I also read an article in the July issue of Popular Science that says that right after the disaster, the Japanese government doubled the amount they listed as the "safe" amount of radiation per year.
Only to match the international standard for emergency workers. Before the accident the mandated limits were much lower than the international norm.
I see a lot of people implicitly conflating TEPCO and its subcontractors with the government. Both have demonstrated incompetence and dishonesty a-plenty, but this incident, like most of the really shady stuff going on, was on the TEPCO side (specifically one if its subcontractors).
The first and last real MS innovation was the Microsoft BASIC interpreter which became ubiquitous in 1980s home computers. Everything else they ever did was shamelessly stolen and/or bought and/or badly copied from others. Even MS-DOS started out as a bought-out CP/M imitation.
...
MS has always been a follower at best. It has frequently been a predatory abuser of its monopoly. It has usually parasitized on the innovations of others. Embrace, extend, extinguish was always how they operated. It has never been an innovation leader.
Actually, Microsoft did pioneer one major innovation, one which has driven most of the software industry for decades. And that's their development/business model.
Before the MS era, large-scale commercial software was expensive. And it was expensive because it was written according to rigorous processes. Writing software is easy. Writing stable and reliable software is hard, because most of the effort goes into the comprehensive design, verification, and QA that's necessary to make it truly reliable. And that costs money, which has to get passed on to the customer.
Microsoft's great innovation was to realize that, rather than spend a small fortune buying 99.99999% reliable software, most people would rather pay a fraction of that amount for 98% reliable software. It's that last 1-2% of quality control that costs most of the time and money in development. So Microsoft decided to shortcut it and sell cheap software to the masses. And people demonstrated that yes, rather than spend $1000 on an application that never crashes, they'd prefer to spend $100 on an application that crashes sometimes but can get the job done if they're careful to save early & often.
We don't have to like it, but this was an major innovation, and it did shape the computer industry for decades. Innovative doesn't necessarily mean good.
Neither Serenity, nor Mensys who now has ownership of eComStation, has the OS/2 source code (beyond what IBM already disseminated via the device driver kit, or open sourced a la JFS). What they have is an OEM license, not a source license. The major system-level enhancements in eComStation were mainly done through add-on device drivers which add to or even supersede the IBM components; the desktop enhancements were done by subclassing, which is possible due to the object-oriented structure of the Workplace Shell. I'm sure Mensys would be as delighted as anyone to see IBM open source OS/2.
IBM does indeed make money from it still, not just from royalties on eComStation, but also directly from selling more OS/2 licenses and support contracts to their existing customer base. On the other hand, that wouldn't necessarily change if the OS/2 source code was released - IBM prefers to make its money in support rather than software anyway.
The real problem is the legal cost of open sourcing it. The code would have to go through a full technical and legal audit and cleanup first, and that means not only a lot of programmer-hours, but lawyers. Lots of lawyers. Lots of lawyers equals lots and lots of money. Maybe not a fortune relative to the depth of IBM's pockets, but it would still require some very compelling arguments (probably with a lot of zeros attached) to convince them it was worth it.
This is basically how the OS/2 port of OpenOffice.org works.
The company that sells eComStation (OEM version of OS/2 with updates for modern hardware) funds the OS/2 port of OO.org. Anyone who buys eComStation 2.x automatically gets an OpenOffice for OS/2 support contract which includes full binaries. Also, anyone can elect purchase just the OO.org support contract (with binaries).
Meanwhile, the source code for the OS/2 port is all checked in to Apache's repository along with everything else. So anyone can grab it and build it if they have the know-how.
Most users seem fine with this arrangement, as it keeps the OS/2 port funded and alive.
The article only hints at this, but the reason Ottawa is so keen to get this going is that the U.S. government is making noise about phasing in requirements for ALL travellers from other countries to have biometric passports.
Quite possibly this is the condition of a deal with Washington to exempt Canadians from stricter biometric identification when crossing the border.
Otherwise Ottawa is probably just desperate to stay in the good books, so they're extending this as an olive branch to Washington.
The NDP had screwed up the first two years of their mandate, yes. Give them some credit though, by the time 'Rae Days' came along, they'd done their big ideological reversal and were trying to cut spending and balance the budget. (Rae Days were his attempt to cut civil service budgets without mass layoffs. Not that the civil service appreciated it at the time; bet they did later, though...)
Poor Bob Rae, he thought being honest and trying to compromise was going to cut it... he just ended up pissing off all sides. The fact that he was stuck with a load of incompetent ministers didn't help either.
