Very Computer

Quote:

> .....Lot's of comments. DELETED...

It seems that everyone is always complaining about WRS. I think VxWorks is
a great product and the support is generally really good. Over the years,
we have run into a few issues, but if you characterize the problem and report
it, they fix it or give a workaround. What else can you expect?

You have to understand, a systems product like VxWorks is the hardest of
all types of software products to support. Customers have infinite
degrees of freedom to expose problems in the software. When was the
last time YOU shipped a sophisticated product with NO bugs. Bugs are a
fact of life.

As far as posting the source code to the internet, this is stupid. WRS
is a business not a charity. As a paying customer, ideally, I would like
to have the full source code available. However, the main problem is support.
If you have customers making changes, its impossible to support the code.

I think WRS is a great company and has added lots of the value to the
embedded development world. VxWorks is a robust RTOS that has performed
very well for us.

Regards,
Jeff

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jeffrey R. Szczepanski
Xerox Engineering Systems
300 Main Street                                

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Where there's smoke, there's fire.  You don't hear me complaining anymore.  I
don't want to jeopordize my reputation with WRS because what
ever support they can give, I really need !!

Quote:> I think VxWorks is
> a great product and the support is generally really good.

Rah, Rah, Rah.  Go, Go, Go.  Many thanks for begging the question.

Quote:> Over the years,
> we have run into a few issues, but if you characterize the problem and report
> it, they fix it or give a workaround. What else can you expect?

The availability of a peer engineer with whom to discourse when I've
doneeverything I can think of and the behavior of my system calls is still a
complete mystery.

Quote:> You have to understand, a systems product like VxWorks is the hardest of
> all types of software products to support. Customers have infinite
> degrees of freedom to expose problems in the software.

This should be your core argument, as apologist.  There are many layersand
packages now, and the perverse and byzantine reasoning of us firmware
engineers defies the vision of the designers who tack these packages onto
the base system.

Quote:> When was the
> last time YOU shipped a sophisticated product with NO bugs. Bugs are a
> fact of life.

Last year - 6 tasks, 3 months, deeply embedded control network interface.VxWorks
was rock solid for what I did.  Only the 3rd party drivers were a
little flaky.  I stuck to the garden path, using techniques and models that
are proven (semaphores, message queues, standard interrupt mgmt).
Fortunately I never had to send out any mail or serve up java-based web
pages, because this is just the kind of new (for me) ground I hate to plow.

Quote:> As far as posting the source code to the internet, this is stupid. WRS
> is a business not a charity. As a paying customer, ideally, I would like
> to have the full source code available. However, the main problem is support.
> If you have customers making changes, its impossible to support the code.

At GE Medical systems, about 8 or 9 years back, we had a source codelicense.  We
had one really outstanding software engineer on the case full
time, and he definitely helped find bugs using the source (Jim Foris where
are you?).   The source code was not easily decipherable then.  No doubt
it is much improved or WRS would have never made it so far.

Quote:> I think WRS is a great company and has added lots of the value to the
> embedded development world.

Rah, Rah, Rah.  Go, Go, Go.   Actually I agree, but I couldn't help alittle raz
here.  In my opinion, they redefined embedded cross-development
with network capability, their shell and NFS on the target made me
much more productive over the years, the symbol table and dynamic
load/unload have also been productivity boosts.  I have also worked
projects with Microtec (VRTX, X-RAY) and ISI (PSOS) and their
support is just as problematical.  They have their problems too.

Quote:> VxWorks is a robust RTOS that has performed
> very well for us.

VxWorks has performed well, I agree.  Wind River Systems has performed"as well as
can be expected".  This is the real world.  Not everyone can be
a Hewlett-Packard.

Quote:> Regards,
> Jeff

Nothing personal, Jeff.  Just trying to have some fun.  My real complaintsall
revolve around the behavior of NT.  I have now gone from Tornado/NT
on MVME, to Tornado/Solaris with MIPS target, and now I'm back on
Tornado/NT on X86 targets.  The first round was with Tornado 1.0, and it was
hell.  I was astounded at the difficulty of trying to debug multiple tasks.  Then
the Solaris version was much better behaved, even with the new Launcher
GUI.  Now, I'm back on NT, and I have to agree with all the criticisms of the
other authors in this thread.  It costs time and energy just dealing with the
target server and the de*.  I have a subcontractor delivering a key
software system.  They were new to VxWorks, and gave it their best shot,
before putting wrappers around all the task and system calls, so they could
build for NT or for VxWorks, and they can use MSVC de* for most
of the debugging.  It takes all kinds, eh?

all the best,
c__

=================  May all your goats be free of fleas,
=================  and my your camels never spit.

says...

