Xref: utzoo comp.windows.news:2617 comp.windows.x:37573 Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!seismo!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!hedrick From: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu (Charles Hedrick) Newsgroups: comp.windows.news,comp.windows.x Subject: Re: NeWS "open" / "standard"? Message-ID: Date: 15 Jun 91 00:57:45 GMT References: <91164.101625BROEKHVN@QUCDN.QueensU.CA> Followup-To: comp.windows.news Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J. Lines: 20 Yes, the NeWS spec is published and others can implement it. There is also code that Sun will let people license (though you'd have to pay Sun). Originally Sun intended NeWS to be the standard window system. They considered it better than X, and indeed there are some technical arguments for that opinion. The market had just adopted NFS, and they hoped the same would happen with NeWS. It didn't, partly because other vendors were becoming scared of Sun, and wanted nothing to do with anything else they initiated, and partly because software for X was available sooner. (It's pretty clear that the first plausible product in an area wins, except in areas where an official standards process can be used to impose a new standard.) Thus Sun was forced to support X, and ended up with OpenWindows, a server that implements both X and NeWS. For the moment most applications that are likely to be used with OpenWindows are based on X. However Sun says they will be coming out with new software in the future that uses NeWS, and takes advantages of its superior capabilities. Unless they are successful in getting other vendors to support both X and NeWS, particularly X terminals (and at least for us, software for 3/50's used as X terminals), some users may resist using applications based on NeWS.