The recession was hardly their fault, though. That was Mulroney and Crow between them.
Back to the topic at hand, I notice the article said that OpenOffice was a competitor to StarOffice. Isn't that like saying Mozilla is a competitor to Netscape?
Yeesh, some of the remarks in this topic really make me shake my head. Do people here actually understand how and why constitutional monarchy (or parliamentary democracy in general) works?
The Queen doesn't decide who gets knighted. All she does is wield the sword. It's the government that makes the choice, and the Queen is not part of the government. (No, really, she's not. Parliamentary democracy keeps State and Government separate, for a number of very sound reasons; see below.)
Furthermore, the Queen does not "lobby" parliament. She has nothing to do with the mechanics of governing. She has no power over the political process whatsoever, and is barred (both legally and traditionally) from interference.
The Queen is a glorified safety valve; in case the Prime Minister and his deputies die (e.g.) in a plane crash, the country needs somebody who can instantly take charge without going through weeks of political maneuvering. Whereupon she would have exactly one function: to appoint an interim Prime Minister as quickly as possible and retreat back to the safety of Buckingham Palace again.
For those purposes, it's actually better to have somebody in the position who is not a politician, and owes nothing to partisanship. It gives an air of impartiality, which in the present Queen's case is fairly well-deserved; she takes her role as the neutral arbiter very seriously.
I'm not a big fan of any operating system that doesn't have a native TCP/IP stack.
This comment says a lot about OS/2's lack of success. Inaccurate rumours like this just got propagated all over the place, until people thought it was the whole truth without bothering to learn any different.
There's no accusation here; probably you're just generalizing about the version you were exposed to. (which must have been very old). But the remark still illustrates the problem of inaccurate rumours that plagued (and continue to plague) OS/2...
OS/2 has come shipped with built-in TCP/IP and SMB networking in every version since 3.0 Connect -- during the days that Windows 3.11 was MS's latest offering...
IBM has donated some source code to Linux. The IBM Logical Volume Manager (a.k.a. EVMS) is a direct port of the OS/2 LVM. (The OS/2 reference code is even sitting in the CVS tree.)
And, of course, where do you think JFS came from?:) It's not the AIX version that Linux users are getting...
ISTR a quote from an IBM executive saying that whatever the Linux community asks for, IBM will look into open sourcing.
OTOH, the kernel, the graphics API, some of the file system drivers, and the networking subsystem undoubtedly all still fall under the joint copyright with Microsoft that IBM signed a decade ago. Probably Microsoft would need to give its permission for any of those to be open sourced, and we can guess how likely that is...
Of course, the Workplace Shell also includes a bunch of third-party technology, like NeXTstep design elements, TrueType, Adobe TypeManager, etc.
It would probably take IBM years of coding effort and legal wrangling to open-source OS/2's innards. And frankly, I doubt that IBM management would consider it worth the effort. A great pity, but there you have it...
I see a number of people saying that OS/2 has poor hardware support. I don't know where this information comes from...
OS/2's hardware support is just about on a par with Linux's. In some areas, it's no doubt weaker (multimedia, perhaps). In others, it's stronger. I'm sure it balances out...
OS/2 has had solid USB support, for instance, for at least two years. (True, it doesn't support OHCI, but most built-in controllers are UHCI.) Supported devices include modems, keyboards, mice, printers, speakers, USB-Ethernet and CD-RW devices.
Other recent technologies OS/2 includes are UDF (for DVD-ROM and DVD-RAM), I20 (Intelligent Input/Output), ATA-100, and even support for some WinModems. This doesn't strike me as the mark of an obsolete OS.
OS/2 supports Logical Volume Management, far more elegantly and transparently than Linux, for instance. The newest versions also come with JFS (journalled file system).
OS/2's multithreading, SMP support, TCP/IP stack and Java virtual machines are all generally considered just about the best of any x86 operating system. These are all up-to-date with current features.
In terms of everyday hardware, OS/2 supports almost all NICs, SCSI controllers, and video chipsets. (A special IBM version of Scitech Display Doctor supports almost all current video cards in a single driver.)
As for software support... well, OS/2 is in a transitional phase. Remember, OS/2 originated in the days when BBS shareware ruled the cheap software market, and three-figure industrial applications ruled the commercial market.
There are still big, commercial packages and small shareware packages (some extremely high-quality ones, at that), although admittedly the variety is shrinking rapidly.
But the open source model is rapidly picking up steam on OS/2. Some of the most promising application support under OS/2 is free or Free. Just take a look at OS/2 NetLabs for a quick sample of some of the projects underway. And that's just scratching the surface.
