From: ygoland@edison.seas.ucla.edu (The Jester)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.apps,comp.os.os2.advocacy
Subject: Why OS/2 **WILL** fail
Date: 26 Sep 92 23:39:04 GMT
Followup-To: comp.os.os2.apps
Organization: PGP VER2 Key Available Upon Request

First let me begin by confusing the hell out of the issue and saying
that I LOVE os/2. I use os/2. Within a day of seeing the os/2 $50
offer I bought it (before that I didn't know WHERE to buy it!) and
after that I spent $150 to buy 4 more megs of ram to really USE
os/2. I now develop foxpro and borland c applications, along with
modeming, word processing, and everything else under os/2. And with
my recent aquisition of wowii the only reason I had left for using
dos, to play with my sound blaster, is gone as well. With that said,
I will address my point:Why os/2 WILL fail. 

The number of people being forced to use a computer and the number
of people choosing to use a computer increase everyday. But one of
the biggest blocks in the way of succesful computer development and
sales was how difficult it was to use a computer for someone who
isn't a computer expert. With the advent of sufficent cycles to have
gui's systems like the mac came out and were hits. They weren't hits
because their software was better or because they were more
powerful, they were hits because the average joe could USE them.
Many people and companies were willing to shell out TWICE what they
would pay for a MORE POWERFUL PC in order to get a system their
people could actually (gasp) use. This is where os/2 comes in. OS/2
is a perfect example of PC power without rembering who the real
market is. OS/2 is POWERFUL, REAL powerful. But its also a pain in
the ass. It reminds me of the old japanese vcrs which had 50
(literally, I counted several) buttons on the remotes and more knobs
than I had the time to count on the vcr body itself. OS/2 is
very much like that. In an effort to give the user total control
(which computer professionals such as myself ADORE, I just LOVE
tweaking priority so I can download and still get work done) they
have alienated the average user. I don't know ANYONE who can't just
jump into a MAC or Windows program without problem, but sit them in
front of os/2 and they start drooling in confusion. From truly
little things like having an icon move with the right mouse button
(yes, I know, you can change that, I did) to trying to figure out
how in the name of hell to get some damned dos program working to
remembering how the hell you change from full screen to window (yes,
I know alt-home, you aren't listening =) and so on and so forth.
OS/2 gives the user more choices than a user knows how to deal with.
Theres a REASON why SO MANY PEOPLE are willing to buy a mac even
though it will cost them everything they own. Because they don't
have to WORRY about anything. They don't need to worry about
different screen modes, hard drive types, mother board standards,
software compatability and so on and so forth. OS/2 has not helped,
from the software point of view, in this area at all. It just
complicated issues. OS/2 can't survive in it's current form. Its just
too damn hard for your average computer semi-literate to deal with!
Any idiot can install and get windows running, but getting os/2
running takes a computer jock.OS/2 is a WONDERFUL system if your a
computer jock, but if your say a writter who has a book they need to
get out, its nothing more than another road block. OS/2 will either
understand that the unwashed masses of computer ignorants are the
true market or they will fail. Personally I expect os/2 users to
become like NEXT users. There will always be some, but they will be
small and off in the woods some place.

Oh and btw, is there ANYONE out there who can do file management
faster through the gui than they can through the command line? Why
is it that file management on the mac is really easy from a gui but
the os/2 gui is so slow in this area? I'm running off a 486/33mhz
with 210 drive (and things are slow even on the hpfs partition in
gui (wps)), 8 megs of ram, 1 meg vga card running in 800x600 mode.

			Just one guy's opinion,
					The Jester
-- 
			The Jester
"Its what you DON'T know that counts"-Anonymous
"Patience is a virtue I haven't quite developed but I'v learned
how to imitate."-The Jester
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.apps