From: brian%jaguar.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Brian Sturgill)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
Subject: IBM, Microsoft, and OS/2 -- a history.
Date: 6 Oct 92 08:20:26 GMT
Organization: University of Utah CS Dept
Originator: brian@jaguar.cs.utah.edu


Wayne Desmond's "Open letter to Gordon Letwin" post reminded me
of a post I've been intending to make.  Too many people in c.o.o.a
believe that Microsoft is responsible for the lag of the development
of DOS, the early failures of OS/2, and also believe that Microsoft
"abandoned" OS/2.

Below are excerpts from several books that pertain to the IBM/Microsoft split.


Robert Cringely's Accidental Empires: Page 287
	OS/2 1.0 was designed to run on the 80286 processor. Bill Gates
	urged IBM to go straight for the 80386 processor as the target
	ofr OS/2, but IBM was afraid that the 386 would offer performance
	too close to that of its minicomputers.  Why buy an AS/400
	minicomputer for $200,000, when half a dozen networked PS/2
	Model 80s running OS/2-386 could five twice the performance
	for one third the price? The only reason IBM even developed
	the 386-based Model 80, in fact, was that Compaq was already
	selling thousands of its DeskPro 386s. Over the objections
	of Microsoft, then, OS/2 was aimed at the 286, a chip that
	Gates correctly called "brain damaged."
	
Robert Cringely's Accidental Empires: Pages 293,294
	A fiesty (for IBM) band of graphics programmers at IBM's labe
	in Hursley, England, first forced Microsoft to use an inferior
	and difficult-to-implement graphices imaging model in Presentation
	Manager ...
	...
	Microsoft began moving away from OS/2 in 1989 when it became
	clear that DOS wasn't going away, nor was it in Microsoft's
	interest for it to go away.  The best solution for Microsoft
	would be to put a new face of DOS, and that new face would
	be yet another version of Windows.  Windows 3.0 would include
	all that Microsoft had learned about graphical user interfaces
	from seven years of working on Macintosh applications.
	Windows 3.0 would also be aimed at ... 386 processors...
	would give users 90 percent of the features of OS/2...
	
Robert Cringely's Accidental Empires: Page 294
	Although by early 1990, OS/2 was up to version 1.2, which included
	a new file system and other improvements, more than 200 copies
	of DOS were still being sold for every copy of OS/2.  Gates
	again proposed to IBM that they abandon the 286-based OS/2 product
	entirely in favor of a 386-based version 2.0. Instead, IBM's
	Austin, Texas, lab whipped up its own OS/2 version 1.3, generally
	refered to as OS/2 Lite...
	
Robert Cringely's Accidental Empires: Page 295
	IBM wanted to take from Microsoft the job of defining to the
	world what a PC operating system was. Big Blue wanted to abandon
	DOS in favor of OS/2 1.3, which it thought could be tied more
	directly into IBM hardware and applicaitons, cutting out the
	clone makers in the process. Gates thought this was a bad idea
	that was bound to fail. He recognized, even if IBM didn't,
	that the market had grown to the point to where no one company
	could define and defend an operating system standard by itself.
	Without Microsoft's help, Gates thought IBm would fail. With
	IBM's help, which Gates viewed as meddling mroe than assistance,
	Microsoft might fail.  Time for a divorce.
	
OS/2 Notebook, Microsoft Press: Pages 613,616
	[From an interview in early 1990]
	Gates: We are trying to address the diverse needs of the forty
	million machines in the world.  DOS, Windows and OS/2 provide
	a complete range of oeprsting system alternatives to support
	tremendous applications growth in the future. Our positioning
	statement should help applications developers make the decision
	about which platforms are appropriate for them to support.

	Another strong message is the high level of commitment that
	our companies have to OS/2 and the importance of application
	developers' input to our planning. We rely on developer feedback
	to set our priorities for enhancements to OS/2. As a result,
	reducing memory requirements is now at the top of our list.
	We made the announcements as part of our commitment to keep
	developers informed of out long-range plancs.
	...
	In the past, because Microsoft saw a higher volume in Windows
	applicaitons, we developed Windows version before PM versions.
	After mid-1990, Microsoft will ship PM versions of applications
	at the same time or before Windows versions. We can see the
	opportunity to create much better applications under OS/2.
	The OS/2 market is growing sufficently so that it is a good
	business decision to do this.

[Now.. to all the OS/2 fans that just gleefully read this... go
back and read Gates' words CAREFULLY; especially that last paragraph.]

Robert Cringely's Accidental Empires: Page 296
	Windows 3.0 was introduced in May 1990 and sold more
	than 3 million copies in the first year.
	
Dietal and Kogan The Design of OS/2 2.0: Page 17
	In September of 1990, IBM and Microsoft also announced a change
	in their development relationship: The companies decided to
	discontinue the policy of splitting development responsiblity
	for OS/2 across sites. IBM became solely responsible for the
	development of 16-bit and 32-bit OS/2, while Microsoft continued
	work on advanced OS/2 kernel technology and the Windows system.

From the July 1992 Windows NT Developer's Conference Notes (Paul Maritz's talk):

		HISTORY

	Design started in 1988

	Team built around Dave Cutler - developers with Windows, OS/2,
	UNIX, and VMS(R) experience.

	Serious coding started 1989 - system first booted in late 1989
	on an Intel i860!

	Decision make in 1990 to focus on:
	32-bit Windows as key API
	Intel 386/486 and MIPS architectures

	Goal set in October 1990 of shipping complete product in 1992

When I put the above all together?
IBM, afraid of competing with it's AS/400 lines, kept stalling the
move to a 386-based OS.  Microsoft.. viewing the 286-based OS/2 1.X
as a dead-end, increasingly frustrated with IBM's failure to
move, got a lucky break -- Windows 3.0 sold like hotcakes from the
start.  Microsoft was then big enough to move out from under
IBM's shadow, and the success of Windows 3.0 was the necessary
vehicle.  Taking their prototype of OS/2 3.0, they created
the OS _they_ had wanted for 386s all along.. that OS is Windows NT.

Reading Gates' statements from early 1990 above, I can now see
why there are so many upset developers.  However if you read
carefully it is clear that Gates was hedging his bets even then.
I mean consider the tough spot Microsoft was in.  IBM and Microsoft
were firmly linked in corporate America's mind.  Microsoft entered
into OS/2 expecting to revolutionize OS's but IBM's late development
of 386-based machines and fear of usurping _IBM's_ AS/400 line
forced MS to design for the 286... and a 286 is not really
capable of supporting an OS like OS/2. Microsoft was too small
and perhaps too immature to break with IBM. Finally (several years
later) things came to a head, and simultaneously Windows 3.0 became
a huge, instant, success.  Microsoft saw their chance and took it.

I don't see how people can view this as Microsoft "abandoning" OS/2.
In truth they were simply reverting to the path they had wanted all
along.  They tried to bring IBM along, but Big Blue Bureaucracy was
always in the way.  In the end it was switch or die.

Brian
-- 
C. Brian Sturgill                I strongly encourage you to read Ross Perot's
University of Utah                             United We Stand
Center for Software Science             How we can take back our country.
brian@cs.utah.edu; CIS: 70363,1373  (It's more important than OS/2 vs NT! :-))
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy