Xref: utzoo comp.windows.ms:5766 comp.os.os2.misc:274 Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!bywater!arnor!larios!db3l From: db3l@ibm.com (David Bolen) Newsgroups: comp.windows.ms,comp.os.os2.misc Subject: Re: Query: Which would you recommend? Windows? or OS2 w/ PM? Message-ID: Date: 28 Sep 90 19:49:42 GMT References: <4227@rex.cs.tulane.edu> <1990Sep24.050147.11516@chinet.chi.il.us> <90270.162249TURGUT@TREARN.BITNET> <26395@cs.yale.edu> Sender: news@arnor.uucp (NNTP News Poster) Followup-To: comp.windows.ms Organization: Laboratory Automation, IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center Lines: 41 In-Reply-To: spolsky-joel@cs.yale.edu's message of 28 Sep 90 04:42:00 GMT In article <26395@cs.yale.edu> spolsky-joel@cs.yale.edu (Joel Spolsky) writes: >In article <90270.162249TURGUT@TREARN.BITNET> TURGUT@TREARN.BITNET (Turgut Kalfaoglu) writes: >>I consider it a generalization to say that OS/2 needs a fast 386 and an nn >>megabyte of hard disk. I have OS/2 1.1 running on a fast AT compatible, and >>it flies - I have no problems with its performance. In fact, I switch >>to DOS box and run benchmarks (SI, Landmark,etc) and they report very >>small degradation. >>Regards, -turgut > > >Of course they report very small degredation, because the OS/2 >"compatability box" just switches off OS/2 completely. It makes no >attempt to multitask or otherwise intervene in the operation of the >DOS box like Windows does. I can't argue that having "multiple windowizable DOS boxes" with OS/2 2.0 won't be better than the current DOS box, but OS/2 is definitely multitasking when you are running in the DOS box. True, you can have only a single DOS box on an OS/2 1.x system, but any OS/2 applications will continue to execute in the background. Only the DOS box itself is required to be in the foreground to run. > That is why, in OS/2 (unlike Win 3 on a >386), in a DOS box, you can't cut and paste, you can't multitask, you >can't put the DOS box in a window, and you can't run more than one DOS >box. Today, this is a good argument for Windows. If and when OS/2 2.0 >has multiple widowizable DOS boxes, then it will have caught up to >Windows.... Cut and pasting doesn't really have anything to do with multitasking, but more with how the window manager controls the input to applications. In terms of multitasking, OS/2 has the better tasking model, with a fully preemptive scheduler (it *actively* takes the CPU away from tasks when they use up their timeslice). Windows, on the other hand, requires cooperation on the part of applications to periodically yield the CPU. True, if you are simply comparing how many DOS windows you can run at once for Windows 3.0 and OS/2 1.x, Windows comes out ahead. But OS/2 is built on a better base, and with 2.0 will catch up in the multiple DOS task area. -- David