Most major Linux applications are also available on OS/2. XFree86, Samba, Perl, Apache, CDRecord, GIMP, GNOME, VIM, bash, gcc... I could go on.
The point is, OS/2 is far from obsolete and nowhere close to being a dead end. Give us some credit. We (OS/2 users) are not a bunch of sad relics from an ancient era who refuse to wake up and notice the world has moved on. We're moving with the world.
Some of us even hope to help move the world ourselves... and that, I think, is eComStation's goal.
The primary market for eComStation is not intended to be Joe/Jane User.
It's not particularly aimed at the open source crowd either...
While it's inclusive to existing (personal) OS/2 users, they're not the primary market either... nor are the current "big shop" IBM OS/2 houses.
The target market for eComStation is (as far as I understand) primarily small to medium sized business users who are getting sick of the hassles and expense of trying to manage Windows or mixed-client networks.
eComStation's key points are its remote manageability features. Remote IPL. Network-wide synchronized application deployment.
Remote control tools. The ability to function as either fat or thin client.
Combined with an extremely impressive array of packaged business-quality software. (SmartSuite, Desktop On-Call, InJoy, Applause, and others.)
And combine that with existing OS/2 features (stability, scalability, superb multi-threading and multi-tasking, powerful LAN client software, logical volume management, journalled file system, USB support, I20 support, dynamic video driver architecture)... you have one damn impressive productivity platform.
ALT
I've always been interested by the X-Men, even though I actually know very little about them. (Every time I've tried looking at the comics, I just get thoroughly confused by all the different continuities, runaway marketing, seemingly conflicting universes... is it too much to ask just to be able to start at the beginning?)
Anyway, I thought this was an excellent movie, not just as an action film, but as a 'superhero' film, and even as an X-Men film.
My major complaint is mostly that the movie was a bit short, and didn't have enough development on the character side (I understand a lot of that was actually filmed, but was sacrificed in the final edit).
Specifically:
Cyclops was basically just 'there'. He had virtually no character development at all. (Storm didn't fare much better, but at least she got that fun part at the climax.)
None of the villains were really fleshed out at all, besides Magneto. I guess this is kind of unavoidable, though. Sabretooth was pretty much 'generic evil muscle'; at least Toad and Mystique were interesting figures in action.
Their attempt at a love triangle between Wolverine, Jean Gray, and Cyclops fell rather flat, and just got lost in the rest of the action. Three major reasons for this:
Cyclops, as a noticeable personality, is virtually MIA (as mentioned);
Wolverine and Jean had absolutely no on-screen chemistry together;
Lack of effort. They had one scene of Wolverine clumsily hitting on Jean shortly after meeting her, and he trades a few insults with Cyclops during the action. Not really enough to make his final words to her believable, IMHO at least.
Given that, the antipathy between Wolverine and Cyclops seemed a little contrived.
What really made the movie good, though, was the humanity. Hugh Jackman really has to take a lot of credit here. It's incredibly difficult to portray a character as tough and cynical as Wolverine without seeming either wooden, or a total jerk. But Jackman's Wolverine is wonderfully sympathetic, and believably three-dimensional.
The lack of chemistry between Jean and Wolverine didn't really bother me, thanks to the beautifully-executed chemistry between Woverine and Rogue. Personally, I found that particular subplot more touching than that of Magneto's obsessiveness and Xavier's angst. Maybe because it's the former kind of experience that really define people... after all, how many of us find ourselves in a position to change the world like Xavier or Magneto?
I went into the movie expecting Patrick Stewart to carry it, acting-wise. But, while he was definitely great, the honour really has to go to Ian McKellan and Hugh Jackman. Together with Anna Paquin, the four of them completely carried this film: not just super-powered characters, but human ones, too.
This (OS/2 news) is hardly a new plan. First off, free support for Warp 4 expires in 2001? That was the plan from the day it was released.
IBM traditionally announces x number of years of free support when a product is released. Then it moves to paid support. Warp 4 was released in 1996, so that's five years of free updates and service releases. That's more than MS ever offered for Windows, by the way.
In fact, they often end up extending the support period. Free Warp 3 support only ended last fall, around two years (IIRC) after the originally announced date. They may do the same with Warp 4.
And remember, this is just free support, which basically means home & SOHO users (the same users IBM claims not to support at all!). Their enterprise users all have paid support contracts, and believe me, IBM will continue to upgrade and support OS/2 for these people.
Even Warp 3 is still receiving support and service upgrades, you just have to pay for it now...
