Nicholas Parsons wrote:
I thought that the X window system had started as a research project at MIT. So I wonder when and how did it die???
The way I learned it, the MIT project was called "W", that being the command to start the "windowing system". Based on the research, they figured out where the technical issues were and redesigned it from bottom up. Of course, the new one was 'one better than W', hence 'X'. (It may be an urban myth, but I'll keep it until a better one comes around.) In the X11R3/4 days, the whole system was pretty heavy in terms of necessary resources. I remember doing evals during that time & all the 'experts' said X was going away. Of course, the emphasis was on thin clients, and no one wanted to part with their local copy of [shudder] Excel.