Exploring "un-Windows" alternatives

Hi Mary!

I think the story of IBM, Microsoft, and Apple (and other early movers and shakers in the PC industry) - is absolutely fascinating....

I read the book "Accidental Empires" by Robert Cringely - it's a fascinating book, I highly recommend it! My feeling (with the benefit of hindsight) is that part of Microsoft's ingenuity was making its operating systems backwards-compatible.... So that, you could run your old programs on any new operating system they came out with. This was a stroke of genius!

I think if Apple had done this with its Macintosh (so that it could have run Apple II software), Apple still could be in front today.... By making operating systems NOT backwards compatible, they gave their established users a "chance" to move to the competing systems!

As far as I know, back in the early 80s, Microsoft was the only company making everything backwards-compatible.... None of the other big PC makers of the time (Apple, Commodore, Atari, Sinclair, Tandy, etc.) were doing this.... And partly due to this (along with their collaboration with IBM's brand name), Microsoft kept streaking ahead! They managed to keep their customers loyal....

I think this ties in with what you were saying about people not being willing to switch to the OS/2 - people like to keep using their old software!

This is one thing which I don't like about Windows XP - it doesn't seem to be fully backwards-compatible.... (Which I think may be a mistake on Microsoft's part....)

- Dien Rice
(Cut my teeth on the Commodore-64 :) )