From: bcoleman@hayes.com (Bill Coleman)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.advocacy
Subject: Re: 7.1 vs. OS/2 and Windows NT
Date: 9 Oct 92 13:32:36 EDT
Organization: Hayes Microcomputer Products, Norcross, GA

In article <Eep=77u00WB8Mikopz@andrew.cmu.edu>, Carl B Jabido <cj00+@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>   
> Fine, keep System 7.0 only for Macintoshes, while the rest of the world
> is trying to get operating systems which are _platform_independent. 

This raises a very interesting semantic argument. When Apple releases a
Macintosh that uses a PowerPC microprocessor, will System 7 be platform
independant? Well, it is still running on a Macintosh. Although that
Macintosh uses a completely different processor chip.

Of course, elements of the Mac OS are going into Pink, which is planned to
be platform independant. So when Taligent releases Pink in a couple of
years, you might say that that System 7 has acheived platform indepenance.

> Macintosh more or less uses TASK SWITCHING!  Sure you can have as many
> programs as memory can have.  Whenever I want to do something different
> though, I have to stop what I'm doing in the app I'm in and then switch
> apps.

If you are trying to imply that Macintosh applications can perform no
processing in the background, you are wrong. Just because you switch
another application in front doesn't mean that background apps halt.

Of course, it is difficult for a Paint program or a Word processor to do
much in the background. But compression software and communications software
work like champs in the background on a Mac.

So, whatever name you choose to give it, the Mac can perform processing
with multiple applications. It just does it non-preemptively.

>> >As to the benefit of memory protection, I think lots of Mac users here 
>> >would disagree with you.
>>  
>> I don't think someone who apparently knows so little about the
>> Mac should speak for Mac users.
> 
> Oh, so then Mac users don't care about memory protection?

No, people like you, who obviously know little about the Mac shouldn't
attempt to speak for Mac users.

If you want to know what Mac users think, you should ask them. You shouldn't
just assume one answer or another.

>> It's for programmers to write applications that don't crash.
>
> Well tell that to the people who wrote Genie Pascal (here at CMU)
> because that'll crash on anything.

I have a better idea. Shoot them.

> "It's for programmers to write applications that don't crash."  I think
> that's just a good excuse for those people who don't have memory
> protection, and still want to justify their OS.  Sure, it's good for
> programmers to write apps that don't crash.  

Let me put it to you this way. 

Which would you rather have:

A) An OS with memory protection to protect you when applications crash

or 

B) An OS whose applications don't crash.

I choose B. 

Unfortunately, it isn't a perfect world, so B doesn't exist. Fortunately,
I can live with an OS without memory protection. Even though memory 
protection is a Good Thing, I can live without it if my applications don't
crash. There is a benefit to having memory protection, but that benefit is
small.

> BTW, isn't Apple adding that at the same time they're adding preemptive?

It is said to be part of the microkernal version of System 7. So, yes.

-- 
Bill Coleman, AA4LR                ! CIS: 76067,2327    AppleLink: D1958
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Disclaimer: "My employer doesn't pay me to have opinions."
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Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.advocacy