Yes, I think you're right. By the time I ran into OS/2 in 1992, I'd been out of college for over four years, was still very much single, and had one major hobby -- personal computers.:-) Well, collecting CDs, too, but the PC stuff took over VERY quickly once I discovered the local BBS scene, RIME, Fido, etc. in 1989.
The cost of OS/2 was trivial, of course -- US$99 for the upgrade from Windows. But I spent roughly 5K on a new box at that point (built by a cow orker of mine at Unisys) specifically for upgrading to OS/2, and I stuck in a second IDE drive not too long afterwards because I needed more space for Windows and DOS stuff and I also wanted to play with Linux (in the form of SLS 0.99). Heh. I was triple booting in the fall of 1992.:-)
My main attraction to OS/2 had nothing at all to do with Windows, though, which is why our perceptions of resource requirements differ. I didn't care about WinOS2. Most of the "good" Windows application stuff out there was far too expensive for a home user, Windows games really sucked, and Windows shareware apps tended to not be very interesting with a few notable exceptions.
No, I was a BBSer, and I wanted OS/2 for one thing: Virtual DOS Machines!
I was a VERY heavy user of wonderful DOS programs like Telemate, SLiMeR, 4DOS, WordPerfect 5.0 (which I do admit I paid a pretty paenny for), Stereo Shell, etc. OS/2 let me run all of them concurrently in virtual machines, but more to the point -- I could use Telemate in the background with my new USR V.32 + 14.4HST/DS V.Surfboard internal modem (a big hinking fullsized card with a fullsized daughterboard I picked up from the sysop of a local BBS for a mere $500 used), and other DOS programs wouldn't skip a beat. So I could run a Telemate script to run off and dial ExecPC, Channel 1, and all sorts of other BBSes in the background, grabbing file lists and the QWK packets I wanted from local BBSes (as well as Delphi forum captures), and I could be doing something else all the while.
Under Windows, I had two choices: reboot to vanilla DOS and run Telemate, or suffer through all sorts of dropped packets using a native comm program. OS/2 was lightyears ahead of those options!!
By 1994, I had added more RAM to make a 20MB box, I'd added a DX4/100 OverDrive processor, and I'd added an Adaptec 1542 SCSI controller and a 3.6GB 5.25" Full Height SCSI drive -- a hot monster that made my whole fullsize tower case shake back and forth when it did rapid seeking!:-) Since Windows stuff had gotten a lot better, I started caring a lot more about Windows software, but by then I had the hardware to run it.
Summary: I think my overall impression of OS/2 was so positive because I used it as a DOS multitasker, and I didn't really use the high-resource WinOS2 subsystem much at all until well after I had enough hardware to not care so much.
I agree that it's probably enough to make IBM pause.
BTW -- I still run OS/2 on PPro hardware. Try running any current Linux variant on something that slow and come back to me after doing your own comparison. Linux is perceptively slower in almost all contexts, and I'm not just talking about GUI stuff -- I'm talking about user experience on the CLI on a machine under load.
Just anecdotal evidence, of course. If I had some way to benchmark it, I would.
Wow. More comments from the clueless (in terms of what OS/2 is, not in terms of tech in general).
Please learn more about OS/2 before spewing such crap, okay? If it was as easy as you say, some of us would not still be running OS/2.:-)
The OS/2 API is emphatically NOT the Windows API, though there are some similarities for obvious reasons, and some OS/2 software is heavily multithreaded as OS/2 was optimized to run such code. It wasn't rare at all to see a program spawning a dozen threads or more even back in the 486 days. Try that under Windows. Or Linux at the time.
The WPS is implemented as a series of SOM objects which support full third-party extensibility with inheritence and the whole OO enchilada. Nothing in the Linux world currently comes close as an OO desktop framework. Good luck reimplenting that from scratch unless you have a few decades of time to spare.:-)
What is it in OS/2 that I need?
