Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
Subject: OS/2 and NT -- from a user perperctive
From: ghdai@vax1.umkc.edu
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1992 01:03:42 GMT
Organization: University of Missouri - Kansas City

From: jahonen@lut.fi (Jarmo Ahonen)

It has been interesting to follow this group, but
now I have realized that most people tend to forget
normal users (you too, Brian :-).
Although it may be that I cannot be defined as a normal user, I believe
that I know enough of them to say something about
what they want etc.

WHICH IS BETTER: OS/2 OR NT?

It doesn't matter, really. Personally I would like to see
the best win, but who cares. I want to get decent compilers
and decent applications AND I DO NOT REALLY CARE ABOUT HOW NICE THE
SYSTEM IS IF WORK GETS DONE.


[ Yeah, I got OS/2 and a 32-bit FORTRAN compiler from Microway, and therefore
my research program that demands 5MB of RAM for holding data can then run
on my machine, which was just impossible under DOS.  

Well, DOS extenders work indeed, BUT how about multitasking?  My large program
needs quite some time to run, and I don't want to wait util it's done.  Under
OS/2, however, I can do somthing else, while waiting for the computing results.

BTW, it seems my 486/33 is quite fast.  Usually a same job needs only twice
the time that needs on a VAX-6000/540 cluster machine.  That mainframe of
course holds many users, but to myself, my PC's speed is satisfactory enough
for the time being.  And yes, OS/2 2.0 is just the system that gets my work
done!  ---- GH Dai ]


And its the same with different flavors of UNIX.
Although I have to manage some UNIX machines, I
do not care about which flavor of UNIX is "best", I care about
their usefulness(less) AND THEIR APPLICATIONS.
The same goes with compilers etc. In other words, the system
must:
1) be stable enough to allow useful work to be done. 
2) have enough capabilities to allow productive work during even 
   when other things are done, i.e. multitasking (but not like in
   Windows which seems to have problems with it :-( )
3) HAVE USEFUL APPLICATIONS AVAILABLE. (this is the most important part)

Currently, I regret to say, neither OS/2 or NT fulfill these requirements.
OS/2 does, however, have some programming languages etc already, and
those tools are good enough to be given to our users. To 
me NT does not exist, but OS/2 does (although it seems to be
buggy). So, if I have to buy something something NOW, there seems to be no
alternative to OS/2. Or can I get NT with SmallTalk from somewhere
and let our departments use it? (I can do it with OS/2, however)

WILL THERE BE BETTER APPLICATION FOR OS/2 OR NT?

I do not really care. I want to know IF I CAN GET ANY APPLICATIONS FOR
THE SYSTEM. There seems to be at least some applications for OS/2, but
I cannot get any commercial applications for NT --- actually I cannot
even get a useful version of NT and install it for our users.

It seems to be the case that we are going to use the first system
which has enough commercial APPLICATIONS. Although NT may be GREAT
I tend to believe that WordPerfect+Lotus+etc will be ready for OS/2
before they are ready for NT. And if that is the case, we will
forget NT and buy OS/2. The same goes for NT if it has enough applications
first.

CRASHING THE SYSTEM

Well... We have been able to crash every machine we have (VAXes, UNIXes,
HP, etc...). A crashing system is a fact of life and you have to suffer, but
the system should not be too buggy, because in that case it will not be 
possible to get any useful work done.


How came that you people tend to forget that most of us buy systems to
get work done, not to play with fine features? 


[ Good point!  ---- GH Dai ]


Those who want to see OS/2 to secceed, hope that APPLICATIONS for OS/2
are ready before there are applications for NT. And those who want
NT to succeed hope that OS/2 applications do not enter the market before
NT and its applications.

Actually OS/2 is not so buggy that we could not use it if it had enough
applications... Beware NT, time is getting critical :-)

I hope that you development people will comment what I have written...

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Jarmo J. Ahonen
Computing Centre, Lappeenranta University of Technology, P.O.Box 20,
SF-53851 Lappeenranta, Finland. email: jahonen@kannel.lut.fi


[ I essentially am reposting this message, since the opinion expressed
is highly appreciable.  ---- GH Dai ]