Poll: Back in the day... Did you think that Apple should have bought Be instead of NeXT? (be honest) [Archive]

wrc fan

Jul 2, 2003, 04:54 AM

Originally posted by MacBandit
Didn't Apple buy BeOS? As I remember Copland was based on Be and it wasn't until Steve came back that they bought Next (Steve's baby) and dumped the development of Copland and about a dozen other things.

No, Palm bought Be (and that was only a few years ago). Copland was Apple's faild next-gen OS, which lead to them considering to buy Be.

I wanted Apple to buy Be at the time. I had gotten a free copy with my PowerTower Pro and I was floored with how well it ran (and that was just a preview release). I still do think it was one of the most advanced and forward thinking OSes of it's time, and I wish that it had had success even when it switched to the PC.

Now I agree that buying NeXT was a good thing to do, but mainly just because it brought Steve Jobs back. OS X is nice, but BeOS runs a lot faster on my 200mhz 604e than OS X (even 10.3) runs on my 450mhz G4 Cube.

yzedf

Jul 2, 2003, 08:54 AM

At the time I thought both Be and NeXT were both junk. Be seemed to have more potential, and NeXT sold spiffy hardware (Cube).

It seems to have worked out OK, so I don't really care much either way.

gerror

Jul 2, 2003, 09:24 AM

At the time I set my money on Be. Just because it looked good. I was a little younger then ;)

Rocketman

Jul 2, 2003, 09:37 AM

Originally posted by arn
I don't believe that to be true. BeOS was still in development. I don't believe a full feature set had been included at that time.

NeXT was complete.

Speed was hard to compare -- as the NeXT OS wasn't available for the Mac architecture.

arn

NeXT had several things in its favor. It was designed from the ground up with Steve Jobs' vision so any company Steve had a decision in automatically had a leg up. It was designed with future extensibility and hardware CHOICE in mind, something BeOS probably lacked.

Then there is the political football. BeOS was run by a former Apple employee that Jobs was not all that happy with to begin with. It would be like he could have the IBM 970 8 years later if he was wiling to give Amolio a job, no thanks. He'd "risk it".

When you get right down to it both BeOS and NeXT were good candidates but as with all OS decisions (DOS 1.0 included) there comes a fork in the road. Often the political thing and the "vision thing" outweigh the other things.

Besides it probably made NeXT investors whole setting the stage for Pixar :)

Rocketman

bousozoku

Jul 2, 2003, 09:50 AM

My answer was NeXT but would have been both, if such an option existed.

NeXTStep was a comprehensive operating system with a loyal following and stable applications and developers. BeOS was a wonderful upstart that, like AmigaOS 10 years prior, could do multimedia well but had almost no applications and no hardware support. At least, AmigaOS got past that and really became something special.

I ran BeOS 4.0 and 4.5 on my PowerComputing PowerCenter and it moved so quickly that I could see the real power of the PPC604e that Mac OS had kept bogged down. I did some development on it, but couldn't do simple things like print out any of my work because there weren't printer drivers for my HP DeskJet.

Ellen Hancock, CTO at the time, did us all a favour by suggesting NeXT instead of Be. Even though I loved using Be, for all the things it did, it wasn't enough.

patrick0brien

Jul 2, 2003, 10:24 AM

Originally posted by TiMacLover
I think if they didn't buy Next we would not have Jobs

This is the single best reason I could think of why it was good that Apple chose NeXT over Be.

Even before Apple started going downhill in the mid '90's, I rememebr having conversations with people that Steve was the 'core' of Apple. After Sculley ousted Steve, he did 'ok' as Apple's CEO and introduced us to the Mac II. Then came Spindler and the Power Macintosh, he did 'ok', but not as good as Sculley. Then came Amelio, and he practically crashed the whole works.

The problem was that all of these guys tried to compete with WinTel head-on, in their own back yard.

Steve is probably the only person who 'gets' Apple's meaning in the world, so IMHO, the OS that Apple chose is secondary to the visionary they reacquired.

Without Steve, I think Apple would have long been gone - regardless of Copeland, Gershwin, BeOS, or NeXTStep.

strider42

Jul 2, 2003, 11:01 AM

Originally posted by oaklandbum
Now I agree that buying NeXT was a good thing to do, but mainly just because it brought Steve Jobs back. OS X is nice, but BeOS runs a lot faster on my 200mhz 604e than OS X (even 10.3) runs on my 450mhz G4 Cube.

add everything to be to make it a really functional OS that included the graphics systems of OS X, and it probably would have run slower as well. its not really comparable. i mean, older mac os ran faster (i remember system 6 being extremely responsive, or system 7) as well, but it didn't have to do as much either.

