Databook for OS/2

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by David Both

Original site: http://www.databook.bz/?page_id=2704

Notes

This is a partial reconstruction of some of the information contained in the original DataBook for OS/2. In most places, where the data is available, I have kept the original Lotus Notes headings for the pages. This provides a bit of a historical context for the pages as the headers contain dates and times that the documents were created and last updated in Notes.

Most of the original illustrations are missing, even though the captions are still part of the text. I may recreate those, but please don’t hold your breath.

Note that many of the entries in this DataBook for OS/2 were written over 15 years ago. Keep that in mind as you read them and don’t laugh too hard. ;-)

Thanks

Thanks to WD “Bill” Loughman of Berkeley, California for sending me his downloads of some of the pages of the original DataBook for OS/2. Using that data, I am recreating the pages that he has saved. This is a great boon for anyone still using OS/2.

Unfortunately, much more data is still missing. If you, by any chance, have downloaded and saved any pages from the DataBook for OS/2, I would be very appreciative if you would zip them up and send them to me.

Forward

Chapter:1 – Front Material
Subsection: 2 – Other Stuff
Document Number:01
Topic: Forward
Date Composed: 10-27-96 02:06:52 PM Date Modified: 11-16-98 08:55:17 PM

I started writing this DataBook as a database for my own use in my consulting business, Millennium Technology, Inc. Over a period of time, I realized that my customers could use much of the data I had collected in my database. As it became clear that I could provide this data as a value-add to my current customers, it also became apparent that many others could benefit from this information as well.

At first, I intended to write a book and have one of the mainstream book publishers publish it. Well not many of them seem to be interested in Warp these days. Most of the “real” book publishers seem to have jumped on the Windows bandwagon.

With that problem staring me in the face, and since I have been creating the database anyway, and since I was going to make it available on the internet to my own customers, I decided to make it generally available for a one time access fee. I was also encouraged in my efforts by some of the good folks at (the now defunct) Indelible Blue, Inc. who told me that many of their customers are looking for information about Warp. Unfortunately IB has had no recommendations for books about Warp, especially Warp Server and Warp 4.

It is my hope that the $50 fee will be low enough to attract those who really need access to this type of data – along with the fact that the DataBook will never be out of date. As new Warp products are released by IBM, this DataBook will be updated to include them. The intent of the DataBook for OS/2 Warp is to provide information about all versions of IBM’s OS/2 Warp – to fill the gap which exists since the hardcopy book publishers don’t seem interested in the OS/2 Warp community.

Perhaps the DataBook and its kindred will soon be the “real” books and paper books will be the exception.

Warp Products Covered by the DataBook For OS/2

The DataBook for OS/2 Warp covers the following Warp products:

  • Warp 3
  • Warp 4
  • Warp Connect
  • Warp Server
  • WorkSpace on Demand
  • Warp Server for e-business


OS/2 Books Reference

These are the books I have found most useful in working with OS/2 Warp over the years. Combined, they cover much of the material that I had included in the old DataBook® for OS/2.

Obtaining these books may be somewhat problematic these days, but there are still a few around. I do have several copies of “Inside OS/2 Warp.” Table 1: OS/2 Reference Books Title ISBN Author(s) Publisher Description Inside OS/2 Warp 1-56205-378-7 Minasi, Camarda, Hallberg, Both, et. al. New Riders Publishing I co-authored this book and Chapter 22, “Troubleshooting” was reviewed as being, “A tour de force that will surely repay your $39.95.” That aside, this book is aimed at experienced users. It provides excellent coverage of everything from using the Desktop to how things work including an especially good, in-depth chapter of filesystems, and one on optimization. The OS/2 2.0 Handbook: Applications, Integration and Optimization 0-442-01234-9 Zack Van Nostrand Reinhold This book is a complete reference that discusses how to integrate DOS, Windows (3.1) and OS/2 applications. OS/2 Power User’s Reference 0-07-912218-3 Chapman McGraw-Hill This is a Tips and Techniques book using a “help desk” like Q&A format.

Chapter 1 – What is an Operating System and why is it Important?

The operating system you use on your computer is as important—or more so—than the hardware you run it on. This chapter of the DataBook for OS/2 discusses operating systems, why they are important, and why—at the time this was originally written—OS/2 was the best choice.

This chapter starts with a brief discussion of what OS/2 Warp really is, then proceeds with a brief introduction to the concepts, functions, and purposes of operating systems. It covers the basic tasks which an operating system performs.

This section also shows why the operating system of your computer is important to you. The importance of multitasking is covered and how multitasking enables you to use your computer more effectively. The different operating systems on the market today are discussed along with brief comparisons of OS/2, DOS, Windows 3.1, Windows 95, and Windows NT. Which of today’s operating systems are appropriate for business and which ones are appropriate for small business and home use are also discussed.

Scalability is extremely important; running the same operating system from laptops to servers can make life much simpler for the network administrator or the IS manager. Warp is the only operating system on the market today which can provide that level of scalability.

A short discussion of the history and versions of OS/2 is also included in this chapter.

Technology in Today’s Business

Computers are being used in almost every business today, both large and small. Small businesses especially find computers essential. One estimate places over 25.8 million computers in home offices alone, assuming only one computer per office. Most small offices have one or more computers. With more than 21 million small businesses in the United States today, the number of personal computers in use in the small office home office (SOHO) environment is probably between 50 million and 75 million.

The term “small business” is defined differently by many people and the definition even varies between industries. Virtually all definitions of small business, however, include more than 99.9% of all the business entities in America. With only certain exceptions, the same is true for most of the rest of the world.

