[vox] OS/2 and Linux, why has IBM changed?

[Kevin Hooke]

Quoting Tim Riley <timriley@timriley.net>
>I think the problem was technology because OS/2 was FUBAR
>shortly after I installed it around 1995.

Surely you can't mean that? As a PC based operating system OS/2 was (around
94-95) light years ahead in terms of technology compared to Windows at the
time, purely because it had been written from the ground up to be scalable
and reliable, unlike the Windows3.1/DOS legacy code that crept into Win95
that led it to be so unreliable.

OS/2 had full pre-emptive multitasking, and ran ( I think I've got the terms
right ?) purely in x86 protected mode, which meant badly written apps and/or
drivers did not crash the whole OS and PC - Windows3.1 at the time only had
co-operative multitasking and ran in x86 real mode. I believe even 95 when
it appeared still had a mix of real mode and protected mode code (do hw
drivers on 95 run in real mode?) which I beleive is why 95 is so unstable -
its easy to write buggy hw drivers that have unlimited access to the
underlying hardware and crash the whole os.

Why didn't OS/2 take off? In my opinion, lack of support from IBM itself,
and probably a screwed up relationship with Microsoft regarding the OS/2
kernel which was co-written with Microsoft - incidently, the same code that
later became the NT kernel... :-) I bet there was some legal pressure
somewhere regarding this arrangement that prevented IBM from fully pushing
OS/2.

Kevin