Taft

Jul 2, 2003, 11:15 AM

Originally posted by pimentoLoaf
As I recall, BeOS was much-more bug free and much-much faster than NeXT OS. I also seem to recall that BeOS was available for the Mac platform -- provided you had enough hard drive space (and I didn't).

This isn't true at all.

I've talked at great length before about why NeXT was probably the better solution. I guess one more time can't hurt...

First, you should consider Apple's experience with the Mach kernel and Linux BEFORE they bought Next. In October 1995 they launched a program to release Linux for Macs which would run the Mach microkernel. They were looking to use this OS as a server for the platform. Based on this work, they were already familiar with the capabilities of *nix systems and the Mach kernel.

Next, consider that NeXT had Steve Jobs. The Apple board at the time surely considered him a great asset to the company.

Next, consider backwords compatibility. Apple knew that any large transition of OS's would require backwards compatibility (hence the various "boxes" under Copland). Arguably, this could have been acheived on any platform, including Be, but the Linux community already had (circa 1996) done some great work on the Mac-On-Linux project which could serve as the base for Classic compatibility. Actually, MOL and the Classic environment are almost identical in functionality. That pre-existing knowledge would have been very valuable.

Next, consider the server push that Apple had been making. With Copland as well as mklinux, Apple had been searching for a server-quality OS. Looking at NeXT vs. Be in terms of enterprise server capabilities, NeXT looks much more attractive. Why? Because NeXT was very integrated with the *nix and open source community. Linux, the *BSDs and other Unix's had a good reputation as server workhorses as well as a publically available code-base. NeXT's OpenStep was basically Unix, which meant that Apple would be able to extend it using any of the freely available knowledge the open source community had amassed. They, in fact, did this with much of the Darwin base, into which they fused FreeBSD networking code as well as other open source code.

Be, on the other hand, was less tested, tried and true, for a server environment. All indications pointed to Be being quite suitable as a server, but NeXT and *nix already had everything necessary to cobble together into a server "class" OS.

etc. etc. etc.

What I think it really comes down to is that Apple, pre-NeXT buy-out, already had developed significant knowledge and relationships with *nix, open source groups, and the Mach kernel. All of these are the foundations to Darwin. NeXT strengthened that knowledge and brought Steve Jobs back to the scene.

As for being "bug-free" or faster, neither is reallly a clear winner. Be was undeniably fast. But I saw OpenStep running some sophisticated bank software on the old NeXT boxes, and that was damn fast, too. Quartz/Cocoa is what has been "slow" about OS X, the underlying OS isn't as fundamentally slow as some would have you believe. And, if anything, I would say NeXT was probably a little more bug-free. I used Be OS a little in the early days (before they cut ties with the Mac platform). I also used OpenStep. Neither "crashed" much, and OpenStep had all the tools that pretty much any other Unix (outside of corporate *nix) had at that time, which means much more than Be.

There is ample documentation of all of this information around the internet. I think that given Apple's history, this decision made the most sense.

...And it worked! Look at OS X today. Pretty exciting, no? I rest my case...

Taft

scem0

Jul 2, 2003, 11:20 AM

wow, lots of people have no opinion on the issue.

I'm one of 'em. :)

scem0

gsdali

Jul 2, 2003, 11:28 AM

BeOS had an amazing filing system I recall. But I missed out on using it due to going from Centris 660AV to G3 minitower way back when.

There are some opensource BeOS derived project out there aren't there. I might dig one up and be obtuse and use it as the house server.

Taft

Jul 2, 2003, 11:50 AM

I'm surprised so many people said Apple should have picked Be.

To those people: why do you think they should have? What about the technology do you think made it superior?

Taft

MacBandit

Jul 2, 2003, 11:58 AM

Well for some reason I was still hung up on that Apple tried Be and that Jobs came before Next but I found an article that set me right. I guess I was thinking of Rhapsody which was another failed system that Apple was developing like Gershwin and Copland.

Here's the article.

http://www.macworld.com/2001/03/bc/21osx-recap/

ryan

Jul 2, 2003, 12:05 PM

Originally posted by Taft
I'm surprised so many people said Apple should have picked Be.

