Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!bionet!ames!ames.arc.nasa.gov!lamaster
From: lamaster@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Hugh LaMaster)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: IBM RISC
Message-ID: <43746@ames.arc.nasa.gov>
Date: 26 Feb 90 19:24:45 GMT
References: <8064@pt.cs.cmu.edu> <9327@portia.Stanford.EDU> <273@dg.dg.com>
Sender: usenet@ames.arc.nasa.gov
Organization: NASA - Ames Research Center
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In article <273@dg.dg.com> uunet!dg!mpogue (Mike Pogue) writes:
>In article <9327@portia.Stanford.EDU> underdog@portia.Stanford.EDU (Dwight Joe) writes:
>>Are we going to see a replay of the Apple II vs. IBM pc situation in
>>the early 80s?  
>Certainly the IBM announcement is interesting and challenging from a number of 
>perspectives.

>1) The UNIX workstation market is much more OPEN (sorry to use the buzzword)
>		than the PC market of the early 80's.

>	2) Software that is ported to the IBM machine can easily be ported to 
>		other machines (MIPS, SPARC, 88K).
:
>Pretty soon, IBM customers will have a CHOICE of vendor HW platforms for running 
>their software.  (Oh my God!)

I think the IBM announcement will turn out to be the best possible outcome
for current Unix/Workstation vendors.  The reason is this:

Fortune 500 companies will see this as "legitimizing" Unix, the same way that
the IBM PC "legitimized" the PC.  Never mind the stupidity or illogicality of
this attitude - that is how they think about IBM and computers.  Today.

Which means that they will permit their staffs to buy Unix machines *from IBM*.
But probably not the competition.  Today.

Software vendors are, and will, scramble to convert their packages to the IBM
systems.  And, Sun and DEC, since those are now blue chip companies
as well.  Technicians will often succeed on at least supporting other
standard ABI systems like m88k and MIPS, which gets more players in the game.
By then, most of the non-portable garbage is out of the code, and the smaller
companies can assist porting and supporting as needed.  Now, notice that a
software package which was formerly IBM only now runs on other systems.

This announcement opens up the potential for a flood of commercial software
on Unix workstations.

At the same time, the captive I/O peripheral approach IBM is using will limit
IBM's penetration of the hardware market in existing Unix shops, the same
as it did for DEC initially.  So, the net effect will be to add to the size 
of the Unix market while limiting penetration into the existing marketplace.
And, at the same time, provide an impetus for porting a lot of commercial
software to the Unix marketplace.

*******************

What to watch out for: Captive Software.  I have already seen a
reactionary trend forming on the part of marketeers - big vendors are
trying to recapture software by signing agreements which will delay or
prevent the introduction of particular packages on rival systems.  Sometimes
the price of getting "preferred status" is that a package *not* be
introduced on other systems for some specified time, if ever. 

I wonder about the legality of this activity, but, in any case, 
the consumer's protection against this will be *to buy software 
that is available on the widest variety of platforms even if only 
one is needed today*.   That is the protection that the investment you make
in software will not be chaining you to a particular hardware vendor in
the future. 


  Hugh LaMaster, m/s 233-9,  UUCP ames!lamaster
  NASA Ames Research Center  ARPA lamaster@ames.arc.nasa.gov
  Moffett Field, CA 94035     
  Phone:  (415)604-6117