Apple versus Microsoft: The top 20 stolen ideas of the OS wa...

[MacBytes]

Category: Mac OS X
Link: Apple versus Microsoft: The top 20 stolen ideas of the OS wars
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Posted on MacBytes.com
Approved by Mudbug

[Chobit]

I remember using command tab to switch between apps and command` to switch between windows within an app back in the classic days. I'm not sure when it first appeared in the MacOS, but it was certainly not 10.3, though that may be when the application icon preview started appearing. My memory is a bit foggy. Anyone have a better timeline on this?

[SPUY767]

Originally Posted by Chobit

I remember using command tab to switch between apps and command` to switch between windows within an app back in the classic days. I'm not sure when it first appeared in the MacOS, but it was certainly not 10.3, though that may be when the application icon preview started appearing. My memory is a bit foggy. Anyone have a better timeline on this?

Don't bother. It's quite obvious that the author is simply trying to appear unbiased by saying that each side copied. I mean seriously, you choose the Control panel as a feature stolen from Windows? On a Mac all the control panels were always in a convenient place. A Folder.

[iJed]

NeXTSTEP, which OS X is based on, contained most of theses features years before Windows did...

[whooleytoo]

Before System 7, wasn't the control panel one app; or am I imagining it?

Saying Apple stole the idea of including backup in the OS is a bit odd too, it's a rather obvious inclusion in any OS.

[jaw04005]

My favorite is saying Terminal was copied from Windows. It’s not like Unix existed years before MS-DOS or anything.

And I like how they left out the biggy — the modern GUI was invented by Apple and Xerox PARC.

Originally Posted by whooleytoo

Saying Apple stole the idea of including backup in the OS is a bit odd too, it's a rather obvious inclusion in any OS.

At least, he didn’t say Time Machine was a copy of Window Vista’s Shadow Copy/Previous Version. As someone who uses both, that drives me nuts. They’re not even comparable.

[yoyo5280]

Anybody notice that apple was stealing back in the day, and microsoft is stealing now?

I just found the interesting. I'm just curious who left behind the scenes at the windows group to make that happen.

[zombitronic]

The funny thing is that this article is a link to two other articles. Call me skeptical, but this seems like an attempt to generate page hits.

Apple "stealing" Screen Sharing from Remote Desktop was featured on both lists. While that, itself, is an obvious error, these two features are not the same thing. RDC uses the proprietary RDC protocol and only allows a user to log into a remote computer. It does not share the screen and the remote user does not see what's going on while the screen is being controlled. Screen Sharing, on the other hand, uses the VNC protocol and literally shows the screen of the remote computer that's being controlled. The user at the remote computer sees everything that's going on.

And number one on the list should have been the GUI.

And where is Linux or other operating systems in all of this?

It disappoints me to know that people get paid to come up with these articles.

[bruinsrme]

Personally I couldn't care less if ms is stealing from appla or vice versa. All I care about is that I, as a pc user, get to enjoy the same features as a mac user and that a mac user can enjoy what pc users get to enjoy. To me the pc vs mac war is wearing. How about both companies pull their heads out of there asses and come out with an os that doesn't need updates days after it's released.

[BC2009]

Originally Posted by whooleytoo

Before System 7, wasn't the control panel one app; or am I imagining it?

Saying Apple stole the idea of including backup in the OS is a bit odd too, it's a rather obvious inclusion in any OS.

Saying "backup" was a stolen idea is ridiculous -- not to mention the fact that only
certain versions of XP included the backup utility (specifically the professional version).
The XP Home edition did NOT include backup -- I guess Microsoft felt that "Home"
users were less vulnerable to viruses and hard drive failures -- either that or home
users' files did not really matter.

[spillproof]

This is why competition is good. I don't care who created the idea, I'm just glad I can use it.

[rdowns]

Some people just can't let this go away. The OS wars are long over. Microsoft won.

[yoyo5280]

Since vista, its the OS games II... And Apple is winning.