To those people: why do you think they should have? What about the technology do you think made it superior?

Taft
If you used the BeOS back then you would understand. The BeOS was elegant and fast, even on 200MHz 603e PowerComputing machine, and it *screamed* on a dual processor (180MHz 603) BeBox.

The thing that Be also had going for it was that there was a program called SheepShaver, that allowed you to boot and run MacOS 7 (*8) within the BeOS. Yes it was a bit buggy and not at all feature complete, but it had been written by a couple of guys in their spare time and could have easily been improved and integrated into the OS (like Classic with OSX).

I think its important to remember that at the time no one knew Apple was looking at NeXT, so looking back on that decision is hard to do in an objectable state of mind.

Taft

Jul 2, 2003, 12:39 PM

Originally posted by ryan
If you used the BeOS back then you would understand. The BeOS was elegant and fast, even on 200MHz 603e PowerComputing machine, and it *screamed* on a dual processor (180MHz 603) BeBox.

The thing that Be also had going for it was that there was a program called SheepShaver, that allowed you to boot and run MacOS 7 (*8) within the BeOS. Yes it was a bit buggy and not at all feature complete, but it had been written by a couple of guys in their spare time and could have easily been improved and integrated into the OS (like Classic with OSX).

I think its important to remember that at the time no one knew Apple was looking at NeXT, so looking back on that decision is hard to do in an objectable state of mind.

I did use BeOS back in the day. It was nice. Really nice, actually...

But I could say the same thing about Mac OS 9 and earlier. Or linux. etc.

But the thing you need to keep in mind is that there were probably a lot more criteria for the OS than passing the "it's a nice OS test." Sure, Be had some cool technology. But would it have fit as well as NeXT with Apple's business goals/model or Apple's developers, or third party application developers?

My opinion is that it wouldn't (read above for why...).

Taft

eric_n_dfw

Jul 2, 2003, 01:04 PM

Originally posted by MacBandit
Well for some reason I was still hung up on that Apple tried Be and that Jobs came before Next but I found an article that set me right. I guess I was thinking of Rhapsody which was another failed system that Apple was developing like Gershwin and Copland.

Here's the article.

http://www.macworld.com/2001/03/bc/21osx-recap/ No, Rhapsody was (basically) OpenStep 4.x. It was what OS X is based on before Quartz and Carbon came along.

Jobs wanted everyone to port their apps from classic Mac OS to "Yellow Box" (aka OpenStep frameworks, aka Cocoa), but everyone balked at re-writing their app's. Thus, Carbon was born to ease the transition. www.igeek.com has some good articles about this whole thing.

MacBandit

Jul 2, 2003, 01:11 PM

Originally posted by eric_n_dfw
No, Rhapsody was (basically) OpenStep 4.x. It was what OS X is based on before Quartz and Carbon came along.

Jobs wanted everyone to port their apps from classic Mac OS to "Yellow Box" (aka OpenStep frameworks, aka Cocoa), but everyone balked at re-writing their app's. Thus, Carbon was born to ease the transition. www.igeek.com has some good articles about this whole thing.

Thanks for the link but the link I referenced also explained just what you said.

After much considration I think Apple chose the better route with Next. Next in my oppinion was more flexible and had more room to grow in the long long term. I think OSX will become a world dominating OS if given a chance.

wirewyrm

Jul 2, 2003, 01:23 PM

Originally posted by MacBandit
Well for some reason I was still hung up on that Apple tried Be and that Jobs came before Next but I found an article that set me right. I guess I was thinking of Rhapsody which was another failed system that Apple was developing like Gershwin and Copland.

Rhapsody wasn't an entirely dead OS, unlike Copland. It was released, and people bought it. It was next based, ran Cocoa and Java programs, and ran Carbon apps in a kind of "Classic Mode". Sound like anything..... oh yes OSX. Rhapsody effectively was OSX without aqua or Quartz.

eric_n_dfw

Jul 2, 2003, 01:29 PM

The part I was referring to - the "... Rhapsody which was another failed system that Apple was developing like Gershwin and Copland.", quote sounded like you thought Rhapsody was something outside of the OS X code base. Really, it WAS OS X -- just an early incarnation.

eric_n_dfw

Jul 2, 2003, 01:34 PM

Originally posted by wirewyrm
Rhapsody wasn't an entirely dead OS, unlike Copland. It was released, and people bought it. It was next based, ran Cocoa and Java programs, and ran Carbon apps in a kind of "Classic Mode". Sound like anything..... oh yes OSX. Rhapsody effectively was OSX without aqua or Quartz. Are you refering to Mac OS X Server? (The first release?) If so, you are right except that i don't think Carbon was around then, was it? It had the classic, "Blue Box", mode that was much like today's classic - just buggier. I used to run in on a 7500 with a G3 upgrade at an prior job.

