Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!rex!wuarchive!uunet!brunix!cgy From: cgy@cs.brown.edu (Curtis Yarvin) Newsgroups: comp.arch Subject: Re: OS/2 is dead? Message-ID: <59288@brunix.UUCP> Date: 13 Dec 90 05:00:06 GMT References: <28775@usc> <14887@ogicse.ogi.edu> Sender: news@brunix.UUCP Reply-To: cgy@cs.brown.edu (Curtis Yarvin) Organization: Brown University Department of Computer Science Lines: 44 In article <14887@ogicse.ogi.edu> borasky@ogicse.ogi.edu (M. Edward Borasky) writes: > > >In article <28775@usc> ajayshah@alhena.usc.edu (Ajay Shah) writes: >>Knowing OS/2 is safely dead and buried where all terrible OSes >>belong >OS/2 is NOT dead or even dying. It is the natural evolutionary path >of MSDOS/WINDOWS. MSDOS/WINDOWS and OS/2 will eventually converge. >Once the members of the 80x86 family BELOW the 80386 die off, MSDOS >will be a point in history like RSX-11 and OS/360. "BRONTOSAURUS is NOT dead or even dying. It is the natural evolutionary path of TYRANNOSAURUS/ARCHAEOPTERYX. TYRANNOSAURUS/ARCHAEOPTERYX and BRONTOSAURUS will eventually converge. Once the mammals die off, TYRANNOSAURUS will be a point in history like FISH and ALLIGATOR." Let's face it, even Unix has been obsolete for 6 or 7 years. And Unix is a saber-toothed tiger compared to OS/2 - which, after all, only runs in 80286 mode. While man has made many technological triumphs in this decade, the 286 is not one of them; the ghost of Rube Goldberg lives and breathes in every AT. When Microslosh comes out with a nice clean OS/2 for the 386, than maybe you can start talking. But right now I consider Windows MORE advanced than OS/2. Not that OS/2 is such a great achievement, even for what it is. It wants at least 2 megs to run, and costs... well, what? about $200? Which is cheap and elegant compared to SunOS, but helplessly bloated next to Windows. Its 8086 "compatibility box" is DOA, and its programming interface is mediocre. Unix isn't the operating system of the future, either. (Now if the marketdroids at AT&T would only rip the lard off their brains and SELL Plan 9... but I digress.) But it's MY favorite OS. And hopefully there are enough people like me around that it'll survive. OS/2 doesn't even have that. It doesn't appeal to the users(Windows and Macintosh are at least as slick). It doesn't appeal to the developers (how many native-80286 apps have been sold?). It doesn't appeal to the OEMs (how many systems come bundled with OS/2?). It doesn't even appeal to the hackers (CAPITAL LETTERS? I CAN'T PROGRAM IN CAPITAL LETTERS!). Face it, folks: OS/2 is surrounded on all fronts, and its hull is beginning to leak. Curtis "I tried living in the real world Instead of a shell But I was bored before I even began." - The Smiths