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Messages - PAUL555

#1
Whichever strategy is used, no OS can have wide acceptance unless it can be installed easily by a non experienced user and without any tweaking required. At least the basic Core hardware - Motherboard, Sound, Video, Drives and Network Cards need to be supported without adding in new features to the new versions of the OS. Wifi, Acpi e.t.c may be additional features which many users may or may not want.

Is there any chance that IBM will release the complete code of OS/2 to Serenity or any other vendor ?

Paul
#2
 So, from the discussions above, the lack of applications on Os/2 was for the following reasons :

(1) Windows development tools were easier to use than the equivalent tools on Os/2.    

(2) Windows development tools were less costly and / or available free of cost from Microsoft.    

(3) Windows 3.1 was easier to install on the PC hardware than OS/2.    

(4) OS/2 was itself offering the Win-OS/2 option, than why bother to code for native applications on OS/2.

(5) IBM itself was the worst enemy of OS/2 and was trying to kill off OS/2 after the Power PC debacle and after Lou Gerstner took over.

(6) Microsoft was pressurising PC manufacturers from installing OS/2 alongside windows or on its own.

(7) Microsoft put in code to prevent the newer Windows 3.11 applications from running on Win-Os/2.

Paul
#3

If Mac could make this happen, then there is no reason why other companies cannot make this happen. I understand that the end users(hobbyists) are not the core customers of Ecomstation. The core customers are obviously the government / large banks / large companies. I am assuming that Ecomstation right from version 1.0 is supporting the hardware used by those core customers.

My suggestion is only to avoid the long development time and effort (similar to what happened for Ecomstation 1.2 to 2.0 - around 6 years). The alternate suggestion is to have two versions of the OS, one for the core customers and one for the end user / hobbyist(which can increase worldwide sales). The only stumbling block in my opinion in more wider usage of Ecomstation is that it doesnt install and work out of the box on all hardware. Earlier the price was an issue, now that has been taken care of by Mensys since 2.0 came out. Every single review I have read on the Intenet of Ecomstation right from 1.0 to 2.0 has been of the installation failing or some hardware not working properly. This fact alone greatly discourages any new users from trying out Ecomstation on real hardware other than on virtual machine emulators. Other than Microsoft, in my opinion, I dont believe any company has the resources or the investment to support every single type of hardware out in the world. 


Paul

#4
I was wondering why Serenity Systems doesnt take the strategy of supporting only a fixed set of modern hardware, say 5 differant Video Cards, 5 differant motherboards, 5 differant hard disks, 5 differant network cards e.t.c from major manufacturers which are widely available throughout the world. This would greatly increase the sales of Ecomstation as the installations issues would not come up. The following year they should support the next version of those same hardware. This strategy would ensure that Ecomstation would be compatible with a limited set of of modern hardware in the future. Anyone wanting to build a personal computer for Ecomstation would use only those set of hardware and hence Ecomstation would be guaranteed to install correctly out of the box without needing any tweaking e.t.c similar to Windows. This would also greatly reduce the development time and effort for Serenity Systems and possibly increase worlwide sales.

Paul  
#5

All the applications mentioned in this thread other than Lotus Smartsuite are small applications from ISVs. What I was asking about was the commonly used applications from the larger companies such as Office, Wordperfect, Wordstar, Coreldraw, Norton Utilities, PC Tools, Internet Security suite e.t.c. Most of the applications that were developed for OS/2 seemed to have been from independent software vendors.

Paul
#6

What are the configuration changes which need to be done to get Internet working on Ecomstation 1.2 / 2.0 running on Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 Spk1 running on Win Xp Spk3 ? 

  Host - Win XP Spk3 running on a personal computer (Physical PC). 
           The Host(Physical PC) has an Internet connection thru Ethernet adapter network.

  Guest - Ecomstation 1.2 / 2.0 running on Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 Spk1. 

Paul
#7

One of the reasons given for the failure of OS/2 on the PC(other than the lack of vision of IBM) was due to the dearth of popular OS/2 applications as compared to the applications that existed for Windows. Was this because OS/2 applications were difficult to build or due to some other reason(s) ?

Paul
#8
Anyway, thanks to Serenity for keeping the OS/2 dream alive......

Paul
#9

Links for OS/2 is also available for download on www.bluenexus.net.

Paul
#10

I also read somewhere that wherever IBM was holding demonstations of OS/2 Warp 3.0 / 4.0, some guy from Microsoft would walk in with a program on a floppy disk to prove that he could crash Warp and thereby prove that it was not the crash protected OS that IBM claimed that it was. If this story is true, it clearly proves that Microsoft was dead scared that Warp would take over the desktop business. I have also heard from an IBM executive that development tools for Warp were much more expensive than the development tools on Windows.

Inspite of all this, I would state that Warp's Preemptive Multitasking and smooth response and the ability to run OS/2, Windows 3.1 and Dos applications is still unrivalled even by Windows 7, Linux and Mac. Not sure, how many of you would agree with me on this. 

Regards

Paul
#11
From what I have read on the internet, it was the failure of OS/2 Warp on the Power PC which caused Lou Gerstner to pull the plug on the continuation of the OS/2 development effort. Several billions were supposed to have been invested on the OS/2 Warp for Power PC development.

Also the problem of the single input queue in OS/2 Warp must have caused dissatisfied customers in applications and / or desktop hanging. I find it really strange that a problem like the single input queue should have come up in the design of an operating system which was expected to run preemtive multitasking, multithreaded mission critical applications.        

Paul
#12

Links Golf for OS/2 has come up on Prt Bay. Anyone looking for this game can check this out. Since the game is currently abanonware for Stardock, this notification should be okay in my opinion.

Paul 
#13

Since OS/2 Warp 4.0 faced major installation problems in installing onto Clones of the IBM PC made by Dell, Compaq, Gateway e.t.c, how come IBM did not resort to sales of IBM Personal Computer Hardware preinstalled with OS/2 Warp 4.0 / 4.52 in order to boost world wide sales of OS/2 instead of giving up to the Microsoft Win 95 bandwagon ? This question is related to the years of 1995 / 1996 when Win 95 had just come out.   

Paul
#14
What is the take on 2.0 GA, is it possible to automatically install on modern hardware ?

Paul
#15

There was supposed to have been a problem with the initial set of Ecomstation 2.0 GA cds. Has this been fixed in the latest downloadable ISO ? Also, what are the improvements over RC7 ? To purchase at the upgrade price, should there be a previous version of Ecomstation already installed ? Can a fresh install be done with the upgrade version of 2.0 GA ?

Paul