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Following are some of the comments to MicroImages during the last quarter exactly as written except for the [edit] alterations in [brackets] to keep them anonymous. Obviously many more comments are received by MicroImages by voice but cannot be reproduced here verbatim as quotes. Please note that these quotations are not edited from their original form in spelling, grammar, punctuation, etc.

from a FAX from an international representative on 28 November 1995. (using V5.10)
"A friend in [a government agency] told me that we should do much more advertisement of MIPS because of easy-to-use and lots of functions of integration of Vector/Raster/CAD/TIN. He bought a PC ARC a year ago, but nobody install. Box, though beautifully, are left on the floor over a year. Combination of MapInfo and MIPS is a following wind."
[beautiful boxes do make excellent door stops, and describing a product as a "following wind" is an elegant description from the polite Asian world.]

from a FAX from an international representative on 29 November 1995. (using V5.10)
"This week I had and have two parties from [a city] for a TNTmips demo. They checked MapInfo and thought MapInfo is not suitable for their purpose of geoprocessing. Cartographic data must be made and updated during their projects, TIN is available (not in MapInfo), Feature Mapping, DEM creation, Orthoimage capabilities, Raster can be handled, ..... and running on PC. One of the parties will use TNTmips in GIS projects by (government agencies) for southeast Asian countries."

from a FAX from an international representative on 5 December 1995. (using V5.20)
"Just a comment. People who saw a scroll of records (CB_SOILS) of a Tabular View of database tables of TNTmips 5.2ß said it is faster than the Windows version of ArcView 2. ArcView needs a workstation for fast scroll, the person said. Please complete the checkbox function that enables us to retrieve polygons in Display 2D soon. We have a possible win over ArcView."
[The requested function is in TNTmips 5.3 and TNTview 5.3 plus many other related new selection procedures not in ArcView 2.1.]

email from an international representative on 6 December 1995. (using V5.10)
[the context of this comment is the introduction to MicroImages of a new professional joining this representative organization after working on the ESRI staff as a senior analyst and participant in the team creating the Digital Chart of the World and with 11 years of experience working with Arc/Info.]
"[a name] is impressed by and excited by the opportunity to work with TNTmips. I introduce [a name] to you as she will now play a key role in communicating with MicroImages on behalf of [the representative]. Please join me in welcoming her." [We do!]

email from a FAX from an international representative on 6 December 1995. (using V5.10)
"It was gratifying that [a client] demonstrated his satisfaction as a new TNTmips client in this way. [He] has set up a GIS/RS program almost from scratch in an undeveloped and isolated part of the world. His task would have been far more difficult if were not for the outstanding quality of customer support provided by MI, which has also been an inspiration and model for my own business practices."

email from a U.S. client on 19 December 1995. (using V5.2)
"I just got my copy of 5.2 today and I am glad to see that you are doing your best on holding the stated upgrade cycle! I have been waiting patiently for ESRI's PC Arc/Info 3.5 only to get a vague statement that the fall date has been moved to 'early' 1996."

from a letter from a Taiwanese client on 29 December 1995. (using V4.80)
"I am [a name] from Taiwan, I used to work with [a name] at [a company] in 1992. During that year, you gave me lots of instruction on my job, particularly in the field of GIS research, which I applied to my work since then. I really appreciate the solid concepts and methodology infused by you and your company."
"with the goal of developing GIS continuously, I was supported by my present boss [a name] and have worked at the Hydraulic Research lab of [a university] since two years ago. So far we have successfully applied the MIPS package to the projects on 'Study on the Basin Runoff and Inundation Models for Gai-Yi Area (III)', our co-research government agency, [an agency name] also pays high regards to the powerful function built in the MIPS."
[some details skipped]
"I appreciate the technical support your company gave me during the course of this project. Thumbs up to [a MI software support engineer's name], who always responded to my request and impressed me with his outstanding performance and expertise. I would like to send this report to you and the fellows in MicroImages Co. Welcome for any comments on our report. And I look forward to working with you in the future." [as do we]

from a FAX from an Angola client on 9 January 1996. (using V5.20)
"The new demo SF TNTatlas CD-R is a smashing demonstration of the concept of how to present and distribute stacks of high quality interactive visual information."
"On the occasion of the turn of the year, I also wish to congratulate you and your team for the well deserved success crowned by MI's growth in 1995. Your team constitutes an example of the right way to develop complex specialist software products for a rapidly evolving universe of applications. Through each release of successive upgrades, MI manages to convey renewed enthusiasm directly to the end client like myself."