XnavxeMiyyep

Jul 2, 2003, 01:49 PM

Originally posted by eric_n_dfw
Are you refering to Mac OS X Server? (The first release?) If so, you are right except that i don't think Carbon was around then, was it? It had the classic, "Blue Box", mode that was much like today's classic - just buggier. I used to run in on a 7500 with a G3 upgrade at an prior job.
I'm interested in trying it just for the heck of it, was that Server 10.0 or 10.1?

Makosuke

Jul 2, 2003, 01:55 PM

I have to give BeOS credit; I installed it on my 6500/250 way back when, and it was really impressive. When, for the first time ever, I was able to drag a playing quicktime movie around and have it continue to move, I began to understand the power of multitasking and how the MacOS of the time hamstrung the hardware it was running on.

But, although it was a tough call, I figured the Next aquistion was probably a wiser move, since it brought in a more mature OS and Steve. And let's face it, although the BeOS could've made a great MacOS, had we gone that route with Amelio at the helm we'd more than likely be Amiga now: Great OS, but dead with a tiny remaining cult following.

In retrospect, even if OSX isn't as lean as Be, the choice was definitely a good one--power and room to grow.

Thanks to Steve, and Next, not only do we have a massive developer community of Unix-heads on our side (the spike in cool shareware within weeks of OSX hitting the street was shocking to me), but we are a relavent niche market. Maybe not a big market, but very much alive, and if nothing else Mac-influenced design is pervasive.

wrc fan

Jul 2, 2003, 02:48 PM

Originally posted by XnavxeMiyyep
I'm interested in trying it just for the heck of it, was that Server 10.0 or 10.1?

It was "Mac OS X Server 1.0", and it was a dog to run. At my former job, we had it running on a 500mhz G4 and it was so slow that the Mac OS X Developers Release seemed fast to me.

XnavxeMiyyep

Jul 2, 2003, 02:53 PM

Originally posted by oaklandbum
It was "Mac OS X Server 1.0", and it was a dog to run. At my former job, we had it running on a 500mhz G4 and it was so slow that the Mac OS X Developers Release seemed fast to me.
Ok then, maybe I won't test it out.

wrc fan

Jul 2, 2003, 02:56 PM

Originally posted by Taft
I'm surprised so many people said Apple should have picked Be.

To those people: why do you think they should have? What about the technology do you think made it superior?

Taft

Advantages: BeFS, C++ programming language (sure Object-C is nice, but a lot more people know C++), the kernel had lots of modern advancements, it booted up in 15 seconds on a 200mhz 604e, BeFS, low memory usage, excellent multimedia capabilities, posix layer allowed the porting of UNIX comand line tools, and did I mention BeFS?

Disadvantages: Bad networking support, booted up so fast you couldn't turn on your computer and go grab a cup of coffee in the morning cause it would be on before you got out the door, and not multi-user (although now-a-days with lots of families having a computer for every member, I've found multi-user to be not as important).

eric_n_dfw

Jul 2, 2003, 04:33 PM

Originally posted by oaklandbum
Advantages: BeFS, C++ programming language (sure Object-C is nice, but a lot more people know C++), the kernel had lots of modern advancements, it booted up in 15 seconds on a 200mhz 604e, BeFS, low memory usage, excellent multimedia capabilities, posix layer allowed the porting of UNIX comand line tools, and did I mention BeFS?

Disadvantages: Bad networking support, booted up so fast you couldn't turn on your computer and go grab a cup of coffee in the morning cause it would be on before you got out the door, and not multi-user (although now-a-days with lots of families having a computer for every member, I've found multi-user to be not as important). Most people who know Objective-C consider C++ to be a disadvantage! (but your point about C++ having more developers is true.) BTW, you do know that you can use C++ in OS X don't you? Carbon is C++.

eric_n_dfw

Jul 2, 2003, 04:37 PM

I wasn't an ADC member until OS X Server 1.0 came out. Does anyone remember if Rhapsody actually ran on PPC or was it the Intel OPENSTEP 4.2 package they gave people before the PPC port was released?

arn

Jul 2, 2003, 05:17 PM

Originally posted by Taft
I'm surprised so many people said Apple should have picked Be.

