From: brian@jaguar.cs.utah.edu (Brian Sturgill)
Subject: Re: IBM, Microsoft, and OS/2 -- a history.
Organization: University of Utah CS Dept
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 92 19:27:59 GMT

In article <92281.125206MXD118@psuvm.psu.edu> MXD118@psuvm.psu.edu (Spiro the Spiny Goldfish) writes:
>In article <1992Oct7.112213.10978@wsl.ie>, jja@wsl.ie (John J. Allen) says:
>>
>>brian@jaguar.cs.utah.edu (Brian Sturgill) writes:
>>: But I think you miss the whole point of the chronology that I dug out.
>>: MS "abandoned" OS/2 BEFORE 2.0, and in fact largely because of IBM's
>>: resistance to 2.0.  Microsoft wanted to make the system right, but
>>: IBM kept clinging to its illusion that it was still in control of
>>: the computing market.  The decision on Microsoft's part to split
>
>This is absolutely incorrect. I was working at IBM when Microsoft and IBM
>were about to split (summer of '90). OS/2 1.3 was about to come out, but
>OS/2 2.0 had been in development at that time for AT LEAST A YEAR. In fact,
>I was using an early version of 2.0 at the time. (Our department was writing
>code for OS/2 1.3 *and* 2.0 at the time).

Release of 2.0 was still a year and a half away when Microsoft _publically_
left.  I never said that Microsoft did not start the project.

>
>Microsoft split with IBM because they didn't want IBM to release OS/2 1.3,
>which was a vastly superior product to 1.2, and could have competed with
>Windows. (Turns out it didn't - both Microsoft and IBM underestimated how
>important good DOS support was, I guess).

Actually this is what Cringley (and thus I have been saying), but with
one major exception... Windows.  Actually I like your version better,
it makes even more sense.  From the start IBM said that Microsoft could
have the low-end and that OS/2 would get the high-end.  I can see how
OS/2 1.3 could cause a fight.  It also fits with what Cringely says...
that the fight was over the fact that OS/2 should be for 386's. This
says essentialy the same thing.  It also explains even better why
Microsoft made the huge advertising blitz when 3.0 came out.
They probably felt that IBM was trying to horn-in on their territory
and wanted to make sure they guareenteed their piece.

Hm.... this is funny... maybe the DOS support wasn't the factor in OS/2
1.3 vs Windows 3.0 at all, maybe it was IBM throwing a scare into
Microsoft, causing MS to put on it's Marketing Think Cap, that caused
the "Windows phenomenon".

The two points I've been trying to make still hold though, one is that
IBM forced (by its failure to push 2.0 over 1.X) Microsoft to leave.
And that Microsoft did not "abandon" OS/2 2.0, the product was not even
close to shipping at the time they left.  Why should MS be held
accountable to produce apps for a system that is not their own?

BTW, Cringely takes exception to your view that 1.3 was a "vastly superior
product", he claims that 1.3 improved user performance at the cost
of subsystem performance.  I only used 1.3 for about a month, so
I can't really say.  1.2 sucked though.

>----
>Mike Dahmus       MXD118@PSUVM  or  dahmus@cs.psu.edu
>TEAM OS/2

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