Incidentally, support for Warp Server for e-business expires in May, 2002. That's three years support; okay, could be better, but again, that's just free support (and they may extend it).
It's not that simple... OS/2 still has a large number of big, Enterprise-level customers... the kind of customers who look still look very suspiciously on open-source.
More to the point, these customers are still paying IBM tons of money for OS/2 licenses and support. As long as they can make money from OS/2, IBM won't start giving it away for free...
Much of the Presentation Manager API, some LAN code, and bits of the filesystems are supposedly Microsoft. Probably some of the driver subsystem as well.
OTOH, the Workplace Shell (desktop UI, arguably the best part of OS/2) is IBM alone. Most of the services are, and the kernel is probably 99-100% IBM code nowadays as well.
Microsoft's biggest part is the HPFS386 filesystem, for which they still charge IBM several hundred dollars' in royalties per copy sold... One reason Warp Server Advanced is so expensive.
Other than that, it's probably not volume of MS code that's the problem, it's figuring out exactly which bits are still theirs, and removing them gracefully.
IBM has promised (in writing, to its major clients) that it will continue to support OS/2 for at least another seven years. This probably means that free fixes and updates will continue for as long.
This news does not supersede the rumours that a new "Warp 5" client will come out later this year. While they are only rumours, there are whispers that IBM is also working on a brand-new version of OS/2 which will also be released soon.
Remember, it is standard operating procedure at IBM not to pre-announce any new product more than three months prior to its release date. (For decades, in fact, they were under court order to behave this way, and the habit dies hard.)
So, just to make this clear: this does not rule out a new version of OS/2 in the near future.
Rather half-heartedly, but they're doing it. The latest iterations support things like:
The UFS/DVD filesystem
USB (mice, keyboards, drives, and printers)
The JFS filesystem and Logical Volume Manager (LVM).
SciTech Display Doctor (universal accelerated video driver set, including advanced support for all the latest chipsets.)
The major shortcoming is in multimedia -- i.e., recent sound card drivers, codecs, plugins (you think RealPlayer is bad news on Linux? Hah.)... There are open-source efforts addressing most of these, but they move slowly. (More slowly than on Linux, alas.)
In any case, OS/2 is perfectly useable as a home system for most purposes. And it looks like it will remain that way for at least a few more years.
They haven't 'suddenly come out'. IBM has been continually, steadily updating and refreshing OS/2 for years. New "FixPak"s come out roughly every quarter.
All that's really new about this "Convenience Pack" offering is that they're going to update the distribution CDs (i.e., roll the latest FixPaks into the installable package), and make them available free to Software Choice subscribers (an action which is long overdue).
I can understand the attitude. If you're used to the Windows UI and 'way of doing things', then you will hate the OS/2 UI for at least the first couple of months. Possibly much longer, if you keep trying to adhere to the Windows UI mentality.
For a first-time computer user, the OS/2 UI is vastly superior. And for everybody, once you truly understand how it works, and everything you can do with it, you just can't do without it again.
Some of its key points:
It's consistent. Everything is an object. Everything. Files, programs, icons, folders, drives, directories, URLs, print jobs, whatever.
Want to open that HTML file in Netscape, or in a text editor? Drag it onto the Netscape program object, the editor program object, or, if you've got the associations set up already, just right-click and choose the associated program you want to open it with.
Local LAN printer is stalled, and your print job is waiting in the queue? Just open the printer object, and drag your print job onto another printer.
This consistency extends to the programmer's point of view as well. Want to enhance the way desktop folders work? Simply subclass the WP_Folder object class, and add whatever you want. Then register your new class with the desktop, and your new class is all ready. You can even do an across-the-board replacement of the old folder class with little more effort.
The object paradigm is fully integrated, and fully extensible. In a modal (or task-oriented) interface, like Windows uses, you choose a task (by opening a program), then choose documents or files on which to perform that task. To perform a different task on the same file, close the program (optionall), then open another program, and open the file in it.
In an object-oriented interface, like OS/2's, you start with the files (the objects), and choose the task to perform on them.
For example: to compile a program in Windows, I might open Explorer (task=locate file). I double-click on the file to bring it up in a text editor (only one file association possible, alas). When I'm ready to compile, I save the file, open my compiler (task=compile), choose the file, and compile it.
In OS/2, I open the folder where source files are kept. I right-click on the program, and choose "Editor". I edit the file. When I'm ready to compile, I right-click on the program, and choose "GCC compile" (or whatever). To debug, I right-click on the file and choose "GDB debug". Simple, consistent, and infinitely extensible. (I can associate as many programs or tasks with any given object, file type, or object class as I want.)