[BongoBanger]

Originally Posted by yoyo5280

Since vista, its the OS games II... And Apple is winning.

Increasing you global market share by less than 2% when your opposition releases its poorest received OS in a decade or so is not 'winning', it's 'making marginal gains'.

Windows outsells OS X by at least a factor of 20. This game is over.

As for the article, it's largely true - Apple and MS have copied from each other and from third parties. The winner is the consumer who gets the best of everybody's features and I really couldn't give a crap who made it first.

[yoyo5280]

Originally Posted by BongoBanger

Increasing you global market share by less than 2% when your opposition releases its poorest received OS in a decade or so is not 'winning', it's 'making marginal gains'.

Windows outsells OS X by at least a factor of 20. This game is over.

Look at numbers, microsoft wins. Look at trends, Apple is winning.

Don't get me wrong, I want microsoft to stay the winner, and Apple to be the little guy. But behind all the design and innovation, apple is just a big company who is really really trying to overpass the big guy, and doing a good job of it.

[Sun Baked]

Originally Posted by iJed

NeXTSTEP, which OS X is based on, contained most of theses features years before Windows did...

Yes, but many of these authors never saw or used NeXT or Rhapsody, so it is pointless to argue with them.

They also probably think electric cars are new ideas, instead of something that competed with and lost to the internal combustion engine a hundred years ago.

Why tell them to open a book and read from it, I'm sure the history book is much better used if we simply pick it up and beat them with it.

[OllyW]

Originally Posted by spillproof

This is why competition is good. I don't care who created the idea, I'm just glad I can use it.

Originally Posted by rdowns

Some people just can't let this go away. The OS wars are long over. Microsoft won.

Two excellent points.

Sadly, I fear the remainder of this thread will revert back to the normal tit-for-tat argument.

[rdowns]

Originally Posted by yoyo5280

Since vista, its the OS games II... And Apple is winning.

OK, let's just throw out the previous 30 years and call it a do over.

[yoyo5280]

Originally Posted by rdowns

OK, let's just throw out the previous 30 years and call it a do over.

Think olympics.
Just in 30 year increments.

[BongoBanger]

Originally Posted by yoyo5280

Look at numbers, microsoft wins. Look at trends, Apple is winning.

I am. It isn't.

Look, Apple are doing well but there is no chance they will become the dominant consumer OS because they would have to release OS X to third party hardware and, frankly, I don't think it's up to that.

[The Flashing Fi]

Originally Posted by yoyo5280

Look at numbers, microsoft wins. Look at trends, Apple is winning.

Don't get me wrong, I want microsoft to stay the winner, and Apple to be the little guy. But behind all the design and innovation, apple is just a big company who is really really trying to overpass the big guy, and doing a good job of it.

*sigh* Don't get caught up in all the advertising. As much as Apple tries to use that little guy image, the truth is, Apple doesn't want to beat Windows in marketshare. You may be going, "Woh, wait, what?" In order for Mac OS X to beat Windows, under Apple's current scheme of only having Mac OS X available on Macs, Apple would have to license their OS to gain more marketshare, which won't happen because Apple is a Hardware company who uses software to sell their hardware, or Apple would have to release cheaper computers. Both of which seem unlikely. Apple is perfectly content in being a niche market.

But as long as you can get a complete Dell PC with a Quad Core, 4 gigs of memory and 20" screen for less than 800 bucks, it's going to be hard for Apple to overtake MS in marketshare.

Apple's "real" competition is companies like Dell. They're the ones who they're trying to take marketshare away from in the home desktop and laptop markets. But trying to pit a war against Dell, HP, ect wouldn't be as effective as making a war against Windows.

But as long as Apple appeals to the higher market, they will eventually reach a saturation point, where if they want to sell more units, and thus take away marketshare from PC companies and thus, Windows, they'll need to lower their prices and offer more low-end models.