To those people: why do you think they should have? What about the technology do you think made it superior?

Taft

Just to clarify...

this survery is to see what people thought at the time. Not, if people think they made a mistake or not.

arn

MacBandit

Jul 2, 2003, 05:17 PM

Originally posted by eric_n_dfw
The part I was referring to - the "... Rhapsody which was another failed system that Apple was developing like Gershwin and Copland.", quote sounded like you thought Rhapsody was something outside of the OS X code base. Really, it WAS OS X -- just an early incarnation.

Yes, I understand about the Rhapsody to OSX connection thanks for making it clearer for those that may not. Though in affect Rhapsody was a dead end as they had to rework the base of the system get rid of the yello box idea so that developers would come on board. In affect Rhapsody was killed and OSX was born due to the developers wishes.

wrc fan

Jul 2, 2003, 05:17 PM

Originally posted by eric_n_dfw
Most people who know Objective-C consider C++ to be a disadvantage! (but your point about C++ having more developers is true.) BTW, you do know that you can use C++ in OS X don't you? Carbon is C++.

Yeah, I also believe you can use it in Cocoa now (same as you can use Java in Cocoa), either that, or it'll be in 10.3. But you still have to use Object-C for the main framework. (correct me if I'm wrong, I'm just a hobbiest when it comes to OS X programming)

I wasn't an ADC member until OS X Server 1.0 came out. Does anyone remember if Rhapsody actually ran on PPC or was it the Intel OPENSTEP 4.2 package they gave people before the PPC port was released?

It was my understanding that Rhapsody was just the code name for the early OS X builds, which includes Server 1.0

eric_n_dfw

Jul 2, 2003, 05:27 PM

Originally posted by MacBandit
Yes, I understand about the Rhapsody to OSX connection thanks for making it clearer for those that may not. Though in affect Rhapsody was a dead end as they had to rework the base of the system get rid of the yello box idea so that developers would come on board. In affect Rhapsody was killed and OSX was born due to the developers wishes. Actually, I'd say that the "Yellow Box" is "Cocoa". Cocoa has evolved a bit since then but it's still basically the same OpenStep frameworks.

eric_n_dfw

Jul 2, 2003, 05:40 PM

Back on topic of the poll, I voted "good idea" because I was evaluating (and in love with) OPENSTEP and WebObjects at the time. I hated Mac OS (I think all of us Amiga geeks did at one time or another ;) ) and as using OS/2 v3 and WinNT 4 at the time.

I didn't even know anything about the PPC chips at the time - When I saw this at www.next.com I started paying attention:

MacBandit

Jul 2, 2003, 05:49 PM

Originally posted by eric_n_dfw
Actually, I'd say that the "Yellow Box" is "Cocoa". Cocoa has evolved a bit since then but it's still basically the same OpenStep frameworks.

I think your quite right but I would think it a mistake to say that they are one in the same. It was more of a matter of an evolution based on necessity created by the developers. Cocoa is what became of the yellow box so that developers had an easier way to port their programs to OSX and take advantage of the advanced system architecture.

On a side note I too am an ex commodore/Amiga user and really loved the Amiga OS though it was quite ugly it was very innovative and powerful. The only thing I regret is not being really old enough at the time of it's peak to really understand it's advantages. A few years older and I probably wouldn't had jumped ship so quickly to Apple the first time I really got to play with a Mac.

eric_n_dfw

Jul 2, 2003, 06:00 PM

Originally posted by MacBandit
I think your quite right but I would think it a mistake to say that they are one in the same. It was more of a matter of an evolution based on necessity created by the developers. Cocoa is what became of the yellow box so that developers had an easier way to port their programs to OSX and take advantage of the advanced system architecture.Sound's like you are describing Carbon though. Having done a very small amount of OpenStep development (on Windows, no less!) the OS X Cocoa development is nearly the same - mainly different GUI elements. (I rarely get play with Cocoa development though)