It's both flexible and intelligent. File types aren't bound to filename (or extension). I can easily set file "FOO1" to type "HTML", and file "FOO2" to type "MPEG Audio". Or I can set file "MYPIC.BMP" to types "Image File", "Bitmap", and "Binary Data", and choose which type I want to treat it as at any given time.
As another example, program object "Program1" is pointing to "C:\Apps\PROG1.EXE". Let's say I decide to move PROG1.EXE to "E:\Utils\PROG1.EXE". Lo and behond, the program object "Program1" automatically updates itself to point to the new file location. No need to edit the properties. (Ah, the wonder of Extended Attributes!)
(As another minor example, I also think some of the mouse bindings are more intelligently thought out. Left button is Select, right is Manipulate. So, you left-click to highlight, left-drag to mark, left-double-click to open; you right-click to bring up the context menu, and right-drag to move.)
Well, I could go on... but I think I've gone on long enough. Suffice it to say, I've yet to see a desktop UI that's as enjoyable to use as the OS/2 WorkPlace Shell. That's one of the only things keeping from using Linux full-time. I just can't do without it.
The computer systems IBM had running the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano were all on OS/2. They are probably going to do the same thing in Salt Lake City this year.
Ever gotten a bank loan, or an insurance quote? I'd give you odds that the agent or finance manager was using an OS/2 machine.
Ever used an automated teller machine? Most of them run on OS/2.
Ever used a host-controller workstation for a System/390 mainframe? Most of them, in my experience, run OS/2.
A great many LAN domains run on OS/2 servers and controllers. OS/2 Warp Server is an absolutely phenomenal product, and plenty of administrators still know it.
OS/2 is still very popular in banks, insurance companies, and other financial institutions. Not to mention other places where stability, high availability, ease-of-use and industrial, 7/24 vendor support are crucial.
Slashdot Mirror
I also read an article in the July issue of Popular Science that says that right after the disaster, the Japanese government doubled the amount they listed as the "safe" amount of radiation per year.
Only to match the international standard for emergency workers. Before the accident the mandated limits were much lower than the international norm.
I see a lot of people implicitly conflating TEPCO and its subcontractors with the government. Both have demonstrated incompetence and dishonesty a-plenty, but this incident, like most of the really shady stuff going on, was on the TEPCO side (specifically one if its subcontractors).
and the company has driven innovation for decades
Uh... geez. Where to even start?
The first and last real MS innovation was the Microsoft BASIC interpreter which became ubiquitous in 1980s home computers. Everything else they ever did was shamelessly stolen and/or bought and/or badly copied from others. Even MS-DOS started out as a bought-out CP/M imitation.
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MS has always been a follower at best. It has frequently been a predatory abuser of its monopoly. It has usually parasitized on the innovations of others. Embrace, extend, extinguish was always how they operated. It has never been an innovation leader.
Actually, Microsoft did pioneer one major innovation, one which has driven most of the software industry for decades. And that's their development/business model.
Before the MS era, large-scale commercial software was expensive. And it was expensive because it was written according to rigorous processes. Writing software is easy. Writing stable and reliable software is hard, because most of the effort goes into the comprehensive design, verification, and QA that's necessary to make it truly reliable. And that costs money, which has to get passed on to the customer.
Microsoft's great innovation was to realize that, rather than spend a small fortune buying 99.99999% reliable software, most people would rather pay a fraction of that amount for 98% reliable software. It's that last 1-2% of quality control that costs most of the time and money in development. So Microsoft decided to shortcut it and sell cheap software to the masses. And people demonstrated that yes, rather than spend $1000 on an application that never crashes, they'd prefer to spend $100 on an application that crashes sometimes but can get the job done if they're careful to save early & often.
We don't have to like it, but this was an major innovation, and it did shape the computer industry for decades. Innovative doesn't necessarily mean good.
Neither Serenity, nor Mensys who now has ownership of eComStation, has the OS/2 source code (beyond what IBM already disseminated via the device driver kit, or open sourced a la JFS). What they have is an OEM license, not a source license. The major system-level enhancements in eComStation were mainly done through add-on device drivers which add to or even supersede the IBM components; the desktop enhancements were done by subclassing, which is possible due to the object-oriented structure of the Workplace Shell. I'm sure Mensys would be as delighted as anyone to see IBM open source OS/2.
IBM does indeed make money from it still, not just from royalties on eComStation, but also directly from selling more OS/2 licenses and support contracts to their existing customer base. On the other hand, that wouldn't necessarily change if the OS/2 source code was released - IBM prefers to make its money in support rather than software anyway.
