From: nan@matt.ksu.ksu.edu (Nan Zou)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.advocacy
Subject: Re: 7.1 vs. OS/2 and Windows NT
Date: 5 Oct 1992 03:10:14 -0500
Organization: Kansas State University
NNTP-Posting-Host: matt.ksu.ksu.edu

bcoleman@hayes.com (Bill Coleman) writes:

[...]

This is not directed particularly at Bill, just a small request to all
posters: please trim down on the quoted material, leave out the .sigs
and other irrelevant material, include only the part of the article that
you are replying to.  Scrolling down 200+ lines at 2400 bauds is getting
a bit tedious, especially if most of the stuff are old news.

>System 7 features: 
>* Scalable fonts (Windows has, OS/2 not)

Does ATM count?  I don't play with fonts too much.

>* InterApplication communication, with provisions for App to App communications
>  using standard terminology (AppleEvents), on the same machine or over a
>  network. (Windows not, OS/2 not)

More precisely, OS/2 does not have the exact same form of IPC as
AppleEvents, but it does have pipes, named pipes, semaphores, and
Windows DDE and OLE based IPC.

>  (And when OCE gets here, Store and Forward will be standard!)
>* Support for "live copy and paste" between applications that aren't running

Don't know what that means.

>  concurrently, or are running on different machines on a network. (Not, Not)
>* Built-in support for standard 24-bit color, with automatic interpolation

Device Independent Graphics means any video device could be supported,
be it 1-bit or 24-bit, with the necessary device driver.

>  to differing bit depths. The ability to support multiple monitors with

I tried running Wing Commander, a 256-color DOS game on a 16-color PM
desktop, the window gets dithered into 16 colors and the game runs, not
too pretty but it runs.

>  differing depths, and to change the depth on the fly. (Not, Not)

Multiple monitors is theoretically possible if hardware exists.

>* Human Interface Guidelines and standards sufficient to form consistancy 
>  between applications (Not, Perhaps)

HIG in IBM world is CUA (Common User Access), current spec is CUA 92.

>* Built-in support for an SQL dialect (Not, Yes?)

Don't know.

>* Support for the localization of Sorting order, Data and Time formats,
>  currency, measurement, calenders and numbers (Not, Not)

Windows yes, OS/2 yes.

>* Standard support for temporal data, graphics data compression, both for
>  static and real-time graphics and sound. (QuickTime) (Not, Not) 

Different standards, MPC and Ultimedia.

>  (Although Windows will eventually get QuickTime when Apple ports it over)
>* Standard color picker (Not, Not)

What is it?

>* Support for timing to the millisecond level (Time Manager) (Not, Perhaps)

OS/2 has Maxtimeslice and Mintimeslice setting, I don't mess with them.

>* Aliases. (Not, Perhaps under HPFS?)

Shadows under WPS.

>* Automatic slot conflict resolution (NuBus and Slot Manager) (Not, Not)
>  ( MCA helps, but it isn't automatic )

Hardware issue, both MCA and EISA have auto device configuration,
running some register setup program during device installation.

>* Power management for battery-powered machines. (Not, Not)

Hardware issue.

[ future speculations omitted ]

Of course, OS/2 has quite a bit of features that MacOS doesn't have:
pre-emptive MT, memory protection, multithreading, OO GUI, REXX, etc.
(out of concern for Bill's health, I will not mention the three-letter
'C' word here).  If you want to learn more, go read comp.os.os2.advocacy
should give us a fresh change from the repetitive NT zealots.

Note I'm not interested in discussing which OS is better or any other
matters of personal opinion, just the facts.

-- Nan
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.advocacy