Where you're inaccurate:
"IBM originally created it [OS/2] to compete with Microsoft.."
I can't imagine where this idea comes from. IBM always considered
Microsoft a business partner, not a competitor. To understand what
drove the creation of OS/2 you have to understand IBM's mainframe
hardware environment of the time. Apart from the big iron CPUs, IBM
developed oodles of custom hardware boxes for I/O channels, printer
controllers, disk controllers... you name it... if there was a need for
peripheral intelligence IBM built custom control boxes to do it... and
at *very great* expense. But with the advent of the PC the peripheral
design guys saw that here was a general purpose box that could be used
to replace most of that custom hardware at far lower cost. But what was
the impediment? Single tasking PC DOS and small memory size was the
impediment. To use inexpensive PC hardware for that task they needed a
multi-tasking OS and larger, virtual memory capability. That was the
actual and driving impetus to create OS/2.
But it was not the only reason. The original business plan for the IBM
PC was as a quick cash cow. The plan was to create 160,000 units and
then get out of the business... because that's what was deemed the size
of the market. So much for the plans of mice and men. The PC was
wildly successful beyond anyone's imagination. So OS/2 was also seen as
an improvement to the PC software, a means to support far more
sophisticated color graphics and a graphical windowing system and
ultimately expand the market even more.
Where you're inaccurate again:
"Microsoft got involved with the development of it to, as
Steve Ballmer put it, "Ride the Dragon's back". In other words, IBM was
too important a partner to lose, so MS helped them write OS/2 so they
could keep them close and keep an eye on them. They also could make
sure it wasn't that good." and "But IBM was so focused on keeping it
only on their hardware, while MS let anybody and everybody building an
x86-based box run Windows."
OS/2 was originally intended to be developed totally in-house.
Microsoft asked to be included and was. Exactly what their purpose was
(beyond a promise to IBM of speeding development and continuing their
existing PC business) I don't know. But certainly when Microsoft got
involved, if not before, the plan for Microsoft was still the same as it
had been. IBM developed and tested OS versions for its own hardware and
Microsoft for any of the compatible manufacturers who cared to buy it
for their own hardware. Those were and always had been the contractual
business agreements between Microsoft and IBM on distribution of the OS.
And Microsoft didn't just "let anybody and everybody" run Windows.
There were contractual relationships involved. These days (but not
then) hardware is so compatible due to standards that one can pretty
well expect the software to run on most any system.
But I have to chuckle at the notion that we might have needed MS to help
us with OS/2. Microsoft at the time was mostly a collection of
20-somethings fresh out of school. Full of vim and vigor but with
little or no experience in multi-tasking, virtual memory operating
systems or the organizational skills to manage a large scale software
development project (as in millions of lines of code). Those
technologies and organizational systems had been pioneered by IBM in the
development of OS/360 and OS/370 when Microsoft's developers were still
in grammar school or even younger. Ballmer's and Gates's decisions to
stick around was what allowed them to learn how to do that. Microsoft
did have a few very good designers but basically IBM taught Microsoft
how to do large scale development.
And I have no idea how Microsoft could "make sure it wasn't that good".
They would have had to be in complete control of design, development
and testing none of which was true. When they were in complete control
of design, development and testing with Windows it took them from (I'm
skipping the early failures) 1990 with Windows 3.0, 3.1, Windows 95,
Windows 98, Windows ME, Windows 2000 and Windows NT until finally
getting it mostly right in 2001 with Windows XP. But I will grant that
XP SP3 got it mostly right.
So, why did Microsoft *suddenly* bail out of OS/2 to go their own way
with Windows? My boss always said that it was the contract which
specified that each of us had to pay the other royalties on every copy
we sold. According to him that contract clause always grated on Bill
Gates as he hated to pay us royalties... probably because they sold more
copies than us. But we also did most of the work. For OS/2 Microsoft
said they could help us out by committing to do 60% of the total
development work. In fact they never met that committment. They did
about 40% and IBM had to make up the slack.
Actually, I'm surprised that IBM never sued them since Microsoft
abruptly broke their development contract with IBM when they pulled out.
But it's all water over the dam today.
Chuck Norcutt
On 1/12/2013 2:26 PM, Paul Braun wrote:
> Hmmm... that was what I always understood from various and sundry stories
> and authors....
>
> But if you were there, I'm going with your version.
>
>
> On Sat, Jan 12, 2013 at 1:23 PM, Chuck Norcutt <
> chucknorcutt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> Sound like a twisted Microsoft story. 'Tain't exactly true.
>>
>> Chuck Norcutt (who was there and whose boss signed the IBM/Microsoft
>> shared development contract for OS/2) :-)
>>
>>
>>
>> On 1/11/2013 2:32 PM, Paul Braun wrote:
>>> Wow.....
>>>
>>> What version? Warp 4? I'm suprised to see someone other than a bank
>>> machine still running OS/2, especially on the internet.
>>>
>>> Was an interesting OS. IBM originally created it to compete with
>>> Microsoft, but Microsoft got involved with the development of it to, as
>>> Steve Ballmer put it, "Ride the Dragon's back". In other words, IBM was
>>> too important a partner to lose, so MS helped them write OS/2 so they
>> could
>>> keep them close and keep an eye on them. They also could make sure it
>>> wasn't that good.
>>>
>>> In many ways, far superior to MS-DOS and Windows 95. But IBM was so
>>> focused on keeping it only on their hardware, while MS let anybody and
>>> everybody building an x86-based box run Windows.
>> --
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>
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