from a FAX from a Ugandan client on 5 January 1996. (using V5.10)
"Our lab is using TNTmips for some time now and we are rather satisfied with it. Therefore, we plan to buy a second TNTmips software package which we would like to use then for educational purposes since the system is more conformable, powerful and easy-to-learn than many other products on the market."

from email from a South African client on 9 January 1996. (using V5.20
"I would just like to say that I am extremely pleased to hear that SMI and MicroImages have come to some formal agreement to allow Atlas GIS files (.BNA and .AGF) to be directly imported into TNTmips. I truly believe that this is a strong relationship which will benefit both users of Atlas GIS and TNTmips. They are both very good packages and will start to place pressure on some of the larger GIS systems in the functionality that they provide."

from a FAX from a U.S. client on 16 January 1996. (using V5.20)
"The impetus for this [FAX] is our dissatisfaction with ESRI ArcView 2.1. ArcView does not handle multiple projections as seemlessly as TNTmips. We would like to use TNTview as a preferred front-end browser/query package. However, TNTview is missing some critical features when compared to ArcView 2.1. This request is to add these critical features to TNTview so we can provide it to our clients with data sets we generate. IN SHORT, WE WANT TO REPLACE ARCVIEW WITH TNTVIEW."
[The features requested were limited printing, interactive query tools, styles editor, import and export, and some text editor interfaces. All these items are planned for V5.30 and V5.40 of TNTview except for the text interfaces.]

from a FAX from a German client on 1 February 1996. (using V5.20
"I received new key on 31 Jan 96 via DHL. Thank you for quick reaction. The interface speedup and ability of real multitasking using W95 version are exciting"

from a FAX from a client in Kazakhstan on 1 February 1996. (using V5.20)
"Version 5.2 arrived safely at the end of December and installed without any problems."

from an international representative on 17 January 1996. (using V5.20)
"I haven't had any significant problems with V5.2 and now have it up and running on Windows 95 which I quite like and as you say is nice to use. I have been using TNTmips, MS Word plus other software and it seems to be multitasking quite nicely although it slows down the windows refresh rate considerably. This will be dependent upon the amount of RAM in the computer. I am quite happy with the speed and performance of TNTmips under the configuration I have. i.e. P5 at 66 Mhz and 16 Mb RAM in fact there is an improvement in the interface opening/closing speed which is significant. This will postpone my decision to upgrade to a P5/120 for a time. I will probably wait now until the entry level P6 is available which by the sounds of it will quadruple the speed from a P5/66?"
[The normal upgrade fee between V5.10 and V5.20 covered the cost of the application features added in that quarter. Thus, all clients received the W95 version without direct charge except for some of you who had an old black key and upgraded it for the $50 cost of the new replacement gray key. The net result of all this set forth clearly above is that this has saved many parties the money needed to upgrade their existing computer for a few more quarters.
MicroImages has not been provided with any opportunities for upgrading the software we use from W31 to W95 without direct charge. However, MicroImages is pleased when we can deliver this kind of result to our clients. We hope this successful transition to W95 and associated performance increase will be accepted by all as partial compensation for problems you might have experienced with our products.]

from a FAX from a German client on 2 February 1996. (using V5.20)
"Also I would really be interested in becoming a beta site for your beta versions of TNT. Is this possible [yes]?
"Say G'day from OZ to everyone, I really enjoyed the user group [AUW8 meeting]."

from email from an Australian client on 9 February 1996. (using V5.20)
"Thanks for the assistance in getting the Windows 95 version working, It is very much faster that the Windows 3.1 and NT versions."
[It is likely that the NT version is now equally fast but his comparison was made with V5.10 running under NT.]

from a FAX from an international representative on 16 February 1996. (using V5.10)
"I have changed my systems into Windows NT. TNTmips v5.2 is under heavy use and is working OK so far. I am also still working on two Atlas projects, so I am going to order TNTatlases in the near future. We have come also into point to move all the soil map production into TNTmips in [a country]."