Two things -- support for a few programs like Embellish that GIMP and Pixel, etc., still can't tough for OO layerd graphics manipulation, and a command-line environment that comes close to 4OS2 in friendliness and interactive power. Bash can be made to emulate a 4OS2 command line with a good.inputrc file to modify command editing and history searching and some third-party utilities, but it still feels like a hack in comparison. Personal taste.
I've been using Linux since SLS 0.99plsomething alongside OS/2, and I still prefer OS/2 for most of the common tasks I do. Linux can do just about everything these days that OS/2 can, even more, but that doesn't make it a more comfortable choice, and it's also a lot heavier these days. Even DSL and Puppy are heavier (and thus slower) than Warp 4 on similar hardware.
Sorry, but I used OS/2 2.0, 2.1, and 2.11 (GA+SP) on an 8MB 486DX/33 machine for years, and it was fine. Set the swap file to a second drive and a fixed size, and it ran quite well (software loading could be a little slow, though). Even WinOS2 was fine in terms of performance on such a machine.
Warp 3 was released and optimized for that hardware, so in some ways it was actually faster.
Keep in mind that most Photoshop users and such would not be using such minimal hardware.:-)
Yuo're right that Windows 3.1 was lighter in its requirements, but it was also lighter in functionality and (more importantly) stability. And did you ever try to use a 9600bps or faster modem under Windows 3.1?? Ugh...
IBM was under a federal Consent Decree back then, so even if they were still an 800-lb gorilla, they were explicitly forbidden from taking certain actions.
Why do you think Microsoft was given a shot at the DOS contract in the first place? I'm sure IBM would have much rather provided its own simple OS, but bundling their own software with their own hardware was one of the big no-nos.
OS/2 was also lighter, faster, better at handling load, and more flexible than Windows NT up to (and arguably through) Windows NT 4.0. Windows had the applications, of course, but performancewise it couldn't touch an OS/2 server. Linux probably couldn't touch it either in terms of sheer performance or multithreading, but of course Linux is far more portable.:-):-)
FWIW, NT and OS/2 share *very* little code. Windows NT was completely rewritten after the IBM/Microsoft split by Dave Cutler and crew before its initial release in Windows NT 3.1 in 1993, and the OS/2 kernel was rewritten by IBM between OS/2 1.3 and the release of OS/2 2.0 in 1992.
While some of the OS/2 code remained in NT in places like the 16-bit OS/2 VIO subsystem and the HPFS filesystem (PINBALL.SYS), it wasn't that much. And while some Microsoft code likely still exists in OS/2 (HPFS, etc.), I don't think the amount of actual remaining MS code is all that great anymore.
IBM actually took over with the 16-bit OS/2 1.3, but OS/2 2.0 and later were redesigned 32-bit versions with a lot of new code including:
* The WorkPlace Shell (the SOM-based OO desktop) * The MVDM subsystem allowing for multiple highly configurable DOS virtual machines * The WinOS2 subsystem, effectively a tweaked Widnows 3.0 (later Windows 3.1) running in a VDM
Those were the Big Three features in the 32-version, and all were added by IBM after the Microsoft split.
The user interface doesn't hang all the time unless you're doing something strange -- even the well-known SIQ issue is a nonissue on recent releases. The WorkPlace shell is HEAVILY multithreaded, and its mouse button usage is quite consistent and also configurable (e.g., if you want your context menus to appear with the left button instead of the right, it's easy to change). The differention between left and right button usage for selection and dragging might take some getting used to, but there are advantages to it, and OS/2 wasn't the first to do that (check out Geoworks Ensemble's GeoManager, for example, which does much the same thing).
OS/2 follows IBM's CUA guidelines religiously, as do most modern OSes. Just because it isn't what you're used to doesn't make it an inferior choice.
All folder and desktop context menus were configurable via drag-and-drop (you could add commonly used programs to any of 'em), program icons were stored as extended attributes in the filesystem, shortcut icons were able to track the files they were attached to across drives, and the most common ways of launching programs were the Launchpad and the Warpcenter toolbar.
If you think OS/2 2.0 and later were at all like Win 3.1, you simply weren't paying attention.
