From: evan@telly.on.ca (Evan Leibovitch) Subject: Re: Linux beoming a real choice? Date: Thu, 10 Jun 1993 15:51:01 GMT
In article <1993Jun08.035452.1353@ksmith.com>
keith@ksmith.com (Keith Smith) writes:
>In fact SCO has more *ix out than all the other UNIX'es _combined_, and
>there is more shrink wrap 3rd party software and hardware support for
>SCO than all other Unix'es combined.
With the COSE announcement, SCO, Univel, and a bunch of other
(relatively significant) Unix players recognized that the above kind of
cheerleading has been damaging to this industry.
If SCO (or Univel, or whomever...) is superior to the competition because
it is smaller, or more robust, or more flexible, or better price/performance,
or easier to use, more power to them. But the industry has recognized that
being able to run more applications than the others *should* not be a
competitive criteria.
It is precicely this kind of competition basded on compatibility that has
kept the Unix industry so fragmented, arguing about whose GUI is prettier
than the other or whose binary standards are superior, and it has played
right into the hands of the Unix bashers like Gates.
One of the big advantages of Unix was supposed to be its portability, no?
It has taken the threat of a mega-hyped piece of vapourware to convince
the vendors that there are many areas in which they can compete, without
having to fight over compatibility issues. "What's most important about
COSE," SCO VP Jim Wilt told me at UniForum, "is that it determines the
interfaces, but doesn't decree the underlying mechanisms we use to get there."
The fact that hardware piece X supports Intel Unix brand A and not B
has been a condemnation of the entire market. Many companies have just
ignored porting their software or drivers to Unix because of what is
seen as a jungle of different interfaces and "standards". That hurts us
all.
We have been through this long enough to know that the use of
third-party compatibility issues as a competitive tool has
inflicted more long-term harm than good on this industry.
Indeed, having such a huge installed base as SCO has is a great
benefit -- but also a great burden, of backwards (and sometimes
forwards) compatibility issues.
--
Evan Leibovitch, Sound Software Ltd., located in beautiful Brampton, Ontario
evan@telly.on.ca / uunet!utzoo!telly!evan / (416) 452-0504
The simple truth is that the truth is never simple -- Linda Ellerbee