Originally posted by MacBandit
On a side note I too am an ex commodore/Amiga user and really loved the Amiga OS though it was quite ugly it was very innovative and powerful. The only thing I regret is not being really old enough at the time of it's peak to really understand it's advantages. A few years older and I probably wouldn't had jumped ship so quickly to Apple the first time I really got to play with a Mac. AmigaOS was awesome for it's day - I started with an 1MB A500 running Workbench 1.3. In college I worked for Commodore for a semester but the writing was on the wall by then. The fact that the Mac emulators were the hotest software besides Lemmings! and the Video Toaster should have told everyone something! (guess it kind-of did) If they would have courted Microsoft for Word and Excel like Apple did things might have turned out much differently. Ah - the memories. :(

MacBandit

Jul 2, 2003, 06:45 PM

Originally posted by eric_n_dfw
[B]Sound's like you are describing Carbon though. Having done a very small amount of OpenStep development (on Windows, no less!) the OS X Cocoa development is nearly the same - mainly different GUI elements. (I rarely get play with Cocoa development though)/B]

You may be right about me describing carbon. I'm working off of book smarts here and no real application. Carbon is definitely an intermediate programing step that is very simple but it doesn't give the program any ability to the higher level system abilities such as protected memory. I think from what I have read though that Cocoa in itself is much simpler then Yellow Box ever was and that Yellow Box was the key point why developers refused to write for Rhapsody.

edenwaith

Jul 2, 2003, 09:43 PM

Originally posted by patrick0brien

Steve is probably the only person who 'gets' Apple's meaning in the world, so IMHO, the OS that Apple chose is secondary to the visionary they reacquired.

Exactly. Since Jobs helped start up the company, there is probably a lot more of his heart in the company than close to anyone else. Like how a mother or father loves their children.

It's exactly that type of love, dedication, and vision I wish every company could possess. Money would not be the number one priority any longer. The love of what they were doing would be on top.

Another example where I feel money and the loss of its pioneers is Sierra Entertainment (formerly Sierra On-line). It is no longer the company it used to be. It doesn't even support or sell its old games. Co-founder Ken Williams sold off the company several years ago, and some other numb-nut took the company over and just screwed things up, spewing out a bunch of mediocre me-too games.

As for myself, I'm glad that the NeXT legacy became OS X. OS X is a programmer's dream. All the power and coolness of Linux, but without all of the headaches in fighting with hardware or reconfiguring software.

From what I remember, Copland was Apple's attempt at creating a "modern OS" (wait about another 8 years before OS X happened). Certain elements of Copland ended up going into Mac OS 8. There were some other odd side projects Apple delved into such as Taligent, Pink, and Star Trek (Mac OS on PC).

kosibar

Jul 2, 2003, 09:54 PM

Most of the comments I've read here don't really apply to this case when it comes to BeOS. I see a lot of "no hardware support, no applications."

Let me first comment that I had used BeOS nearly full-time for about a year. The only thing I used Mac OS for was Photoshop. I know both very well, as well as Linux, since I do admin work on my Linux-based servers for my business.

I say that these comments don't apply because they are what Apple would provide. What hardware support would Apple need from Be? Was there hardware support for Apple hardware in Next? (I'm asking, I don't know.) Apple would have modified BeOS to support their hardware. They would have made Classic for BeOS. All of the things that they did to make a smooth transition with Next, they'd have done with BeOS. They probably would have changed the user interface and other aspects to be more Apple-like.

So I think the real question here is which Operating System had the most technical potential, regardless of public support of the individual systems.

Also, I am getting the feeling that the people speaking of BeOS tried it on the Mac, but not R5 on the PC. (Of course I don't mean everybody commenting, but many that I had read.) Many of the things that I see people complaining about in BeOS were not true in R5.

I don't know much about Next, but I know that BeOS was much smoother and more stable than what I see in Mac OS. Waiting for things on Mac OS X really annoyed me until I got used to it. Finder still annoys me to no end compared to Tracker in BeOS. I won't go into that in-depth because this isn't the place for that. Yes, I've seen the WWDC keynote. Yes, I've seen the new finder reviews and images. No, I don't think they've help tame my annoyance.

No, I didn't necessarily vote for BeOS. I agree that Steve Jobs is a huge part of Apple. Next may have been worth it just to get him. Tough call.

edenwaith

Jul 2, 2003, 09:56 PM

Originally posted by gsdali
BeOS had an amazing filing system I recall. But I missed out on using it due to going from Centris 660AV to G3 minitower way back when.