Perhaps you're remembering Windows NT 3.1 instead?
Heh. Remind me... Which other desktop OSes came with ANY voice recognition or navigation features back in 1996?
How about today?
OS/2 was so far ahead of it's time on so many levels, from obvious things like the WorkPlace Shell to its superlative multithreading, its marvelous task prioritization for desktop users, its ability to not only run Windows 3.1 in a highly configurable virtual machine but to also preemptively juggle said machines AND interleave their display windows alongside each other and with native PM windows, and its ability to boot and run under *incredibly* tight hardware constraints (Warp 3 only required **4MB** if using TSHELL, or 8MB if using the WPS).
It's said that so many people seem to have no clue about its capabilities.
My main tool for figuring it all out was to use exuberant ctags to create a tags file, and Nedit to navigate through the source under Solaris, with a little grep thrown in. I also used gdb with the DDD front-end to do a little real-time snooping.
My first video game was Pong at a local (Minnetonka, MN) Shakey's Pizza Parlor. That was such a cool game!! Or not. But it *was* fun at the time. I paid money to play it.:-)
I also have a Compaq Proliant 2500 with Mandrake 8.2 on it playing fileserver, but three 18GB disks just don't go very far these days.:-) Besides, the LinkStation was great -- just plug it in, plug in the network cable, turn it on, and use a browser on some other machine to bring up the web-based control interface. It's really easy.
* Opinionated about which technologies are better for various usages * Very uncomfortable about the idea of working with a technology he doesn't believe to be "right"
NO, NO, NO!
A good programmer has an open mind and makes decisions after thought, study, and understanding the users' needs; not based on some knee-jerk personal prejudice.
With all due respect, not all opinions and beliefs about technology are "knee-jerk" or were born in a vacuum.
Many of those beliefs, biases, preferences, etc., are the product of years of hard experience trying to fit square pegs into round holes (mostly in vain) at the behest of others who didn't see the issues involved until the negative consequences were clearly demonstrated in a production environment. Not all managers understand that their technical people are serious when they say "it won't work"...
I do agree with your main point (knee-jerk is usually bad), but just wanted to pick a nit because it's friday.:-)
If you're gonna use spelling as a criteria, be sure to keep in mind that there are a several variants of English (as well as just about every other natural language in existence), and while you might not consider "favour" to be a (the?) correct spelling of "favor", the programmer you're evaluating might, and this would not detract from the "attention to detail" argument.
Speaking as someone who works in an international company and regularly collaborates with technical folks in the UK and Australia, I strongly agree. Just because they have different spelling standards doesn't make them incorrect. Just wrong.:-)
I don't want to waste five years of my life implementing some POS idea by Joe Random MBA that is never going to make a dime.
If you get a paycheck, what does it matter?
Some people actually like to see their code run in production and helping people or customers in some way.
I've had a few pieces of code running in a major airline's flight ops system for almost 20 years now, for example, and it feels rather good to know that some of my hard work is still doing its thing day after day.
In most of the shops I've worked in, the two are one and the same (that is, most programmers are fairly experienced, and they perform the "project management" tasks for all but the most complex projects).
Every programming language/framework has its own set of advantages and disadvantages. The trick is determining if a given language and/or framework does what you want in the way you want it done.
There are reasons my employer doesn't use Java everywhere, for example, and reasons why C or C++ is preferred in some contexts at my workplace while other languages are preferred in others.
In other words, it's quite possible that a given solution works very well for some people and can't cut it at all for others. One size of development tool does NOT fit all.
That's what I use -- a little 250GB LinkStation Pro with a DriveStation (250GB external USB hard disk) as a backup drive for the file server. It works wonderfully.
Tech skills get you in the door. Good development and communications skills make you a valuable part of the team, and in the long run they'll mean a lot more to your cow orkers than a laundry list of eventually-to-be-obsoleted technical skills.
