"Dimitri" == Dimitri Vulis <dlv@bwalk.dm.com> writes:
Dimitri> (No cryptorelevance, but neither is anything else on this Dimitri> list anymore) Ditto. I've tried to apply some Java relevance though. Dimitri> abostick@netcom.com (Alan Bostick) writes:
to portability...what the world might have looked like for the past 15 years has the UCSD p-system succeeded instead of MS-DOS)
What a horrifying thought! UCSD p-system actually made MS-DOS look good.
Dimitri> My recollection is that when IBM first started selling IBM Dimitri> PC, they offered a choice of (at least) 3 operating systems Dimitri> right from the start: UCSD p-system, CP/M-86 or PC-DOS. IBM Dimitri> didn't do anything to prompte PC-DOS over the other two. It Dimitri> won fair and square in the marketplace because the other two Dimitri> were even worse crap. (Later versions of CP/M-86 got much Dimitri> better.) This is half incorrect. PC DOS was released with a lead time of about 9 months prior to the release of the other O/Ses. This was enough to give it a market share it has never looked back on. There was plenty of speculation in PC Magazine and Byte that this was *exactly* what IBM intended all along. It helped that the alternatives were delivered as virtual cripples with no support software as well. The P-System released for IBM PCs was less functional than the Apple ][ version that ran on 64 or 128k with bank switching, even by the time of DOS 2.0. About the only application it ever really had was Context MBA which was quickly overtaken by Lotus 1-2-3 & company. I wrote three disk device drivers for the Apple ][ UCSD P-System based on documentation of dubious origin, and hated every second of it. Much of the interface was hidden, and (on a 6502 remember) reserved all of the precious 0 page for its own use. It was a half-interesting idea, but definitely in the same class with PC-DOS -- How Not to Write an Operating System. The Java relevance would be that given the current lead in marketing Sun has, even if a technically superior solution arose right now, it might have enough of a disadvantage in lead to never catch up and become popular. Technically superior products don't always win, look at MS DOS/Windows/NT/95 and VMS, albeit from opposite ends of the technical superiority spectrum. -- steve@miranova.com baur Unsolicited commercial e-mail will be proofread for $250/hour. Andrea Seastrand: For your vote on the Telecom bill, I will vote for anyone except you in November.