Re: Where have all the Primates gone??

In article <bQ3Qe.6245$L77.5437@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
wright@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (David Wright) writes:
> In article <3msgrlF18kfipU1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
> Bill Gunshannon <bill@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>In article <9I6Oe.220$rS4.202@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
>> wright@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (David Wright) writes:
>>>
>>> I'm not trying to argue that technical superiority always wins; we
>>> have Microsoft and Cisco as shining counterexamples.
>>
>>Cisco? The only think I know Cisco does is buy out anything that might
>>be competition. (Anybody here remember the early days of networking
>>and a company called Wellfleet?)
>
> They're very good at FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt). A huge triumph
> of marketing over technology.

I would be interested in an explanation of this. I have been working
with Cisco at both the product and (a long timne ago) at the partner
level.

>
>>> But don't forget
>>> IBM's incredible stupidity in the original deal they cut with
>>> Microsoft.
>>
>>Like I said, it was a backroom deal. It was not done in IBM's best
>>interests. If Gerstner had been around then one has to wonder if
>>Microsoft would even still be around today.
>
> Good question. I still have no idea why the IBM people thought they
> were cutting a good deal.

It wasn't, it was a good deal for Bill Gates. Remember, his mother
worked for IBM and got him in to see people without having to
compete with anyone. I have seen no evidence to prove anything illegal
actually transpired, but for those who were around at the time the
whole business seemed rather shady.

>
>>> But the original DOS and Windows weren't even operating systems, they
>>> were just little "monitors". No security, no protection, etc etc etc.
>>
>>They were all anybody offered on machines of that class (well, except
>>for Unix, I guess.)
>
> Exactly. Something industrial-strength would have looked quite
> attractive.

If IBM had actually opened it up for competition. But they didn't.
It was apparently a one-man show.

>
>>> They didn't provide the features that a serious buyer would want.
>>> Being able to provide a full-fledged OS, vs some bit of hackery, would
>>> have been a strong selling point.
>>
>>Not necessarily, for the market they were attacking. Remember, it was
>>called a PC, Personal Computer. Businesses were not it's initial target
>>market.
>
> But they became so pretty fast. IBM wasn't taking out all those
> expensive Charlie Chaplin ads to sell onsies to the individual buyer.

By the time IBM decided they were sitting on a goldmine PCDOS was
too well entrenched to hope to replace it.

>
>>>>That being said, I would still love to see PRIMOS available for
>>>>PC class machines. (And other machines as well, like the VAX or
>>>>even the PDP-11 :-)
>>>
>>> That'd be fun, but Primos was awfully hardware-specific. That was the
>>> biggest problem with the idea of a 386 port.
>>
>>That is the very reason that has been given for over a decade as to why
>>VMS could never be ported to PC Class machines. Except that the PC can
>>emulate the VAX and VMS runs just fine on that emulator.
>
> If you can write a good 50-Series simulator, I have no doubt that a
> GHz (or faster) PC can simulate a 6650 faster than a 6650 could run.
> (I'm using the 6650 because that was the fastest thing in the product
> line when I left the company. I believe that faster processors came
> along soon after.)

And the starting point is already there in SIMH. All we need is
people with a much deeper understanding of the hardware than I ever
got. :-) I would be happy with just having my own personal 850. :-)

>
>>It would be fun to get them to release Primos to the Open Source
>>community and then start modernizing it.
>
> I agree. Primos had some really nice features, like the shared
> libraries with genuine dynamic linking, the command environment, and
> so on. It'd be interesting to see what people did with it. We'd have
> to have the right compilers available, of course. Ah, PLP...

Oh well, it's nice to dream anyway.

bill

--
Bill Gunshannon | de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n. Three wolves
bill@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx | and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.
University of Scranton |
Scranton, Pennsylvania | #include <std.disclaimer.h>
.

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