From: slumos@unlv.edu (Steve Lumos)
Subject: Re: Why OS/2 **WILL** fail
Organization: UNLV Computer Science
Date: Sun, 4 Oct 92 03:10:51 GMT

In article <1agjd5INNfuk@uniwa.uwa.edu.au> craig@ec.uwa.oz.au (Craig Richmond - division) writes:
>slumos@unlv.edu (Steve Lumos) writes:
>
>It is easy to fix though probably.

I don't think it is any secret though that the reason it is a shredder
instead of a trashcan is because IBM doesn't want Apple to be suing
them right when they are going to join forces (grin).

>You obviously weren't using the right word processor.  Things have changed
>recently.  Word continues to get bigger and slower.  The Macs do get

I did admit that I was hardly using the latest stuff. At UNLV, the Mac
lab is currently trailing the DOS lab by a couple years at least. I
have no idea if they have any plans to change this. I think it was
both Word and WordPerfect that I tried.

>(can't remember exactly).  Microsoft products are slow because they are all
>interpreted P-Code.  Nothing but the slowest (but portable) for Microsoft!

Well, we definately agree on something (grin!)

>Another point we disagree on.  More buttons leads to ambiguity.  X-Windows
>is a classic example.  You have 3 buttons on your mouse and it is never
>clear what the outcome of pressing any of these buttons might be.
>Sometimes a button will paste, other times it will close a window.  But
>thats OK, because its all user definable so you can configure it and ensure
>that anyone else using your setup won't be able to do anything.  My

I am pretty selfish. I could care less whether or not anyone else can
use my setup, I want a system that fits me completely. That is how you
can work most effectively.

>ultimate system would have 2 buttons.  One you use for doing things and the
>other makes a pop up menu appear at the current mouse location.  A lot of
>my friends don't agree, but some of them have strange ideas.  Also, I would
>ensure that the Pop-up menu button could not be changed to NOT bring up a
>menu.  The mac handles multiple button modes, but getting you to shift
>click, or option click or hold down the left half  of the keyboard and
>click.  Works quite well and most programs obey the guidleines for the use
>of these sorts of selections.

This is entirely a difference in basic goals. Macs have one button,
PC's have mouses with entire keyboards one them (no, really!)

>I saw this show on TV where they had a big book type thing which was a pen
>based computer.  I don't know if microsoft made it, but it was was running
>windows with yet another level sitting on top of DOS to let the person use
>it.

Yes, I think Pen Based PCs suck. In fact, many of the columnist that I
have read (like Dvorak for instance) also think Pen Based PCs suck. I
think someone mentioned 'worse than a Mac' (just kidding). The is a
special version of Windows called Windows for Pen or some such, and
also a version of DOS (yes, you actually WRITE commands like DIR on
the command line). 

I can see applications for Pen Based computers, none of them require
Windows or DOS or have anything to do with 'real' computing.

>>That is pretty extreme. IMO, Apple's attepts at look-and-feel patents
>>are enough to make me gag at the site of a Mac. Even if I loved the
>>Mac, I would not support a company like that.
>
>You should have a look in comp.patents.  There was a wild article in there
				
				[...]

>these things and gives the Patent numbers too.  Look and Feel suits (Stupid
>as they are) have nothing on these people.

I have heard all of these and still more, but I disagree. IBM is not
going around suing just for the sake of it. When they use their
patents it is for 'swapping' (almost as bad but not quite IMO). There
are stupid patents all over though, not just in computers. One that
Richard Stallman mentioned when he gave a talk here was the blinking
colon between hours and minutes on a watch.

One thing I am pretty sure of is that none of IBM's patents stand to
hurt programmers more than Look and Feel. I will even admit that there
are worse ones than Apple (dBASE and Lotus), but Apple sprang directly
from winning a suit against Xerox to starting a suit with MicroSoft.
Seems HIGHLY hypocrytical to me.

This is also one of the reasons I like Borland. Philippe has stated
that he will fight Look & Feel and Interface Copyright to the very end.

>As one final example of the power of a GUI, yesterday this friend and
>myself were trying to test a Japanese word Processor under a beta release
>of the System 7.1 operating system using the Kanji finder.  Neither of us
>know Japanese, but we were still able to perform most of the basic
>functions because all of the finder menus were in the same place, all of
>the buttons were in the same place and highlighted in a similar fashion.

Well of course all of the buttons were in the same place, it would be
more work to MOVE them than to leave them there. I think it would be
pretty fair to compare this situation to one where I could use a
program in text mode that was written in a different language if the
keystrokes were all the same as ones that I was used to. Not hard at all.

Does the Mac really require different versions of a program to provide
multiple language support? You seemed to imply this but I'm not sure.
I always thought that was just a basic feature in OS/2...

>Japanese version of DOS, you would be screwed most likely.  Your only hope
>would be that all the command.com commands were the same.  If they are not,
>how do you type "dir" in japanese?

I would be lost in a Japanese version of DOS, true. I would be lost
just looking at a Japanese keyboard too (grin!)

-- 
Steve Lumos - slumos@cs.unlv.edu
Xref: sparky comp.os.os2.apps:6588 comp.os.os2.advocacy:6301