-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 James Knott wrote:
G T Smith wrote:
I think, if you check the history, that Windows was included with DOS, when Microsoft told the vendors that if they wanted DOS, they had to include Windows. Soon almost every new computer came with Windows, with other OSs locked out.
Nope (at least not in the UK) IBM were the first big intel based PC manufacturer and accidentally shot themselves in one foot by effectively destroying the market for the AIX based RS 6000 series, and by providing a relatively open hardware standard they shot themselves in the other foot by opening the door for IBM clones (which eventually dominated the market). ... Before this intel PC manufacturers such as North Star,Apricot, Sirius, Brain etc were quite modest in size (and their names are probably long forgotten) Even though they ran variants of DOS, CP/M or p-code their machines had major compatibility issues with each other. DOS and Windows were originally two distinct products. Windows 1, Windows 2 and Windows 3.0 were GUIs that you optionally purchased that ran on top of MSDOS,PCDOS or whatever, much like the way that X can run on top of a shell (CP/M IIRC never had such a GUI front end). They competed against stuff like GEM (Windows was not the only GUI at time). For some reason X was not ported to DOS. M$ had options in a Unix like PC OS (Xenix I think), but it never made any real impact, (at time most small systems people regarded *nix as obscure and obtuse and would not touch it with a bargepole). Windows 3.0 was the first really popular intel PC based GUI, and swept all before it (as Apple were doing in the Motorola world). Windows 2 was usable and 1 IIRC was rubbish. DOS based IBM based machines had been around for some time before Windows 3.0 was launched alongside OS/2 with IBMs second generation of PCs. OS/2 failed, Windows 3 succeeded, M$ abandoned (or was thrown off) the OS/2 ship and the rest is history. (I still remember the scramble to port DOS based apps to Windows 3.0, as not even M$ expected the level of success that this would have). M$ took the opportunity this offered relatively late, the two product lines were kind of integrated into Windows 95 a couple of years later which is really when the bundling took off.
I first used a PC after working with VAX/VMS on a VAX 11/780. It was a bit of a come down.
I first used a PC 30 years ago when 16K RAM machine was a *big* PC and 8in floppy drive was a small drive :-) .. In many ways the mainframe/mini experience when it came was a bit frustrating... Sorry folks this has wondered way OT... - -- ============================================================================== I have always wished that my computer would be as easy to use as my telephone. My wish has come true. I no longer know how to use my telephone. Bjarne Stroustrup ============================================================================== -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with SUSE - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iEYEARECAAYFAkm818QACgkQasN0sSnLmgL4IACg8kaptPI6HbqwD+JzMM4n2TZY /OwAnAzy2mauYqYL8kgunDT6iAPm9RNy =0ki6 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org