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From: jeff@eniac.seas.upenn.edu (Jeff White)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.misc
Subject: Re: System Errors, MF --> Why???
Message-ID: <25323@netnews.upenn.edu>
Date: 29 May 90 03:58:57 GMT
References: <6364.266023a1@umiami.miami.edu> <2661ada6.62fa@petunia.CalPoly.EDU>
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Reply-To: jeff@eniac.seas.upenn.edu.UUCP (Jeff White)
Organization: University of Pennsylvania
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In article <2661ada6.62fa@petunia.CalPoly.EDU> rcfische@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Ray Fischer) writes:
>
>
>gross@umiami.miami.edu writes ...
>>A friend of mine and me were having another one of our "religious" conversations
>>about the virtues of the Mac vs. <insert system here>. 
>>1) Why did Apple decide to go with their version of multitasking instead of
>>   "true" multitasking like even a lowly Amiga 500 can do (and I don't want
>>   arguments that run like 'Well, if you do multitask on an A500, your system
>>   will get real slow...I ain't talking performance..I want to know what 
>>   why certain capabilities have been put into a machine)
>
>Pre-emptive multitasking on the Mac would require a major rewrite of 
>large chunks of the ROM code.  (other stuff deleted)

  I think this is the major point.  The present from of multitasking under
MultiFinder allowed multitasking capability to work with the majority of
applications on all the entire Macintosh line.  If a prgram was written 
properly from the beginning, it didn't take much to make if MF compatible. Just
look at OS/2.  It was designed to bring (among other things) multiasking to
80x86 (ie. DOS) machines, but for that to happen, you need completely new
applications written specifically for it.  
  I don't know if anyone has exact details, but System 8.0 was supposed to be
the MAJOR rewrite of the OS for the Mac, so I would hope that true multitasking
would appear at least in that version, if not sooner.  I guess only the people
at Apple who are working on 7.0 now know whether any attempt is being made to
write it in a form that would somehow allow true multitasking to be incorporated
into it at a future date.

						Jeff White
						jeff@eniac.seas.upenn.edu