#: 7907 S15/Hot Topics
    29-Oct-90  21:43:27
Sb: #7906-#OSK Software
Fm: Kevin Darling (UG Pres) 76703,4227
To: Kevin Darling (UG Pres) 76703,4227 (X)



The real kinship of Unix and OS9 is in the variety of hardware installations.
Fairly closed systems such as those on the Amiga and Mac and PCs, had one great
advantage: knowing what the hardware is going to be like.  Even on the CoCo,
programmers could assume certain screen types, for instance.  To some extent
this is changing (Windows 3.0, color Macs)... but notice that figuring out
solutions is taking _enormous_ programmer resources at those companies.

And as I noted on Bitnet lately, solutions in the Unix world are highly geared
towards the C user _only_.  Their libraries hide a lot of gory details. Jumping
subjects for a second, Mac programs also hide many details (from the user), and
so are complex.  Ever hear of a casual Mac user writing a windowing program,
such as Coco users often do?   Jump again: Microsoft says that an "experienced
C programmer (with MS Driver Course diploma) averages 4-6 months to write his
first OS/2 device driver." (!)

X programs are still rare too... the learning curve is huge, and unless
Desqview/X changes things, the overwhelming majority of X apps will continue
(as now) to be developed for "in house" use only by major companies.

Okay, now let's get to the real key point:  what makes any OS really unique? 
Multitasking? No, that can be emulated or done by others. Visually fancy
programs?  Nah.  Easy to use programs?  Nope.  Choice of runnable hardware? 
Not really.  Modularity?  Not unique nowadays.

So why use OS9?  What is the key attraction of OS9? (And by close extension,
the CORE which we must somehow continue to provide in any display solution?) In
other words, why do people stick with OS9?

=> To me, the key to OS9's uniqueness was and is, that it's relatively simple
to learn, understand and program for... from _any_ language.  How to accomodate
this main precept should be one of the focii of discussion.  Ideas?  Termcap
libraries for all languages (Basic, C, asm, Pascal, shell scripts?!), for
instance?  Or am I all wet? 

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