Quote:

>> .....Lot's of comments. DELETED...

>It seems that everyone is always complaining about WRS.

I wonder why?

Quote:>I think VxWorks is a great product and the support is generally
>really good.

VxWorks is OK - but it is the PC based Tornado IDE that is crap. Bear
in mind that much of the underlying software i.e. the compiler, linker
etc is actually public domain - as is some of VxWorks itself - and you
really do have to start asking yourself what you are paying WRS all
that money for.

Quote:>Over the years, we have run into a few issues, but if you
>characterize the problem and report it, they fix it or give
>a workaround. What else can you expect?

I've been using it off and on for 6 six years - the same *y bugs
are still there!

Quote:>You have to understand, a systems product like VxWorks is the
>hardest of all types of software products to support. Customers
>have infinite degrees of freedom to expose problems in the
>software. When was the last time YOU shipped a sophisticated
>product with NO bugs. Bugs are a fact of life.

Some of the bugs in the PC Tornado IDE are rather basic. Don't forget
you can compare it (the PC IDE) to Microsoft products directly. WRS
just ain't in the same league - and that's not because Microsoft are
particularly good.

Quote:>As far as posting the source code to the internet, this is stupid. WRS
>is a business not a charity. As a paying customer, ideally,
>I would like to have the full source code available. However,
>the main problem is support. If you have customers making changes,
>its impossible to support the code.

What about the Free Software Foundation's products? That is, after all,
 what you are probably using to compile and link your code. It doesn't
cost a penny - it's all public domain - bug fixes are done by
enthusiastic "amateurs".

Quote:>I think WRS is a great company and has added lots of the value to the
>embedded development world.

Yeah. Right.

Quote:>VxWorks is a robust RTOS that has performed very well for us.

But is it really worth the money compared to other similar products?

--

Quote:

>It seems that everyone is always complaining about WRS. I think VxWorks is
>a great product and the support is generally really good. Over the years,
>we have run into a few issues, but if you characterize the problem and report
>it, they fix it or give a workaround. What else can you expect?

It is a good product, though I don't have much positive to say about the
Tornado evolution from VxWorks (might be OK if you lack memory in the
target - otherwise, I like the old stuff better).

Quote:>You have to understand, a systems product like VxWorks is the hardest of
>all types of software products to support. Customers have infinite
>degrees of freedom to expose problems in the software. When was the
>last time YOU shipped a sophisticated product with NO bugs. Bugs are a
>fact of life.

It is exactly the difficulty of support and the tight integration with
end product features which makes source code availability so important.

Quote:>As far as posting the source code to the internet, this is stupid. WRS
>is a business not a charity. As a paying customer, ideally, I would like
>to have the full source code available. However, the main problem is support.
>If you have customers making changes, its impossible to support the code.

I wouldn't say that it would be stupid to post source, but it's clearly
impractical as long as WRS intends to keep making money from the product.

The argument around customer code changes is a perpetual red herring argument
against distributing source.  If the customer is motivated to change the
source, I'd venture that they will know what they are doing more often than
not, at least when making deliberate functional changes.  And you cannot make
deliberate functional changes without having source.

Rare is the supplier support organization which can cope with something
as complex as an elaborate embedded kernel environment with networking
and all the extra bells and whistles.  If one is working on a compressed
development schedule, one cannot depend solely upon the supplier to find and
resolve problems, at least in my experience.

The main problem is conventional-wisdom attitude (I am pulling a punch here)
on the part of suppliers, and a lack of backbone on the part of customers.
If you want source code to be available at a reasonable price, you are going
to have to insist upon it, and not relent when someone either offers you a no-
source-code product, or offers source only at an prohibitive price.

The fact is that embedded component software is not the same as desktop
applications.  It is not sold the same way, and it should not be bought the
same way.

If one has a large-volume or long-lifetime product, it is very dangerous to
incorporate no-source-code purchased components into the product.  Source code
is your only reliable defense against the supplier dying, losing interest in
an superseded product, having an almost-OK product but useless support, or
being acquired by someone who cannot be dealt with.  Anyone who has not
experienced at least two of the above, raise your hands.  Source code is your
best access for critical functional changes necessitated by unique
characteristics of your product.

Considerations for a modest-budget modest-lifetime production support fixture
or laboratory application may be different, but if you are going to
incorporate component software into a serious product, the source code
question needs to be considered and decided with great care.

Quite agree. Especially since these tools generally have lagged behind
the latest version by a significant amount.