The real problem is the legal cost of open sourcing it. The code would have to go through a full technical and legal audit and cleanup first, and that means not only a lot of programmer-hours, but lawyers. Lots of lawyers. Lots of lawyers equals lots and lots of money. Maybe not a fortune relative to the depth of IBM's pockets, but it would still require some very compelling arguments (probably with a lot of zeros attached) to convince them it was worth it.
This is basically how the OS/2 port of OpenOffice.org works.
The company that sells eComStation (OEM version of OS/2 with updates for modern hardware) funds the OS/2 port of OO.org. Anyone who buys eComStation 2.x automatically gets an OpenOffice for OS/2 support contract which includes full binaries. Also, anyone can elect purchase just the OO.org support contract (with binaries).
Meanwhile, the source code for the OS/2 port is all checked in to Apache's repository along with everything else. So anyone can grab it and build it if they have the know-how.
Most users seem fine with this arrangement, as it keeps the OS/2 port funded and alive.
The article only hints at this, but the reason Ottawa is so keen to get this going is that the U.S. government is making noise about phasing in requirements for ALL travellers from other countries to have biometric passports.
Quite possibly this is the condition of a deal with Washington to exempt Canadians from stricter biometric identification when crossing the border.
Otherwise Ottawa is probably just desperate to stay in the good books, so they're extending this as an olive branch to Washington.
The NDP had screwed up the first two years of their mandate, yes. Give them some credit though, by the time 'Rae Days' came along, they'd done their big ideological reversal and were trying to cut spending and balance the budget. (Rae Days were his attempt to cut civil service budgets without mass layoffs. Not that the civil service appreciated it at the time; bet they did later, though...)
Poor Bob Rae, he thought being honest and trying to compromise was going to cut it... he just ended up pissing off all sides. The fact that he was stuck with a load of incompetent ministers didn't help either.
The recession was hardly their fault, though. That was Mulroney and Crow between them.
Back to the topic at hand, I notice the article said that OpenOffice was a competitor to StarOffice. Isn't that like saying Mozilla is a competitor to Netscape?
Yeesh, some of the remarks in this topic really make me shake my head. Do people here actually understand how and why constitutional monarchy (or parliamentary democracy in general) works?
The Queen doesn't decide who gets knighted. All she does is wield the sword. It's the government that makes the choice, and the Queen is not part of the government. (No, really, she's not. Parliamentary democracy keeps State and Government separate, for a number of very sound reasons; see below.)
Furthermore, the Queen does not "lobby" parliament. She has nothing to do with the mechanics of governing. She has no power over the political process whatsoever, and is barred (both legally and traditionally) from interference.
The Queen is a glorified safety valve; in case the Prime Minister and his deputies die (e.g.) in a plane crash, the country needs somebody who can instantly take charge without going through weeks of political maneuvering. Whereupon she would have exactly one function: to appoint an interim Prime Minister as quickly as possible and retreat back to the safety of Buckingham Palace again.
For those purposes, it's actually better to have somebody in the position who is not a politician, and owes nothing to partisanship. It gives an air of impartiality, which in the present Queen's case is fairly well-deserved; she takes her role as the neutral arbiter very seriously.
I'm not a big fan of any operating system that doesn't have a native TCP/IP stack.
This comment says a lot about OS/2's lack of success. Inaccurate rumours like this just got propagated all over the place, until people thought it was the whole truth without bothering to learn any different.
There's no accusation here; probably you're just generalizing about the version you were exposed to. (which must have been very old). But the remark still illustrates the problem of inaccurate rumours that plagued (and continue to plague) OS/2...
OS/2 has come shipped with built-in TCP/IP and SMB networking in every version since 3.0 Connect -- during the days that Windows 3.11 was MS's latest offering...
And, of course, where do you think JFS came from? :) It's not the AIX version that Linux users are getting...
ISTR a quote from an IBM executive saying that whatever the Linux community asks for, IBM will look into open sourcing.
OTOH, the kernel, the graphics API, some of the file system drivers, and the networking subsystem undoubtedly all still fall under the joint copyright with Microsoft that IBM signed a decade ago. Probably Microsoft would need to give its permission for any of those to be open sourced, and we can guess how likely that is...
Of course, the Workplace Shell also includes a bunch of third-party technology, like NeXTstep design elements, TrueType, Adobe TypeManager, etc.
It would probably take IBM years of coding effort and legal wrangling to open-source OS/2's innards. And frankly, I doubt that IBM management would consider it worth the effort. A great pity, but there you have it...
