Oh sweet!

I just started a job as a Multimedia and VR Consultant, working most of the time in a lab full of completely stacked dual G5 powermacs.

Now I need to talk my boss into getting at least a single seat license for me to play with. Visions of midnight cluster runs lashed up to the Onyx4 Cave system next door are running through my head (can you also tell that today was my first working in that lab? Silly me thought the G5 iMac in the cube ghetto was fast!)

I swear today is like Christmas!

I also thought that Digitool were on their way out. MCL was a very sweet system on Mac OS9 and earlier and not too expensive either.

But it seems Digitool have been either too lazy or under-resourced to really make a go of it in the Mac OSX world. Which is a real shame because they used to have a very nice product.

However, it seems that MCL 5.0 was constructed by doing the very least they needed to in order to make MCL 4.? "OSX native". I for one will NOT be paying $525 for 5.1 when I can get SBCL or CMUCL for free.

I would need to have used 5.1 for at least a month with no session time restrictions and been extremely satisfied, before I would be prepared to pay a penny for it.

I think they need to lower their prices and give us something that means that programming in MCL is substantially more productive than when using, a free system such as say, EMACS+SLIME+SBCL/CMUCL.

I think Digitool really have to re-think their pricing and demo strategy.

Dave, I think you are a bit harsh on MCL itself. For some it is the tool of choice for lisp on Mac. Much of the hassle comes from Digitool who seem averse to communicating publically. You may be right about the pricing model, it certainly cannot help new people climb on board. Perhaps the move to Intel will be a challenge that MCL rises to and comes back to really shine. Wouldn't it be useful is Apple themselves took MCL back under their wing (but I can't see the taking any interest).