Quote:> >Over the years, we have run into a few issues, but if you
> >characterize the problem and report it, they fix it or give
> >a workaround. What else can you expect?

> I've been using it off and on for 6 six years - the same *y bugs
> are still there!

My experience is the same - bugs reported do not get fixed. Heck, I've
even sent in source code patches for some stuff that is still wrong
over three years later.

Quote:> >software. When was the last time YOU shipped a sophisticated
> >product with NO bugs. Bugs are a fact of life.

Yes, but I'm expected to fix mine in a timely manner.

--

National Center For Atmospheric Research        lokkar borni under sole-vegg
Box 3000 Boulder, CO 80307-3000                 Gj?'i med sitt shinn
303-497-2057                                    jagar borni inn.

VxWorks Greetings!

  As if you thought I could resist commenting on this thread... ;-)

Quote:>         In the spirit of Mike's lead, I think it would be interesting to=
>  work up an approach in which Wind River could provide source code to=
>  interested parties under some circumstances to aid in the process of=
>  getting things fixed. I'm not sure about the process of putting source
on=
>  the Web, but I would think that there is merit to making source code=
>  available to interested parties under appropriate non-disclosure and=
>  non-compete agreements.=20

I tend to agree with Joel.  If WRS is suffering from the same shortage of
qualified engineering staff that most of the rest of us are, then we have
little hope of major improvments/bug fixes coming out of WRS any time
in the near future.  Geez, they just brought out Tornado 1.0.1 not too
many months ago.  That was supposed to have the new SENS network stack.
But, it wasn't ready and is just now starting to see the light of day
some 6+ months late.  This doesn't bode well for major upgrades like
the DosFS.

If WRS wants to improve user satisfaction, they've got to start considering
investing some of those record profits they're crowing about into some
serious subcontracting to fix the major flaws in the O/S.  SPARTA,
for one, would be willing to stick our hand up for the DosFS.

  My feelings about WRS's Tornado environment are well known to most of you.
But, in fairness, I have been running a "hybrid" envrionment as of late
that combines most of the good parts of the Tornado approach (yes, I
do believe that there are a couple of good features of Tornado) with
the tried-and-true 5.2 features that most of my designs depend on.  The
thing that consistently surprises me is that many of SPARTA's real-time
training course students (the courses are entirely based on
VxWorks/Tornado, but WRS doesn't like us to call it "VxWorks training" ;-)
who have been using Tornado have no idea of the existence of any of
the 5.2 features.  They just assume that the O/S can't do certain
things because they can't see the features from the damn WindShell!

  This concerns me greatly.  If you could define away a whole set
of bugs and support issues by simply not telling folks how to get to
the features, you could save a butt-load of money.  Is the 5.2
configuration going away?  I'll lay you odds that it's not far off
in the plans.  Remember, you're not paranoid if someone really is out
to get you ;-).

  VxWorks is basically a good system.  Unfortunately, there are
lots of quirks that make it tough to work with (gdb not connecting,
etc.)  It's time that WRS apply some serious effort to improve to
*REAL* product (i.e., the RTOS on the TARGET) by fixing the many
things that are clearly broken (e.g., DosFS, NFS, FTP, etc.).  If
that means subcontracting the work, then do it (lord knows you've
got the profits rolling in by your own admission).  There are lots
of interested and talented parties out here that are willing and
able to help.  There's nothing wrong in VxWorks that can't be fixed
by the judicious use of subcontractors.

  BTW, in testing the highly-touted WindView the other day, I found
that it consistently missed the state transition to one of my ISRs
unless I put a big fat for loop in the middle of the ISR to slow it
down!  This was on a 25MHz MVME-162LX using 1.0.1.  So much for
the use of WindView as a software logic analyzer.

Regards,
---------------------------------------------------------------------
|Michael E. Anderson        | Voice -> 703 448 1683 x235            |
|Chief Engineer             | FAX   -> 703 893 5494                 |

|___________________________|_______________________________________|
|             SPARTA, Inc.              |                           |
|     /\\     C4I Operation             |"Software Development is   |
|    ///\\    7926 Jones Branch Drive   | like making a baby...     |
|   /////\\   Suite 900                 | You can't make a baby in  |
|  /////  \\  McLean, VA 22102          | one month by impregnating |
| / \\\\\  \\ 703-448-0210              | nine women.               |
| \  \\\\\ //                           |                           |
|  \  //////                            | Some things just take     |
|   \//////   SPARTA                    | time."                    |
|    \////    Pride In Performance      |                           |
|     \//     --------------------      |                           |
---------------------------------------------------------------------