OS/2's hardware support is just about on a par with Linux's. In some areas, it's no doubt weaker (multimedia, perhaps). In others, it's stronger. I'm sure it balances out...
OS/2 has had solid USB support, for instance, for at least two years. (True, it doesn't support OHCI, but most built-in controllers are UHCI.) Supported devices include modems, keyboards, mice, printers, speakers, USB-Ethernet and CD-RW devices.
Other recent technologies OS/2 includes are UDF (for DVD-ROM and DVD-RAM), I20 (Intelligent Input/Output), ATA-100, and even support for some WinModems. This doesn't strike me as the mark of an obsolete OS.
OS/2 supports Logical Volume Management, far more elegantly and transparently than Linux, for instance. The newest versions also come with JFS (journalled file system).
OS/2's multithreading, SMP support, TCP/IP stack and Java virtual machines are all generally considered just about the best of any x86 operating system. These are all up-to-date with current features.
In terms of everyday hardware, OS/2 supports almost all NICs, SCSI controllers, and video chipsets. (A special IBM version of Scitech Display Doctor supports almost all current video cards in a single driver.)
As for software support... well, OS/2 is in a transitional phase. Remember, OS/2 originated in the days when BBS shareware ruled the cheap software market, and three-figure industrial applications ruled the commercial market.
There are still big, commercial packages and small shareware packages (some extremely high-quality ones, at that), although admittedly the variety is shrinking rapidly.
But the open source model is rapidly picking up steam on OS/2. Some of the most promising application support under OS/2 is free or Free. Just take a look at OS/2 NetLabs for a quick sample of some of the projects underway. And that's just scratching the surface.
Most major Linux applications are also available on OS/2. XFree86, Samba, Perl, Apache, CDRecord, GIMP, GNOME, VIM, bash, gcc... I could go on.
The point is, OS/2 is far from obsolete and nowhere close to being a dead end. Give us some credit. We (OS/2 users) are not a bunch of sad relics from an ancient era who refuse to wake up and notice the world has moved on. We're moving with the world.
Some of us even hope to help move the world ourselves... and that, I think, is eComStation's goal.
ALT
It's not particularly aimed at the open source crowd either...
While it's inclusive to existing (personal) OS/2 users, they're not the primary market either... nor are the current "big shop" IBM OS/2 houses.
The target market for eComStation is (as far as I understand) primarily small to medium sized business users who are getting sick of the hassles and expense of trying to manage Windows or mixed-client networks.
eComStation's key points are its remote manageability features. Remote IPL. Network-wide synchronized application deployment. Remote control tools. The ability to function as either fat or thin client.
Combined with an extremely impressive array of packaged business-quality software. (SmartSuite, Desktop On-Call, InJoy, Applause, and others.)
And combine that with existing OS/2 features (stability, scalability, superb multi-threading and multi-tasking, powerful LAN client software, logical volume management, journalled file system, USB support, I20 support, dynamic video driver architecture)... you have one damn impressive productivity platform. ALT
Anyway, I thought this was an excellent movie, not just as an action film, but as a 'superhero' film, and even as an X-Men film.
My major complaint is mostly that the movie was a bit short, and didn't have enough development on the character side (I understand a lot of that was actually filmed, but was sacrificed in the final edit).
Specifically:
What really made the movie good, though, was the humanity. Hugh Jackman really has to take a lot of credit here. It's incredibly difficult to portray a character as tough and cynical as Wolverine without seeming either wooden, or a total jerk. But Jackman's Wolverine is wonderfully sympathetic, and believably three-dimensional.
The lack of chemistry between Jean and Wolverine didn't really bother me, thanks to the beautifully-executed chemistry between Woverine and Rogue. Personally, I found that particular subplot more touching than that of Magneto's obsessiveness and Xavier's angst. Maybe because it's the former kind of experience that really define people... after all, how many of us find ourselves in a position to change the world like Xavier or Magneto?
I went into the movie expecting Patrick Stewart to carry it, acting-wise. But, while he was definitely great, the honour really has to go to Ian McKellan and Hugh Jackman. Together with Anna Paquin, the four of them completely carried this film: not just super-powered characters, but human ones, too.
IBM traditionally announces x number of years of free support when a product is released. Then it moves to paid support. Warp 4 was released in 1996, so that's five years of free updates and service releases. That's more than MS ever offered for Windows, by the way.
In fact, they often end up extending the support period. Free Warp 3 support only ended last fall, around two years (IIRC) after the originally announced date. They may do the same with Warp 4.