DirectX is an Illusionist cantrip, right? Or was that WinFS? I forget.:-)
AD&D probably doesn't have cantrips anymore, huh? Man. Why did they have to change orignal AD&D, anyway? Besides, RQ1 was always a better system. Now get off my lawn and all that or I'll hit you with a 30-die Wizards Wrath...
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Yes, I think you're right. By the time I ran into OS/2 in 1992, I'd been out of college for over four years, was still very much single, and had one major hobby -- personal computers. :-) Well, collecting CDs, too, but the PC stuff took over VERY quickly once I discovered the local BBS scene, RIME, Fido, etc. in 1989.
:-)
:-) Since Windows stuff had gotten a lot better, I started caring a lot more about Windows software, but by then I had the hardware to run it.
The cost of OS/2 was trivial, of course -- US$99 for the upgrade from Windows. But I spent roughly 5K on a new box at that point (built by a cow orker of mine at Unisys) specifically for upgrading to OS/2, and I stuck in a second IDE drive not too long afterwards because I needed more space for Windows and DOS stuff and I also wanted to play with Linux (in the form of SLS 0.99). Heh. I was triple booting in the fall of 1992.
My main attraction to OS/2 had nothing at all to do with Windows, though, which is why our perceptions of resource requirements differ. I didn't care about WinOS2. Most of the "good" Windows application stuff out there was far too expensive for a home user, Windows games really sucked, and Windows shareware apps tended to not be very interesting with a few notable exceptions.
No, I was a BBSer, and I wanted OS/2 for one thing: Virtual DOS Machines!
I was a VERY heavy user of wonderful DOS programs like Telemate, SLiMeR, 4DOS, WordPerfect 5.0 (which I do admit I paid a pretty paenny for), Stereo Shell, etc. OS/2 let me run all of them concurrently in virtual machines, but more to the point -- I could use Telemate in the background with my new USR V.32 + 14.4HST/DS V.Surfboard internal modem (a big hinking fullsized card with a fullsized daughterboard I picked up from the sysop of a local BBS for a mere $500 used), and other DOS programs wouldn't skip a beat. So I could run a Telemate script to run off and dial ExecPC, Channel 1, and all sorts of other BBSes in the background, grabbing file lists and the QWK packets I wanted from local BBSes (as well as Delphi forum captures), and I could be doing something else all the while.
Under Windows, I had two choices: reboot to vanilla DOS and run Telemate, or suffer through all sorts of dropped packets using a native comm program. OS/2 was lightyears ahead of those options!!
By 1994, I had added more RAM to make a 20MB box, I'd added a DX4/100 OverDrive processor, and I'd added an Adaptec 1542 SCSI controller and a 3.6GB 5.25" Full Height SCSI drive -- a hot monster that made my whole fullsize tower case shake back and forth when it did rapid seeking!
Summary: I think my overall impression of OS/2 was so positive because I used it as a DOS multitasker, and I didn't really use the high-resource WinOS2 subsystem much at all until well after I had enough hardware to not care so much.
I agree that it's probably enough to make IBM pause.
BTW -- I still run OS/2 on PPro hardware. Try running any current Linux variant on something that slow and come back to me after doing your own comparison. Linux is perceptively slower in almost all contexts, and I'm not just talking about GUI stuff -- I'm talking about user experience on the CLI on a machine under load.
Just anecdotal evidence, of course. If I had some way to benchmark it, I would.
eComStation (a repackaged version of the OS/2 4.52 client with various add-ons) has a LiveCD version available here: eCS 1.2 Demo CD
Wow. More comments from the clueless (in terms of what OS/2 is, not in terms of tech in general).
:-)
:-)
.inputrc file to modify command editing and history searching and some third-party utilities, but it still feels like a hack in comparison. Personal taste.
Please learn more about OS/2 before spewing such crap, okay? If it was as easy as you say, some of us would not still be running OS/2.
The OS/2 API is emphatically NOT the Windows API, though there are some similarities for obvious reasons, and some OS/2 software is heavily multithreaded as OS/2 was optimized to run such code. It wasn't rare at all to see a program spawning a dozen threads or more even back in the 486 days. Try that under Windows. Or Linux at the time.
