AT&T Joining OSF

[Anthony A. Datri]

In article <722 at mcrware.UUCP> jejones at mcrware.UUCP (James Jones) writes:
>In article <63717 at sun.uucp>, pope at vatican (John Pope) writes:
>>In article <24355 at bu-cs.BU.EDU>, madd at bu-cs (Jim Frost) writes:
>>>[...] IBM became big by being reliable; they never
>>>did anything really new so what they had was most likely going to
>>>work.
>> Aren't you ignoring things like RISC and Virtual Memory?...
>No doubt many people will point at the Ferranti Atlas and Burroughs large
>systems (B5000 et seq.) as virtual memory systems predating the 370 by
>quite a few years.

Actually, I think IBM became big largely by being there.  They built up
a decent office machine business, and they started leasing mid-range
computers, which made them affordable.  Then around 1963-4, they
invested something like One Billion bucks in the 360 project.  Of course,
as a side effect, they're still building 360's, and still running
OS/360 on them.  At one point IBM modified two (2) 360/65's to have
virtual memory, and called it the 360/67, as a test to see if virtual
memory would work.  CMU had one of them.  As I understand it, the 370
is basically a 360 with vm.

This is all from the various computer history books I have, recalled
from memory.  IBM has indeed come up with a lot of things -- the
floppy, for example.  One of my gripes with them is that they refuse
to abandon the brain-damage of yesteryear.  EBCDIC.  Operating systems
that treat users like card readers.  EBCDIC.  Stupid networking.  EBCDIC.

  And, of course, there's the interesting bit that KERMIT came about because
of Columbia's difficulites in transferring files to and from anIBM mainframe.

-- 
@disclaimer(Any concepts or opinions above are entirely mine, not those of my
	    employer, my GIGI, or my 11/34)
beak is								  beak is not
Anthony A. Datri,SysAdmin,StepstoneCorporation,stpstn!aad