And remember, this is just free support, which basically means home & SOHO users (the same users IBM claims not to support at all!). Their enterprise users all have paid support contracts, and believe me, IBM will continue to upgrade and support OS/2 for these people.
Even Warp 3 is still receiving support and service upgrades, you just have to pay for it now...
Incidentally, support for Warp Server for e-business expires in May, 2002. That's three years support; okay, could be better, but again, that's just free support (and they may extend it).
IBM's full 'release strategy' is here:
http://www-4.ibm.com/software/os/wa rp/strategy/
More to the point, these customers are still paying IBM tons of money for OS/2 licenses and support. As long as they can make money from OS/2, IBM won't start giving it away for free...
OTOH, the Workplace Shell (desktop UI, arguably the best part of OS/2) is IBM alone. Most of the services are, and the kernel is probably 99-100% IBM code nowadays as well.
Microsoft's biggest part is the HPFS386 filesystem, for which they still charge IBM several hundred dollars' in royalties per copy sold... One reason Warp Server Advanced is so expensive.
Other than that, it's probably not volume of MS code that's the problem, it's figuring out exactly which bits are still theirs, and removing them gracefully.
Gah. Slip of the mouse (and/or momentary lapse of intelligence). My mistake, my apologies.
Remember, it is standard operating procedure at IBM not to pre-announce any new product more than three months prior to its release date. (For decades, in fact, they were under court order to behave this way, and the habit dies hard.)
So, just to make this clear: this does not rule out a new version of OS/2 in the near future.
It might not happen. But then again, it might.
The major shortcoming is in multimedia -- i.e., recent sound card drivers, codecs, plugins (you think RealPlayer is bad news on Linux? Hah.)... There are open-source efforts addressing most of these, but they move slowly. (More slowly than on Linux, alas.)
In any case, OS/2 is perfectly useable as a home system for most purposes. And it looks like it will remain that way for at least a few more years.
All that's really new about this "Convenience Pack" offering is that they're going to update the distribution CDs (i.e., roll the latest FixPaks into the installable package), and make them available free to Software Choice subscribers (an action which is long overdue).
For a first-time computer user, the OS/2 UI is vastly superior. And for everybody, once you truly understand how it works, and everything you can do with it, you just can't do without it again.
Some of its key points:
Want to open that HTML file in Netscape, or in a text editor? Drag it onto the Netscape program object, the editor program object, or, if you've got the associations set up already, just right-click and choose the associated program you want to open it with.
Local LAN printer is stalled, and your print job is waiting in the queue? Just open the printer object, and drag your print job onto another printer.
This consistency extends to the programmer's point of view as well. Want to enhance the way desktop folders work? Simply subclass the WP_Folder object class, and add whatever you want. Then register your new class with the desktop, and your new class is all ready. You can even do an across-the-board replacement of the old folder class with little more effort.
In an object-oriented interface, like OS/2's, you start with the files (the objects), and choose the task to perform on them.
For example: to compile a program in Windows, I might open Explorer (task=locate file). I double-click on the file to bring it up in a text editor (only one file association possible, alas). When I'm ready to compile, I save the file, open my compiler (task=compile), choose the file, and compile it.
In OS/2, I open the folder where source files are kept. I right-click on the program, and choose "Editor". I edit the file. When I'm ready to compile, I right-click on the program, and choose "GCC compile" (or whatever). To debug, I right-click on the file and choose "GDB debug". Simple, consistent, and infinitely extensible. (I can associate as many programs or tasks with any given object, file type, or object class as I want.)
As another example, program object "Program1" is pointing to "C:\Apps\PROG1.EXE". Let's say I decide to move PROG1.EXE to "E:\Utils\PROG1.EXE". Lo and behond, the program object "Program1" automatically updates itself to point to the new file location. No need to edit the properties. (Ah, the wonder of Extended Attributes!)
(As another minor example, I also think some of the mouse bindings are more intelligently thought out. Left button is Select, right is Manipulate. So, you left-click to highlight, left-drag to mark, left-double-click to open; you right-click to bring up the context menu, and right-drag to move.)
Well, I could go on... but I think I've gone on long enough. Suffice it to say, I've yet to see a desktop UI that's as enjoyable to use as the OS/2 WorkPlace Shell. That's one of the only things keeping from using Linux full-time. I just can't do without it.
OS/2 is still very popular in banks, insurance companies, and other financial institutions. Not to mention other places where stability, high availability, ease-of-use and industrial, 7/24 vendor support are crucial.
OS/2 is everywhere. You just can't alway see it.