Justification for Release of Mac OS 8 at Sunnyvale
The following presentation was brought before the Lockheed
Martin Standards Committee. If you have anything to add to this page, please contact
Paul.
Agenda
Mac OS 8 Survey Statistics
- 16 Desktop Support Personnel Contacted.
- 106 Macintoshes evaluating OS 8 in survey.
- 38 were installed by ìUsersî.
- All Desktop Support and User personnel felt stability was improved
by this upgrade.
- 43 machines were ìClean Installsî.
- A Clean Install of 7.6.1 was felt to be less stable than a OS
8 clean install by 15 support personnel.
- A Clean Install of 7.6.1 was felt to be less stable than OS 8
(clean or dirty install) by 13 support personnel.
Mac OS 8 Stability Issues
- A Clean Install of 7.6.1 was felt to be as stable as a clean install
of OS 8 by 1 support person
- 105 of 106 users would not accept a refit to 7.6.1 because
- Mac OS 8 was more stable
- More productive time resulting from fewer crashes
- 80 of 106 Users felt that the capability to only have a single
application crash (leaving the others running) resulted in more productive time and
fewer lost documents.
- 91 of 106 users felt the Multitasking feature of OS 8 increased
their productivity
Mac OS 8 Productivity Issues
- 90 of 106 users felt that the improved GUI (popup menus, exploding
folders, Sticky menus, Command-Delete, Control Strip, etc.) increased their productivity
- 75 of 106 users felt that the Desk Picture capability improved
their attitude when looking at their computer screen
- 15 of 16 Desktop Support Personnel reported a decrease in the
number of support calls on properly installed OS 8 Machines (the exception reported
the same amount of calls).
Mac OS 8 Availability
- Mac OS 8 is site licensed to Lockheed-Martin.
- None of the desktop support personnel was satisfied with OS 8
not being available at all.
- All of the Desktop support personnel would be happy with Access
to OS 8 being on a restricted basis (Desktop Support Personnel only).
- To ensure proper installation 15 of 16 of the Desktop support
personnel did not want it available to All Users to install whenever or wherever
they felt.
- Only one of the Desktop Support Personnel was willing to await
the release of OS 8.1 before release of the OS.
Mac OS 8 - Other Features
- Personal Web Sharing
- File Sharing over IP (AppleShare over IP or AppleTalk)
- Upcoming features in OS 8.1
- Printing via IP instead of AppleTalk
- ARA 3.0 Client
- OT 1.3
- Support for Windows 95 long filenames
- Support for large drives (>4Gb) on PC servers
- Support for HFS Plus (better usage of large drive space)
- Support for DVD drives
- Apple Data Detectors (auto recognition of URLís)
Mac OS 8 - Other Issues
- 3 of 15 In House developed applications showed problems with OS
8.
- Promis incompatibility with OS 8.
- Enclosure problem has been identified and a fix is available,
ONE line of additional code in Promis will fix the OS 8 problem. OS 8.1 does not
have this problem
- Formtek and PreStar
- I will work with the groups having these problems and report bugs
to be fixed in OT 1.3 that will ship with OS 8.1, and possibly be available prior
to OS 8.1 shipment. Coordination started on 10/27/97 with Formtek.
Mac OS 8 - Conclusions
- Mac OS 8 is a more stable OS than prior releases.
- Clean versus Dirty installs do not seem to provide a large difference
in stability.
- 105 of 106 Users feel more productive using OS 8 than 7.6.1
- Fewer support calls with OS 8 installed (less cost to support
after proper installation.)
- Desktop Support personnel prefer having OS 8 available for system
upgrades.
- OS 8 should be available to Desktop Support personnel for installation.
- Time to install averaged 30 minutes not 120.
Mac OS 8 Recommendations
- Mac OS 8 available to Desktop Support Personnel on a Central Server
via a password.
- Install Mac OS 8 on an as needed basis, not as a global upgrade.
- Implement a process where In House applications are made aware
of pending OS upgrades to look to the future, rather than wait till there here to
find out there is a problem.
- Release of Mac OS 8 will allow Sunnyvale users to receive the
same benefits as users at other LM sites.
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