Computers are supposed to increase our productivity and make us work more efficiently. But no one has really told us how to do that. At least they haven’t told those of us in small businesses. Paul and Sarah Edwards, in Working From Home (Putnam, 1994) consider a computer as essential as a telephone for the home office. Neither the Edwards’ books, as good as they are, nor any of the other books for small businesses discuss computers other than to tell you that you need one and to provide a very short discussion of some of the terms you need to know and a list of some components you might buy. Most books for small businesses make little or no effort to provide you with any guidance about the kinds of decisions you should be making.

Computers – A Competitive Advantage

Many business, both large and small, use computers today to perform many tasks necessary to the daily conduct of their operations. These tasks range from “simple” accounting chores, to graphics design, word processing, E-mail, fax and other electronic communications, knowledge or information storage and retrieval, financial analysis, and untold others. The list is as long as the number of people using computers in their businesses.

For the savvy business person, the computer can be a weapon to use against the competition. Intelligent application of computer technology in today’s business environment can mean the difference between mere survival and growing your business; between being one of the pack and being the leader of the pack. Appropriate use of computer technology can make your business more competitive. This is true for the very largest businesses as well as the very smallest, and for all of those which fall in between.

Since so many business people are already using computers, you might wonder how you can use computer technology in a way which might be different from everyone else and provide you with that competitive edge. At least part of the answer lies in using your existing or new computer technology to its fullest extent rather than wasting much of the power you paid for. In the next section we will look at a typical example of how most people use their computers today so that you can see what I mean.

Wasted Computing Power

Most of the computing power you have in your office is wasted. Your computers just do not have enough to do to keep them busy even a tiny fraction of the time.

Most computer users do at least some word processing, but this example could apply to accounting, database, spreadsheet, and many other types of applications as well. Let’s assume that our user has a fairly typical computer system – a 33 MHz 80486 processor with 8 MB of RAM and a 500 MB hard drive – and that he or she is a pretty good typist – say 75 words per minute.

Note: This “typical computer” is becoming less and less typical every day as faster Pentium and Pentium Pro systems replace the slower 80486 systems. However I choose to continue using this system for my example, because faster computers waste even more CPU cycles and time. A nice, slow computer provides a good foundation for the rest of this proposition.

Let’s look more closely at a couple of things before we go further with this scenario. You have seen the specification before, for a 33 MHz 80486 processor in this system. But what exactly does that mean? This specification is a measure of the processing power of the brain of the computer. 80486 defines the type of Intel processor chip installed in the computer, and 33 MHz represents the number of clock cycles per second and defines how fast that chip runs. The 80486 computer chip is capable of processing one computer instruction every 4 to 7 clock cycles. Therefore, a 33 MHz 80486 – at 33,000,000 clock cycles per second – should be capable of executing approximately 6,000,000 instructions every second.

Our typist can type about 75 words per minute and it takes about 1500 processor instructions to process each keystroke. If we assume an average of 6 characters per word, we get 6 characters x 75 words per minute / 60 seconds per minute = 7.5 characters per second. And 7.5 characters per second x 1500 instructions per character = 11,250 instructions per second are used to type this document. That leaves 5,988,750 instructions available for use each second which have been wasted. Over 99.8% of the available processing power in this computer has been wasted because the computer simply sits there waiting for the user to press the next key. One way to increase the efficiency of our computer technology is to use those otherwise wasted clock cycles.

All of these wasted clock cycles are not the fault of your hardware, rather they are caused by the fact that DOS was designed in such a manner that it can only perform one task at a time. DOS was designed this way because the original IBM PC, back in 1981, was developed using some invalid assumptions. One of those assumptions was that the PC would be used in a single-tasking environment; that is, it would be turned on at the beginning of the day, run one program all day, and then it would be turned off at night. If the PC was on the desk of an accountant, it would run an accounting application all day long. If it were on the desk of a financial analyst, it would run a spreadsheet. If this PC were on the desk of a secretary, it would run a word processor all day long. There was no basis in these assumptions to provide a multitasking capability – that is the capability to run more than one program at a time.

Why Multitasking?

The Need for Multitasking

When many of us who purchased our first PC back in 1981 or 1982 began to use them, we immediately discovered that we needed the ability to run multiple programs at the same time. For example, within a week of taking delivery of my first PC, I was writing a letter on it. During the course of this letter, I needed to make an arithmetic calculation. I did not have a calculator, but I did have this $5,000 computer; unfortunately I could not use it to do the calculation without some time-consuming procedures. I had to go through the following steps to make a calculation and get it into my document.

  • Save my document
  • Exit from the word processor
  • Insert a diskette with a calculator program
  • Start the calculator program
  • Make the calculations
  • Write down the result
  • Exit the calculator program
  • Insert the word processing diskette
  • Restart the word processor
  • Load the document on which I was working
  • Find my place in the document
  • Type in the number

Because so many early adopters of the PC encountered this same problem, companies like Borland created programs such as Sidekick which would load and remain silent and unused in memory while other programs – such as word processors – did the work required of it. When you needed a calculator, a calendar, a schedule, or so on, you pressed a couple keys and the desired utility program appeared on the screen, ready for use. Programs like Sidekick are called Terminate and Stay Resident programs, or TSRs. So, immediately after the original IBM PC became available back in 1981, people were already trying to overcome the intrinsic single tasking nature of DOS.

One way to make your computer more efficient is to put to use as many of those wasted CPU cycles as you can. That means that you need to add true multitasking to your computer. Multitasking also makes you more efficient because you can have the programs you need available when you need them. There are currently a number of operating systems which you can use and which will give you some form of multitasking.