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Cyhist Jul 22 1996 D
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Date: Mon, 22 Jul 1996 23:29:47 -0700
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From: "A. Padgett Peterson P.E. Information Security" To: "Multiple recipients of list cpsr-history@cpsr.org" Subject: CM> Vaproware & MS-DOS
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Sender: "A. Padgett Peterson P.E. Information Security"
Subject: Vaproware & MS-DOS
> back, hasn't the tale now passed into legend
> about how Gates and his partner told IBM
> that they had an operating system ready for
> their forthcoming PC, and that it just needed
> a little tinkering... and then wrote DOS in a
> matter of months, thus getting in on the
> ground floor with a non-existant product, and
> deterring IBM from looking elsewhere?
May be an urban legend but it just ain't so. My recollection (by crackey), is
that Mr. Bill & co (didn't Pauul Allen do most of MS programming ?) said
"yup" & went to Seattle Computer Products where Tim Patterson has a thingy
called 86/DOS. MS leased it at first, then bought all rights around 1984
or so.
Tim is still around somewhere (see his columns in "Dr. Dobb's" occasionally,
why not ask him what happened ?
While we are on that subject, v1.0 (I have a copy *somewhere*) was pretty
basic. There was no "DEL" command - you used "ERASE", no directory structure
(but then the PC did not support hard disks in 1981). Back then most people
did not even buy an OS (wasn't it around $400 extra then ?) Instead running
almost completely off the built-in ROM BASIC (why IBM was talking to Mr.
Bill in the first place.)
Warmly,
Padgett
______________________________________________________________________
Reply-To: cpsr-history@Sunnyside.COM
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From: "A. Padgett Peterson P.E. Information Security" To: "Multiple recipients of list cpsr-history@cpsr.org" Subject: CM> Vaproware & MS-DOS
X-Listprocessor-Version: 9.1 -- List Server by Sunnyside Computing, Inc.
X-Comment: Discussion of history of computing
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Sender: "A. Padgett Peterson P.E. Information Security"
Subject: Vaproware & MS-DOS
> back, hasn't the tale now passed into legend
> about how Gates and his partner told IBM
> that they had an operating system ready for
> their forthcoming PC, and that it just needed
> a little tinkering... and then wrote DOS in a
> matter of months, thus getting in on the
> ground floor with a non-existant product, and
> deterring IBM from looking elsewhere?
May be an urban legend but it just ain't so. My recollection (by crackey), is
that Mr. Bill & co (didn't Pauul Allen do most of MS programming ?) said
"yup" & went to Seattle Computer Products where Tim Patterson has a thingy
called 86/DOS. MS leased it at first, then bought all rights around 1984
or so.
Tim is still around somewhere (see his columns in "Dr. Dobb's" occasionally,
why not ask him what happened ?
While we are on that subject, v1.0 (I have a copy *somewhere*) was pretty
basic. There was no "DEL" command - you used "ERASE", no directory structure
(but then the PC did not support hard disks in 1981). Back then most people
did not even buy an OS (wasn't it around $400 extra then ?) Instead running
almost completely off the built-in ROM BASIC (why IBM was talking to Mr.
Bill in the first place.)
Warmly,
Padgett
______________________________________________________________________