The WPS is implemented as a series of SOM objects which support full third-party extensibility with inheritence and the whole OO enchilada. Nothing in the Linux world currently comes close as an OO desktop framework. Good luck reimplenting that from scratch unless you have a few decades of time to spare.
What is it in OS/2 that I need?
Two things -- support for a few programs like Embellish that GIMP and Pixel, etc., still can't tough for OO layerd graphics manipulation, and a command-line environment that comes close to 4OS2 in friendliness and interactive power. Bash can be made to emulate a 4OS2 command line with a good
I've been using Linux since SLS 0.99plsomething alongside OS/2, and I still prefer OS/2 for most of the common tasks I do. Linux can do just about everything these days that OS/2 can, even more, but that doesn't make it a more comfortable choice, and it's also a lot heavier these days. Even DSL and Puppy are heavier (and thus slower) than Warp 4 on similar hardware.
Sorry, but I used OS/2 2.0, 2.1, and 2.11 (GA+SP) on an 8MB 486DX/33 machine for years, and it was fine. Set the swap file to a second drive and a fixed size, and it ran quite well (software loading could be a little slow, though). Even WinOS2 was fine in terms of performance on such a machine.
:-)
Warp 3 was released and optimized for that hardware, so in some ways it was actually faster.
Keep in mind that most Photoshop users and such would not be using such minimal hardware.
Yuo're right that Windows 3.1 was lighter in its requirements, but it was also lighter in functionality and (more importantly) stability. And did you ever try to use a 9600bps or faster modem under Windows 3.1?? Ugh...
IBM was under a federal Consent Decree back then, so even if they were still an 800-lb gorilla, they were explicitly forbidden from taking certain actions.
Why do you think Microsoft was given a shot at the DOS contract in the first place? I'm sure IBM would have much rather provided its own simple OS, but bundling their own software with their own hardware was one of the big no-nos.
I can't image why anyone would want to drive a classic Mustang. Can it do anything that a modern Honda Accord can't do?
:-)
See the point?
OS/2 was also lighter, faster, better at handling load, and more flexible than Windows NT up to (and arguably through) Windows NT 4.0. Windows had the applications, of course, but performancewise it couldn't touch an OS/2 server. Linux probably couldn't touch it either in terms of sheer performance or multithreading, but of course Linux is far more portable. :-) :-)
FWIW, NT and OS/2 share *very* little code. Windows NT was completely rewritten after the IBM/Microsoft split by Dave Cutler and crew before its initial release in Windows NT 3.1 in 1993, and the OS/2 kernel was rewritten by IBM between OS/2 1.3 and the release of OS/2 2.0 in 1992.
While some of the OS/2 code remained in NT in places like the 16-bit OS/2 VIO subsystem and the HPFS filesystem (PINBALL.SYS), it wasn't that much. And while some Microsoft code likely still exists in OS/2 (HPFS, etc.), I don't think the amount of actual remaining MS code is all that great anymore.
IBM actually took over with the 16-bit OS/2 1.3, but OS/2 2.0 and later were redesigned 32-bit versions with a lot of new code including:
* The WorkPlace Shell (the SOM-based OO desktop)
* The MVDM subsystem allowing for multiple highly configurable DOS virtual machines
* The WinOS2 subsystem, effectively a tweaked Widnows 3.0 (later Windows 3.1) running in a VDM
Those were the Big Three features in the 32-version, and all were added by IBM after the Microsoft split.
The user interface doesn't hang all the time unless you're doing something strange -- even the well-known SIQ issue is a nonissue on recent releases. The WorkPlace shell is HEAVILY multithreaded, and its mouse button usage is quite consistent and also configurable (e.g., if you want your context menus to appear with the left button instead of the right, it's easy to change). The differention between left and right button usage for selection and dragging might take some getting used to, but there are advantages to it, and OS/2 wasn't the first to do that (check out Geoworks Ensemble's GeoManager, for example, which does much the same thing).
