Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2007/09/01

[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]

Subject: [Leica] Re: M9 (Osborne sub-thread)
From: jbm at jbm.org (Jeff Moore)
Date: Sat Sep 1 12:19:52 2007
References: <200708312220.l7VMJYdQ064567@server1.waverley.reid.org> <8BD0D14C-AD5E-4D33-9757-2629FE98AD00@optonline.net> <46D8E70D.9050104@sbcglobal.net>

Gee, for a post purporting to correct someone else's, there are a lot of
errors here.

2007-09-01-00:14:05 Bill Larsen:
> You are forgetting a lot of things.  The Osborne was not a laptop, it 
> was a computer where the screen disconected from the case with a cable 
> still there

Nope.  The monitor was fixed in the case, between the floppy drives.
Just the keyboard hinged down.

> (and I never weighed the thing...  but I think it was closer 
> to 35 lbs)..

More like 24, FWIW.

> It was introduced after IBM brought out their PC.

April, 1981: Osborne 1
August, 1981: IBM PC
(1982: Kaypro II, another important part of this story)

> The OS was CPM which was a derivative of "Microsoft-IBM DOS.

Uh, no.  CP/M, an OS for 8-bit microprocessors with strong interface
similarities to some of the simpler DEC monitors for the PDP-11
minicomputers, dates back at least as far as 1974, and was being
commercialized by 1977.  MS-DOS is derived from CP/M-80.

Digital Research, Gary Kildall's company which provided CP/M, eventually
made a CP/M version compatible enough with the later MS-DOS's
application interface to be used in its place.  I routinely preferred
DR-DOS to MS-DOS, both for efficiency and for reduced bugginess, but
once Microsoft realized they were in danger of having their market
cannibalized by a superior product, they resorted to their usual
anticompetitive practices to kill DR-DOS.

 -Jeff M

Replies: Reply from abridge at gmail.com (Adam Bridge) ([Leica] Re: M9 (Osborne sub-thread))
Reply from von-ohlen at sbcglobal.net (Bill Larsen) ([Leica] Re: M9 (Osborne sub-thread))
In reply to: Message from lrzeitlin at optonline.net (Lawrence Zeitlin) ([Leica] Re: M9)
Message from von-ohlen at sbcglobal.net (Bill Larsen) ([Leica] Re: M9)