,
Brian Redman, and Dave Nowitz, all one-time employees of the one-time
Bell System.
Anyway, honeydanber has been released by AT&T as:
Basic Network Utilities Package Release 1.0
Here are the basic fees:
$5000 first CPU source license fee
$1000 sublicense fee
$250 per sublicensee binary fee
BNU is a real nice package, it's basically uucp with all the nits
preened out of it. Everything is automatic, everything works, it has
the features you want, mail and files do not disappear, failures are
reported to the appropriate parties, efficiency hacks are all in
place, everything is configurable, it's just a win, trust me.
(BNU also has cu and ct which use the same comm routines as uucp,
finally. It might have other goodies...)
Anyway, the prices are totally outlandish. Let's say a fledgeling
UNIX startup has 1000 machines running uucp in the field. That's
$250,000 we have to pay AT&T to upgrade our customer base. It's
really not practical for us to unbundle uucp, since a functional uucp
already exists. We can't support two differnet uucp's.
If I'm not mistaken, AT&T only charges $250 (tops) for a UNIX binary!
I (and the money people here at Masscomp) think that AT&T should
charge a much smaller per sublicense fee for BNU, if they charge one
at all. We think that about $25/system is right. Realize, this is an
upgrade to an existing software system which is currently distributed
without additional cost as part of all available UNIXes.
Masscomp really wants to distribute BNU, but we can't afford it, our
customers can't afford it and I don't think the story is any different
at other UNIX vendors. It would be a shame to see honeydanber uucp
just lie there and rot because of ignorant losing pricing practices.
What to do? Call the AT&T UNIX Software Info Hotline,
(800) 828-UNIX (828-8649) and ask about BNU and tell your account rep
that you want it but that the price is much too high. Ask them what
you can do about it. Write them letters. You don't have to be a
purchasing agent for your company to call them, you can do it
yourself.
I want honeydanber to see the light of day.
The rep at AT&T who talked to me is Steve Vuksanovitch, you tell the
operator what company you work for and you might get him or someone
else. If you want to send them snail mail, the address is:
AT&T Technologies
Box 25000
Greensboro, NC 27420
Andy Tannenbaum Masscomp Westford, MA (617) 692-6200 x274
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From: s...@gatech.UUCP (Gene Spafford)
Newsgroups: net.bugs.uucp,net.unix-wizards
Subject: Re: honeydanber uucp available
Message-ID: <12074@gatech.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 18-Feb-85 15:44:24 EST
Article-I.D.: gatech.12074
Posted: Mon Feb 18 15:44:24 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 19-Feb-85 02:12:41 EST
References: <616@masscomp.UUCP>
Reply-To: s...@gatech.UUCP (Gene Spafford)
Distribution: net
Organization: The Clouds Project, School of ICS, Georgia Tech
Lines: 48
In article <6...@masscomp.UUCP> t...@masscomp.UUCP (Andy Tannenbaum) writes:
>To arms, to arms.
Damn right.
>Here are the basic fees (for the BNU package -- uucp + goodies):
>
>$5000 first CPU source license fee
>$1000 sublicense fee
>$250 per sublicensee binary fee
>
>Anyway, the prices are totally outlandish. Let's say a fledgeling
>UNIX startup has 1000 machines running uucp in the field. That's
>$250,000 we have to pay AT&T to upgrade our customer base. It's
>really not practical for us to unbundle uucp, since a functional uucp
>already exists. We can't support two differnet uucp's.
>
I called AT&T to find out what the story was for academic institutions.
I spoke to someone involved with educational licensing, Gertrude Williams.
She informed me that BNU is available to educational institutions for "only"
$1000 per machine. Our System V source license FOR THE WHOLE CAMPUS was
only $800!!
This isn't the first problem with AT&T and Unix that we've had. As far
as I'm concerned, I wouldn't recommend that any academic institution
run System V unless they had no other choice at all. We'll certainly
continue to run BSD on our Vaxen -- the pricing more than makes up for
any perceived deficiencies compared to System V.
>What to do? Call the AT&T UNIX Software Info Hotline,
>(800) 828-UNIX (828-8649) and ask about BNU and tell your account rep
>that you want it but that the price is much too high. Ask them what
>you can do about it. Write them letters. You don't have to be a
>purchasing agent for your company to call them, you can do it
>yourself.
If you're at an educational institution, you can call Gertrude
Williams, her number is (919) 279-6765. Please DO NOT abuse the lady
-- she doesn't set policy, and she's tried to be as helpful as she
can. She will relay comments to her management, however. Maybe if
enough people call and register complaints, something will get done. I
certainly hope so.
--
Gene "6 months and counting" Spafford
The Clouds Project, School of ICS, Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332
CSNet: Spaf @ GATech ARPA: Spaf%GATech.CSNet @ CSNet-Relay.ARPA
uucp: ...!{akgua,allegra,hplabs,ihnp4,linus,seismo,ulysses}!gatech!spaf