[SOC] Re: Can you believe this?

[Ian C. Purdie]

Charles Mabbott wrote:

> In light of what I read in the following article, have looked
> at the Imac OS X system.  For those Unix folks, it will rekindle
> a kindly flame in their hearts.......
>
>    http://www.apple.com/macosx/
>
> While not a stanch Apple fan, they have made some great strides.

Well, apart from the first computer I constructed myself back in 1977, wow a whole 2K of
memory and a hex pad. The next was the famous Apple II sometime around just before the
first IBM. I still love 6502 processors.

The biggest mistake Apple ever made was dumping Steve Jobs, removing open expandable
architecture and rigorously pursuing third party vendors, they had it all and handed it by
default to IBM and as a consequence Micro$oft - didn't he luck out?

*NO*, B.G. didn't invent DOS, he purchased a license at bargain basement prices from
Digital Research who had no idea what they had on their hands, neither did Apple as it
turns out.

Apple and Macintosh have always been synonymous to me, I have no idea as to the present
corporate structure, you would find it very hard to get an unkind comment on either except
for two truisms:

a) compared to a typical PC they are/were incredibly expensive, irrespective of perhaps
better performance.
b) a huge amount of popular software is simply not supported for that platform.

When you need to make hard business decisions it is difficult to go beyond mainstream. As
a fellow once commented to me, "MacIntosh is fine if your not in the publishing industry
[their stronghold] and you can afford to go with boutique beers. It's the "boutique beer"
of the PC world".

True...

FWIW

Also no mention of server applications... Regardless of the Micro$oft hype - advertising
campaign etc. I fail to see how they really will dislodge the "choice" of the majority -
Apache!

As I said earlier, only brain dead executives will plump for M$ in server applications. As
a number of web developer colleagues have commented:

"The reason the "suits" [executives] over-ride the advice of "prop heads" [programmers,
sys ops, our Rick] and "pony tails" [developers, designers] is that if something goes
horribly wrong (which it often does), they can then lay the blame on M$ ('course) to their
higher ups [even more brain dead] and plead by using M$ they took the wisest course of
action in installing it in the first place.

This is instead of, in the best "Yes Minister" traditions, having taken the alternative
"courageous" decision i.e. "Apache"

BTW do you know why it's named "Apache"?

72/73's

Ian C. Purdie
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