OS/2 follows IBM's CUA guidelines religiously, as do most modern OSes. Just because it isn't what you're used to doesn't make it an inferior choice.
All folder and desktop context menus were configurable via drag-and-drop (you could add commonly used programs to any of 'em), program icons were stored as extended attributes in the filesystem, shortcut icons were able to track the files they were attached to across drives, and the most common ways of launching programs were the Launchpad and the Warpcenter toolbar.
If you think OS/2 2.0 and later were at all like Win 3.1, you simply weren't paying attention.
Perhaps you're remembering Windows NT 3.1 instead?
Heh. Remind me... Which other desktop OSes came with ANY voice recognition or navigation features back in 1996?
How about today?
OS/2 was so far ahead of it's time on so many levels, from obvious things like the WorkPlace Shell to its superlative multithreading, its marvelous task prioritization for desktop users, its ability to not only run Windows 3.1 in a highly configurable virtual machine but to also preemptively juggle said machines AND interleave their display windows alongside each other and with native PM windows, and its ability to boot and run under *incredibly* tight hardware constraints (Warp 3 only required **4MB** if using TSHELL, or 8MB if using the WPS).
It's said that so many people seem to have no clue about its capabilities.
No such size issues with SCSI disks. :-)
I've since added both cscope and freescope, as well as the old Red Hat Source Navigator for good measure.
My first video game was Pong at a local (Minnetonka, MN) Shakey's Pizza Parlor. That was such a cool game!! Or not. But it *was* fun at the time. I paid money to play it. :-)
I also have a Compaq Proliant 2500 with Mandrake 8.2 on it playing fileserver, but three 18GB disks just don't go very far these days. :-) Besides, the LinkStation was great -- just plug it in, plug in the network cable, turn it on, and use a browser on some other machine to bring up the web-based control interface. It's really easy.
With all due respect, not all opinions and beliefs about technology are "knee-jerk" or were born in a vacuum.
Many of those beliefs, biases, preferences, etc., are the product of years of hard experience trying to fit square pegs into round holes (mostly in vain) at the behest of others who didn't see the issues involved until the negative consequences were clearly demonstrated in a production environment. Not all managers understand that their technical people are serious when they say "it won't work"...
I do agree with your main point (knee-jerk is usually bad), but just wanted to pick a nit because it's friday. :-)
Speaking as someone who works in an international company and regularly collaborates with technical folks in the UK and Australia, I strongly agree. Just because they have different spelling standards doesn't make them incorrect. Just wrong. :-)
Sorry, I mean different. :-) :-)
Some people actually like to see their code run in production and helping people or customers in some way.
I've had a few pieces of code running in a major airline's flight ops system for almost 20 years now, for example, and it feels rather good to know that some of my hard work is still doing its thing day after day.
In most of the shops I've worked in, the two are one and the same (that is, most programmers are fairly experienced, and they perform the "project management" tasks for all but the most complex projects).
It shouldn't be an issue. All good programmers read Slashdot. :-)
Every programming language/framework has its own set of advantages and disadvantages. The trick is determining if a given language and/or framework does what you want in the way you want it done.
There are reasons my employer doesn't use Java everywhere, for example, and reasons why C or C++ is preferred in some contexts at my workplace while other languages are preferred in others.
In other words, it's quite possible that a given solution works very well for some people and can't cut it at all for others. One size of development tool does NOT fit all.
That's what I use -- a little 250GB LinkStation Pro with a DriveStation (250GB external USB hard disk) as a backup drive for the file server. It works wonderfully.
Tech skills get you in the door. Good development and communications skills make you a valuable part of the team, and in the long run they'll mean a lot more to your cow orkers than a laundry list of eventually-to-be-obsoleted technical skills.
DirectX is an Illusionist cantrip, right? Or was that WinFS? I forget. :-)
AD&D probably doesn't have cantrips anymore, huh? Man. Why did they have to change orignal AD&D, anyway? Besides, RQ1 was always a better system. Now get off my lawn and all that or I'll hit you with a 30-die Wizards Wrath...