If I remember correctly, BeOS' file system was constructed by B-trees, which is great for databases...which are large collections of informations...which...hey! That sounds kind of like my hard drive! A large collection of information!

From what I've also read, I think the BeBoxes were able to start up very quickly, like 15 seconds (take with grain of salt). That is one thing I'd love to see again. Machines which start up FAST from a cold boot. I haven't seen machines start up that fast since my Tandy 1000 HX (DOS 3) or my Mac SE (System 6). Now, how come today's machines take so long to boot up?

gsdali

Jul 3, 2003, 03:56 AM

Anyone else here think that OpenDoc/taligent were really great ideas that ought to be revived?

Porshuh944turbo

Jul 3, 2003, 03:58 AM

Do you think Steve Jobs should have made a company called "Banana" instead of "Apple"?

Be Honest...

eric_n_dfw

Jul 3, 2003, 07:05 AM

Everyone interested in this subject really should read this, http://igeek.com/articles/History/CoplandAndNeXT.txt , it's highly informative and non-biased.

eric_n_dfw

Jul 3, 2003, 07:08 AM

Originally posted by MacBandit
You may be right about me describing carbon. I'm working off of book smarts here and no real application. Carbon is definitely an intermediate programing step that is very simple but it doesn't give the program any ability to the higher level system abilities such as protected memory. I think from what I have read though that Cocoa in itself is much simpler then Yellow Box ever was and that Yellow Box was the key point why developers refused to write for Rhapsody. Carbon does get protected memory, premptive multitasking and most of the other OS X benefits, classic doesn't. Examples of Carbon apps: iTunes, Internet Explorer, Finder, Mozilla, Toast, Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, Office.X, BBEdit, Yahoo! Messenger, Quicken.

pianojoe

Jul 3, 2003, 07:56 AM

I, too, recall that Quicktime performance ROCKED on BeOS when it was sluggish (at best) under OS 8.1 on the same machine. Networking was a joke though. I liked Be's creative potential, and, yes, back then, Be was much more impressive that NeXt.

They should hire the Be people to take care of some performance issues that OS X still has. (Anybody yelled "Finder"? And yes, I've seen Panther. The Finder "has improved" but still, no "swoooosh", to use a technical term.)

MacBandit

Jul 3, 2003, 11:33 AM

Originally posted by eric_n_dfw
Carbon does get protected memory, premptive multitasking and most of the other OS X benefits, classic doesn't. Examples of Carbon apps: iTunes, Internet Explorer, Finder, Mozilla, Toast, Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, Office.X, BBEdit, Yahoo! Messenger, Quicken.

I just went and searched the web and well you know your right again. I don't know where I got the idea that carbon apps were just a patch so they could run on OSX without the advanced features. Hmm, oh well.

eric_n_dfw

Jul 3, 2003, 01:37 PM

Complain about OS X's speed problems all you want (and I do!) but when you see what all Quartz is doing you really cannot compare it's snappyness (or lack thereof) to BeOS or any other bitmapped desktop GUI.

Quartz, like DPS before it, is a huge step forward in display tech' from what just about every other GUI offers - including BeOS. The Quartz window server is doing a ton of heavy lifting so that individual app's don't have to. Snappyness will come as they continue to optimize it - as evidenced by 10.2 vs. 10.1.

Also remember, Windows and Mac OS Classic GUI's are hardware accerated where Quartz is not. Quartz Extreme added hardware compositing which helps a lot, but each individual screen component still has to be handled by the PPC chip. (not sure if QE even does the compositing of the widgets on the windows, like scroll bars and such - anyone out there know?)

Lastly, one of the key reasons I think NeXT was a better choice was that the NeXTSTEP/OPENSTEP OS had 10 years of maturing behind it and the OpenStep frameworks were well tested and refined during those years. (Remember, NeXT was doing OOD long before it was cool.) The NeXT engineers also had a lot more experience with porting different platforms: 680x0, HP-RISC, Solaris, x86 (and a rumored PPC version that was never released)

MacBandit

Jul 4, 2003, 02:07 AM

Originally posted by eric_n_dfw
Complain about OS X's speed problems all you want (and I do!) but when you see what all Quartz is doing you really cannot compare it's snappyness (or lack thereof) to BeOS or any other bitmapped desktop GUI.