However, Apple's current model of sell less units, but with a higher revenue per unit, seems to be working really well. If I were them, I wouldn't change anything until they felt a need to change something. But unless they adapt a business model that is similar to Dell, or HP's, where they lower their prices and make less money per-unit, but with a higher sales volume, eventually that higher-end market will be saturated.

[SnowLeopard2008]

Apple was/is/and always will be the first to have a working OS that is virus-free, with a non-resource hogging GUI, and incorporate features that Microsoft will later copy and fail at doing.

Microsoft was/is/and always will be the first to rip off everything Apple made, sue them for copyright, win because they paid the judge $X billion, and create bloated OSes that doesn't work and is home to viruses galore.

F Microsoft. The only good thing that could ever happen will be Steve Ballmer fired. I liked Microsoft Pre-Ballmer. Go Gates!

[GeeYouEye]

Definitely a poorly researched article; Control Panels were all in one window as late as System 6, and except for OS 9 were always all in one place (The Digital Color Meter and Map Control Panels in OS 9 were in the Apple Extras folder).

[gctwnl]

Terminal (or as they explain it "a command line") came from the early days of computing (the first terminals in fact in the 60s).

Much of what Apple had copied from windows they inherited with NEXTSTEP which they brought in as a basis for the replacement of classic Mac OS. Having backup as 'part of the OS', is as much an OS feature as having an internet browser as 'part of the OS. Saying 'support for Exchange' was copied is really silly. Does Microsoft have support for iCal Server etc? And is Outlook not part of Office and not of Windows?

More interesting is the list of features they would like to copy but are unable to. Windows would like to copy some of Mac's security. Windows will at one point probably move to the more logical Mac's way of one menu, multiple windows instead of one-window-per-app with a lot of hacking around to make these apps look as one on the interface level (shared menus).

[gctwnl]

Originally Posted by The Flashing Fi

*sigh* Don't get caught up in all the advertising. As much as Apple tries to use that little guy image, the truth is, Apple doesn't want to beat Windows in marketshare. You may be going, "Woh, wait, what?" In order for Mac OS X to beat Windows, under Apple's current scheme of only having Mac OS X available on Macs, Apple would have to license their OS to gain more marketshare, which won't happen because Apple is a Hardware company who uses software to sell their hardware, or Apple would have to release cheaper computers. Both of which seem unlikely. Apple is perfectly content in being a niche market.

But as long as you can get a complete Dell PC with a Quad Core, 4 gigs of memory and 20" screen for less than 800 bucks, it's going to be hard for Apple to overtake MS in marketshare.

Apple's "real" competition is companies like Dell. They're the ones who they're trying to take marketshare away from in the home desktop and laptop markets. But trying to pit a war against Dell, HP, ect wouldn't be as effective as making a war against Windows.

But as long as Apple appeals to the higher market, they will eventually reach a saturation point, where if they want to sell more units, and thus take away marketshare from PC companies and thus, Windows, they'll need to lower their prices and offer more low-end models.

However, Apple's current model of sell less units, but with a higher revenue per unit, seems to be working really well. If I were them, I wouldn't change anything until they felt a need to change something. But unless they adapt a business model that is similar to Dell, or HP's, where they lower their prices and make less money per-unit, but with a higher sales volume, eventually that higher-end market will be saturated.

Don't focus too much on PCs. Apple is rather succesful in creating or taking over appliance markets. iPod/iTunes, iPhone, AppleTV (not a success, but a trial attempt). Microsoft tends to be tech-oriented (turning a PC into a TV-like media system, OS for mobile, etc.). Apple starts from the user perspective more and their foundational tech work (think os x, quicktime, codecs, core this and that) is done with these possibilities in mind. The current iPod/iPhone runs Mac OS X and contrary to Windows mobile (which is entirely separate) it is in fact *based on* the same system as the OS that powers the XServe.

Microsoft is also completely locked into the x86 architecture while Apple (and before them NeXT) have proven (and impressingly so) that hardware migration (even big-endian/little-endian differences) are no hurdle. Which is why the iPhone runs a slimmed down but true OS X and your HTC does not run Windows other than in name.