from email from a U.S. client on 20 February 1996. (using V5.20)
"The marine science agencies have a particular interest in our applications of TNTmips because of the lack of versatile software to process their image data (video, sonar, and other versatile data). The work we have done with the various graduate students and their projects in the [a name] slough, along with the new side-scan SML program we developed for some offshore projects, has generated additional interest in this capability of molding TNTmips to the project instead of vice-versa."
"One current interesting project using TNTmips involves a group of 4 graduate students and 2 faculty who are currently in Antarctica testing the side-scan SML and TNTmips in an offshore bottom project that utilizes side-scan imaging sonar, a bottom profiler, GPS, and underwater video from scuba divers."
[the SML referred to here is the Spatial Manipulation Language built into TNTmips.]

from email from an Australian client on 28 February 1996. (using V5.20)
[The following message was received after several days of back and forth email to the software support team trying to determine why a TNTmips process continued to fail in approximately the same place. The failure could not be duplicated by the MicroImages staff.]
"I've just got my computer setup again after about three days of stuffing around and I feel that the problem I had is directly related to the above error. Your right about it being an internal problem but it wasn't a bad SIMM. After getting a few more errors like the one above and getting them more repeatedly, it degenerated into rebooting itself for no reason. It quickly degenerated further into rebooting itself every minute or so. I thought that this looked like a virus but couldn't find one so I reformatted the HD but the problem still continued. Ended up picking up the computer and heard something banging around inside of it. All this was caused by the cooling fan for the CPU which had fallen off!!!"
[Complex software challenges healthy hardware, but it's a real headache on sick equipment. This also is not an isolated example of the types of non-MicroImages problems addressed by the software support team at MicroImages.]

from a FAX from a Mali client on 14 March 1996.(using V5.20)
"Thanks for your suggestions in your fax of March 7. I tried out all of them, but to no avail, however. I finally figured out that the culprit is the Ram Doubler programme, which I installed not so long ago. Deactivating Ram Doubler in the SYSTEM.INI file solves the display problem. As for the lock problem, that was indeed just a question of unlocking the project file with the File Maintenance module. Everything is back in order now, but I've gone back to using stripped down setup (without the NDW shell) for TNTmips sessions and another one for the regular office work. I will also follow your advice of updating the Number Nine graphics driver. The problem with Number Nine is that their hardware is usually well ahead of the corresponding software; that board has given me problems before, all related to the driver."
"We are looking into moving up TNTmips (and a projected purchase of Datamine) to a Pentium Pro Windows NT workstation, which should take care of some of the hassles related to the old Windows and all the little add-ons one needs to increase performance in Windows."
[The RAM Doubler referred to here is the version for the PC and Windows. The poor results reported should not be confused with MicroImages' continued recommendation of the use of RAM Doubler for the MacOS platforms. In a recent review in PC Magazine all RAM expansion software was shown to be of limited, and sometimes negative value, with Windows 95.]

from a FAX from a German client on 18 March 1996. (using V5.20)
"First let me tell you that after using TNTMIPS for about two months I am convinced having bought the adequate software package to set up my business as a freelance in GIS."

from email from a U.S. client on 27 March 1996. (using V5.20)
"We're using TNT MIPS 5.2 on windows 3.1. First let me say how much I like the product. Very easy to use but very powerful. I am quite impressed. We recently moved from a way old version and the new version works very well. It took a while to figure out how to get it to work on our old Novell netware system but it does work fine. I have one workstation running off CD and the others running on the file server. As I said, it works well except I have run into one problem."
[This email continues on to relate a problem related to the location of fonts. This client has taken over an academic installation designed, assembled, and sold to his predecessor 4 to 5 years ago by MicroImages. The installation provided to them and still used consists of multiple 486 computers of 33 megahertz with only 8 megabytes of memory. This new client who assumed responsibility for the installation and courses had extensive previous experience using Arc/Info.]

from email response from the same U.S. client on 28 March 1996. (using V5.20)
"Thanks very much for the speedy and professional reply. I knew there was a good reason we bought this product."
[MicroImages works hard to try to provide such service to all its clients. Unfortunately some problems and requests are much harder to solve than others, but none of them are forgotten.]