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From: sdowdy@triton.unm.edu (Stephen Dowdy)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Murph's VAPORWARE Column for October 1990
Message-ID: <1990Sep29.185159.20292@ariel.unm.edu>
Date: 29 Sep 90 18:51:59 GMT
References: <9009280355.AA23389@lilac.berkeley.edu>
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In article <9009280355.AA23389@lilac.berkeley.edu> Sewall@UConnVM.BITNET (Murph Sewall) writes:
}                         VAPORWARE
}                       Murphy Sewall
}              From the October 1990 APPLE PULP
}       H.U.G.E. Apple Club (E. Hartford) News Letter
}             $15/year U.S. - $18/year Canadian
}                       P.O. Box 18027
}                  East Hartford, CT 06118
}            Call the "Bit Bucket" (203) 569-8739
}     Permission granted to copy with the above citation
}
}Intel i586 Design Note.
}Microsoft's William Gates and Intel's David House are
}discussing whether to build the graphics primitives of
}Windows 3.0 and OS/2's Presentation Manager into the mask of
}the forthcoming i586 chip.  Such a decision would markedly
}improve the performance of both graphic user interfaces.
}- PC Week 27 August
}
}Downward Compatibility.
}Microsoft's MS-DOS 5.0 will contain a Set Ver (set version)
}command that will allow users to make the operating system
}emulate earlier MS-DOS versions from 2.0 up for those
}applications that turn out to be incompatible with DOS 5.0.
}- InfoWorld 20 August

I am now confident that the MS-DOS/Intel/Windows/OS-2IBM PC era
will come to an end soon.  Weren't the 386 and 486 releases
plagued by the bugs inherent in an overly-complex out of control
behemoth monster?  And now talk of including Graphical primitives into
a CPU?  This is *NOT* the solution to bad performance of Windows.
If they make this decision noone will *ever* see an i586 chip.
Because, by the time it is done, Graphical Workstations will
be a dime a dozen (almost. much cheaper than equivalent PC Systems)

So, anyone have a clue as to the complexity of the purported "Set Ver"
hack?  I realize MS-DOS is a very simple-minded OS (i really wouldn't even
call it an OS, really), but i doubt this will be simple, and wil add
its own incompatibilities and bugs.

Yep, the PC generation will very quickly bog itself down in the quagmire
it has built around itself.  Meanwhile, Unix workstations will
zip on by.  All the major PC Software vendors are jumping onto Unix systems
and they have a stable portable platform for development.  A Brilliant
beam of light is shining through the darkness...

--stephen
P.S. trying to save people from wasting money and brilliant people on
ill-designed, outdated computer architectures.
P.P.S.  Bring on VM in AmigaDOS.  I don't want to see it die.  The best
of VMS and Unix rolled into one.

--
$! stephen dowdy (AOSED@acvax.inre.asu.edu)
$! BITNET:   sdowdy@unmb
$! Internet: sdowdy@law.UNM.EDU
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