Personally with my Dual/GHz/DDR PowerMac I have absolutely no complaints about snap to the GUI except maybe window creation and resizing. It could open images a lot faster. In any case I don't complain about the GUI because in my experience overall the system performance is far greater especially on a dual processor then anything I have ever used previous. It's amazing the amount of work that can be done all simultaneous without a noticeable drop in speed.

alset

Jul 4, 2003, 02:37 AM

Yes and no.

On one hand, I had been hyped on Be by the net and Mac magazines. On the other, we all knew Steve was the man who could save us (or had been hyped enough by the net and more magazines to think so). In retrospect, things worked out for the best. Still, it's too bad Apple didn't buy both, and combine the tech.

Dan

jkojima

Jul 7, 2003, 12:01 AM

At the time I was sold on Be and considerably doubted the move to NeXT. In fact, that was right around the time I sold out and went PC. I'll admit that when Jobs returned and cut cloning and Be from Apple's agenda I had serious doubts about the company's future and decided to bail.

But now I'm older, wiser, and have moved back to Mac and am loving it. So in retrospect, despite my misgivings at the time, NeXT was probably the best decision.

MacFan26

Jul 7, 2003, 01:45 AM

Just out of curiosity, I was wondering if anyone has read Gil Amelio's book, On the Firing Line. Amelio explained that the biggest reason why he decided to go with NeXT was that the company didn't have anywhere near enough time to complete the BeOS, and Jean-Louis Gassée kept changing his asking price. Steve Jobs on the other hand was much more willing to work out a deal.

wdlove

Jul 7, 2003, 10:42 AM

There isn't really anything that can be done about past decsions. We must move forward with what Apple is now. I think that Apple is well poised at the moment to increase market share!

kosibar

Jul 7, 2003, 03:00 PM

From what I've also read, I think the BeBoxes were able to start up very quickly, like 15 seconds (take with grain of salt).

My dual P3 800 is fully booted into BeOS in 13 seconds. That includes everything - even my CPU monitor, email, chat clients (though connections take a few seconds to establish, the clients are fully loaded) and I'm sitting at the desktop and ready to work.

I miss the quick booting. I don't reboot OS X often, but when I do it's very frustrating. Just so many things done right in BeOS.

Rich

MacBandit

Jul 7, 2003, 05:31 PM

Originally posted by kosibar
My dual P3 800 is fully booted into BeOS in 13 seconds. That includes everything - even my CPU monitor, email, chat clients (though connections take a few seconds to establish, the clients are fully loaded) and I'm sitting at the desktop and ready to work.

I miss the quick booting. I don't reboot OS X often, but when I do it's very frustrating. Just so many things done right in BeOS.

Rich

Why should an OS that has less then 1/4 of the features start up in 1/4 the time? Let me think about it a while. My C64 started in like 2secs. My Amiga500 started in 10secs. Neither of them had a 1/5 of the features or functionality that OSX offers. OSX starts and is up and running completely useable at 39secs on my Dual/GHz/DDR PowerMac. I do think however that with some more optimizations they could get the time down but I feel that that is pretty quick.

eric_n_dfw

Jul 8, 2003, 09:37 AM

Originally posted by MacBandit
Why should an OS that has less then 1/4 of the features start up in 1/4 the time? Let me think about it a while. My C64 started in like 2secs. My Amiga500 started in 10secs. Neither of them had a 1/5 of the features or functionality that OSX offers. OSX starts and is up and running completely useable at 39secs on my Dual/GHz/DDR PowerMac. I do think however that with some more optimizations they could get the time down but I feel that that is pretty quick. I almost never shut my OS X machines down so I don't care that much. The G4 400 sitting here is still 3 times as fast at booting than my 2 year old Dell laptop in Win2K.

eric_n_dfw

Jul 8, 2003, 09:46 AM

Originally posted by MacBandit
Personally with my Dual/GHz/DDR PowerMac I have absolutely no complaints about snap to the GUI except maybe window creation and resizing. It could open images a lot faster. In any case I don't complain about the GUI because in my experience overall the system performance is far greater especially on a dual processor then anything I have ever used previous. It's amazing the amount of work that can be done all simultaneous without a noticeable drop in speed. When I added a Radeon 8500 to my Dual 500 at home, all the "snappieness" issues went away too. The G4 400 here at work doesn't have a Quartz Extreem capable card in it though and you can really tell the difference.