Re: History of OS/2

[Bill Troop billtroop@xxxxxxxx]

This article should not be taken as gospel in every respect.


For example, examining the following paragraph,


> The trouble with protected mode
> in the 286 was that when you were in it, you couldnt get back to real
> mode without a reboot. Without real mode it was very difficult to run
> MS-DOS programs, which expected to have full access and control of the
> computer at all times. Bill Gates knew everything about the 286 chip and
> called it
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_80286#cite_note-11," but for Intel, it was a transitional CPU that
> led to many of the design decisions of its successor. 


It is untrue to say that you couldn't get back to 286 real mode without a
reboot. At least two methods were known and used by Locus Computing in
their Merge/286 product, which allowed users to run DOS and Unix
simultaneously, with remarkable stability. I know, because I wrote an
article about this program for PC Tech Journal back in the day. The only
problem was finding users who wanted to do this.


I also am a little taken aback by asseverations that Gates knew all (or
anything) about the 286 chip. Steve Gibson has pointed out that he cannot
even pronounce the middle syllable of the word 'processor'.


I may have missed it, but I think the author failed to note that parts of
the NY Subway system are still run on OS/2 - - there was a more cautious
article on this subject last year at Time:


http://techland.time.com/2012/04/02/25-years-of-ibms-os2-the-birth-death-and-afterlife-of-a-legendary-operating-system/; eudora="autourl">
http://techland.time.com/2012/04/02/25-years-of-ibms-os2-the-birth-death-and-afterlife-of-a-legendary-operating-system/


And of course it is often said (with what truth I know not) that it can
run for as long as a decade without requiring a reboot.