From: tlilley@jarthur.claremont.edu (Thomas (Ted) Lilley)
Subject: Re: OS/2 2.01 Beta
Organization: Harvey Mudd College, Claremont, CA 91711
Distribution: na
Date: Sun, 11 Oct 1992 07:02:29 GMT

In article <1992Oct10.233432.27395@fcom.cc.utah.edu> brian@jaguar.cs.utah.edu (Brian Sturgill) writes:
>In article <1992Oct10.220520.14135@muddcs.claremont.edu> tlilley@jarthur.claremont.edu (Thomas (Ted) Lilley) writes:
>>In article <1992Oct9.210502.778@mdd.comm.mot.com> wu@mdd.comm.mot.com (Philip Wu) writes:
>>>In <1992Oct9.171907.3735@solaris.rz.tu-clausthal.de> hochstae@allfiwib1.wiwi.uni-marburg.de (Christoph H. Hochstaetter) writes:
>>>
>>>>DOS and WIN16 is not too good in the pre-beta SDK, but do you think,
>>>>that MS will ship the release version with poorer support for DOS &
>>>>WIN16 than OS/2 2.0 currently has?
>>>
>>>Maybe not Windows, but they already stated that DOS support won't be
>>>as good as under OS/2.  No big loss really.
>>>
>>>Phil
>>
>>I can't believe you said that, Phil.  I thought MS learned its compatibility
>>lesson along with IBM...i.e. OS/2 1.x.  Well, it doesn't really matter whaat
>>we think the importance of DOS support is.  The market will tell us whether
>>it is or isn't important, sometime next year.
>>
>>Ted
>
>I doubt seriously that OS/2 1.X's main problem was poor DOS support.
>OS/2 1.X had many, many problems.  It was designed for 286's but
>required huge amounts of resources (1.3 was an exception, but OS/2 by
>then had a bad rep... and there was Windows 3.0).  It was buggy.  It
>was slow.  It had no applications base.  It was highly proprietary and
>cost a lot.  It ran (or so most everybody believed) only on IBM's
>over-priced, under-powered hardware.

Whew.  When I got through reading this article, I was relieved to see
that it  was Brian who wrote this, not Phil.  I'm used to more cogent 
argumentation from Phil.  Anyway, the general concensus on OS/2's previous
failure is that it hinged on such lousy DOS support.  At least, that's what
I've heard to be general concensus, and I'm sure there will be people who
perk up and correct me if I'm wrong.

The other points you bring up all contribute.  Bugginess, slowness, and
application base certainly figured in.  Again, I was under the impression
that 1.3 fixed many of these problems, but as you say, by then it was
probably too late.  However, the one thing that stayed the same was lousy
dos support.  If 1.3 had come up with dos support like 2.0's, I'm sure
you would've seen a revival in interest, though perhaps not on par with
the current interest in 2.0.

>
>NT's DOS support will be better than 1.X's --

I would hope so...I'm not satisfied with 2.0's dos support, and anything
less (like NT's) just ain't gonna cut it.

> IBM's OS/2 2.0 support, while
>good for some, is more of an overreaction by a frighten bureacracy, than
>a well thought out feature.

This is laughable.  If MS doesn't have the same kind of "overreaction"
in their "frightened bureacracy", there not going to go far in the sales
column.  Compatibility *is* the issue...I don't care if you make an OS
that cleans the kitchen sink and lights my cigarette, if I can't be 
productive on it *now*, without buying a new suite of applications, I'm
not going to buy it.  End of Story.

>  Consider also the testing/maintenace burden
>IBM is picking up for OS/2 2.0 -- DOS -- even down to the hardware
>bits level, Windows 2.X, 3.X, Win32s, Win32.  It's possible in the
>near future that OS/2 may run well everyone else's apps, but it mainly
>means there is less incentive for people to make apps for the small 2.0
>native market.

First, I don't give a shit about all the testing/maintenance burden IBM's
picking up for 2.0.  It's called service, and what's better, I'm not paying
for it.  I got OS/2 for $49, I've gotten all the patches and the beta 
Windows 3.1 support *and I haven't layed down another dime for any of it*.

:):):)  That's cause to be happy.

As for there being less incentive for people to make apps for the small
2.0 native market...that's the short term outlook.  IBM's strategy here
is a long term one, and one that's far better for the customer.  They
offer a platform where there's no great schism to transfer to it.  You can
keep your old applications and actually get work done with them.  In some
cases, it runs them better than dos did.  Although this may mean there are
initially less apps developed for it, it's a far better plan than not having
the compatibility...they already tried that, and it *failed*.  In the
long term, they hope to gain a user base significant enough to justify 
development of native OS/2 apps.  I think they've got the best plan around.
I hope they decide to market it someday.

>
>Further the large number of subsystems + IBM's need to maintain its
>reputation for supporting old features for a long period of time, will
>mean that OS/2 development will lag more modern OS's. The back-
>compatibility burden will be huge.  The amount of back-compatibility
>also means a large overhead in disk space needs, more complicated installation,
>and more complexity in the subsystem APIs, and even the WPS in order to
>support it all.  Worse Windows 3.X, Win32s, and Win32 are moving targets...
>OS/2 2.0 developer's main jobs will be simply keeping up.

More modern OS's won't be in use, cause people can't use them with their
old stuff.
(Disclaimer:  This is barring a terrific need developing in the market
for a specialty product that overshadows compatibility)
  Like I said before, I don't give a shit about the compatibility
burden...IBM has managed to hack it so far, and I expect that it will
continue to be excellent for a while.  As for the disk space needs, well,
I don't know how they do it, but they've managed to keep it well below
NT's size.;)

>Any major new feature in OS/2 will have to be geared to be compatible with
>the other platforms.  Imagine they have to support two of many things already!
>Two font systems, two multimedia systems, two sets of printer drivers.
>What seems like a good idea at the moment, will quickly become a burden.
>IBM would better spend its time recruiting ISV support.

It'll probably take some tweaking to get some features to work across
platforms, but not every feature they add will figure into other platforms.
For instance, multithreading.  Multithreading is a feature of OS/2, but
VDM's and Windows don't have or need a clue that it's there.

>
>While all users expect their past investment not to disappear immediately,
>experience in the Macintosh community shows that most apps still working
>after a major upgrade is sufficient.

The Macintosh market is significantly different from the PC market in
this respect:  What *choice* do they have in upgrade paths?

If I'm on a shitty system, (say, DOS),  and someone comes out with 
a system that's somewhat better, and runs a portion of my apps, I may
eventually upgrade.  However, if there's a choice between  (just
hypothetically) a good system that runs my apps, and a good system 
that doesn't  run as many, guess which  one I choose.  Factor in
disk space requirements, interface, ram requirements, and features
I can use (for instance, most Joe averages don't need built in networking),
and you've got a really clear choice.

NT is a high-end system, higher end than OS/2.  It won't be as successful
with Joe average because of this, and because OS/2 offers almost everything
Joe average needs.  Stable multitasking, speed, and good dos and windows
support.

>  Word from contacts inside Microsoft
>seem to indicate that DOS support in the beta is already well above the
>acceptable level.  (Only a few more days till the beta ships!!!)

Wheeha, I'll be there with bells on.

Ted