Remember OS/2? Promoted as the successor to DOS in the late 1980’s and
early 1990’s, the product wound up losing out to Windows and then slowly fading away.
This article recounts what happened and summarizes OS/2 today.
In the mid-1980’s, IBM and its partner Microsoft faced a
challenge. While basking in the industry dominance of DOS, they knew
they needed a more modern, robust operating system going forward. They
wanted a system with a graphical user interface, preemptive
multitasking, standardized API’s, networking support, and a more robust
filesystem to support larger disks. They
also wanted to eliminate direct hardware calls to the BIOS by
applications.
The OS would control interfaces to all program services.
IBM and Microsoft signed a joint development agreement in 1985 to
co-develop this DOS successor. Operating System/2 came out two years
later. But all was not happy in
OS/2 land. The team initially targeted the 286
processor for compatibility, but this was a mistake with the 386 coming
out in 1985. This meant that OS/2 ran in 16-bit protected mode when it
ideally
should have used the 386’s flat memory model and other advanced
386 features. The GUI, called the Presentation
Manager, wasn’t released until over a
year after the base product. Drivers
were few. You couldn’t even find many printer drivers. Performance was
abysmal.
Meanwhile, Windows, Microsoft’s simple add-on graphical face to DOS,
sold
millions of copies. Windows 3.0 and 3.1 were easy to use and 100%
compatible with the huge base of DOS software. Microsoft shifted
its focus to Windows. By 1990 it abandoned OS/2 to IBM, throwing
Windows
3.x and OS/2 into direct competition.
IBM fought back with a major OS/2 release in 1992. Version 2.0 featured
a fully object-oriented interface called the Workplace Shell. It
also had a
32 bit API (with some 16-bit internals). IBM marketed the
new OS/2 as “A better DOS than DOS
and a better Windows than Windows,”
but most users didn’t see why they should buy it. Windows came
bundled with new PCs. OS/2 required an additional purchase.
Consumers stuck with Windows.
In 1994, IBM released OS/2 3.0, called Warp. Warp had better
networking, hardware, and
multimedia support. It came with the IBM Works office suite. In 1996
IBM released Warp 4, with speech recognition,
Java, and a personal version of Lotus Notes.
Computer professionals considered OS/2 Warp technically
superior to Windows 3.1 — and even to Windows 95. IBM sold millions of
OS/2 licenses into large IT organizations, especially in the banking,
finance,
and insurance industries. Many companies used it as a base for
dedicated
applications. But
the product never even got a toehold with the public. With new
PCs bundling Windows, consumers saw no need to buy OS/2.
Get Warped, Baby (Courtesy: Wikipedia)
IBM Drops OS/2
With Windows 95’s success, IBM knew they had lost the battle for the
consumer desktop. The company laid off 95% of the OS/2 project
team and announced that Warp 4 would be the final major release.
Yet IBM didn’t stop selling and supporting OS/2 until a
decade later, in 2006. (Support continues even today for certain IT
contracts.)
ATM Running Warp (Courtesy: Wikipedia)
Corporations with large OS/2 projects, including embedded and dedicated
apps,
continued using OS/2 for years after IBM “stabilized” (froze) the
product at Warp 4.
But with desupport in 2006, users understood they needed to act.
Some asked IBM to continue OS/2 development and support. But IBM had
already made the decision to write off OS/2 a decade earlier. Tens
of thousands signed petitions for IBM to
open source the product. IBM was unable to do so due
to OS/2 code developed, owned or patented by
other companies (such as Microsoft). IBM did open source OS/2’s scripting
language, Object Rexx. Today it’s known as Open Object Rexx and is supported
by the Rexx Lanuage Association. ooRexx today runs on Windows, Linux, and Unix and is a useful and competitive scripting lanuage.
Some users decided that if IBM could not open source OS/2, they would
develop the equivalent themselves. The osFree
project aimed to create an open source OS compatible with Warp 4. The
project appears to have stalled out in the alpha phase.
A commercial company called Serenity Systems International stepped
forward to sell a licensed and updated version of OS/2 called eComStation
(“eCS”). It’s
been successful for them: they released their first
version in 2001, and their most recent version 2.1 in May 2011. eCS
offers a good stable
of free applications.
eComStation Screenshot (Courtesy: Wikipedia)
Some companies preserve their OS/2 code investment by
virtualization. Virtual PC,
VirtualBox, and similar products can host OS/2 or eCS as guests. (There
are some complexities
in virtualizing some OS/2 versions so users need to do their homework
before jumping in.)
The Future
So what does the future hold? The OS/2 — eCS community remains active.
Visit it at web sites like OS/2
World, OS/2 Org, and OS2 Voice. OS/2 users have tons of
free code to download from websites like the Hobbes Project and others.
The annual Warpstock
conference still meets as do other Warp events.
The OS/2 community supports products like those offered by Serenity
Systems. Whether it can also
produce an open source OS/2 like osFree is an open question but one
that appears increasingly unlikely.
While OS/2 and eCS comprise a healthy niche, it’s
unlikely that they will expand beyond their current user base. The
technology that made OS/2 cutting-edge in the mid-1990’s is today
mainstream. There are many popular free
competitors
to niche commercial systems like OS/2 — including many Linux and BSD
distributions. As the
world
moves to 64-bit computing and newer hardware, companies using
OS/2 will likely move to newer
platforms as their applications age.
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Howard Fosdick (President, FCI) is an independent consultant who
supports databases and operating systems. He consults for vendors
as an industry analyst. Read his other articles here.
I vaguely remember some common works between Commodore and IBM to create Presentation Manager…
Know something about such a link with the Amiga Workbench ?
Yes. IBM was in talks with Commidore to port OS/2 to a new as unnamed project, in case bDos didnt work. It did, and the Amiga came with a b based Amiga dos. IBM lost interest, and asked Commidore to pay for the port. Commidore also lost interest, as Amiga Dos was a very good OS. ( better than OS/2 and *much* better documentation. ). Later on the AmigaDos replacement project used a good optimizer on a commercial compiler to replace all the b based commands with a c replacement. Much fun was had. The c stuff proved to be faster. The point is you were right, but didn’t know the backround.
What?!
The Amiga as a machine was a great piece of hardware, but the operating system was a joke if you are comparing it to OS/2.
Sure it was multitasking, but without any sort of memory protection.
Lets not forget how painful it was to do Intuition programming, which lead to the creation of MUI.
I didn’t want to make a comparison between the 2 OS. I just heard about common works.
Sure, Amiga OS lacks memory protection but, considering this, it was a fast and nice to use OS.
And I don’t remember it was painful to develop on/for it !
Amiga also had its own version of Rexx Arexx I think. It was pretty neat. It’s tutorial tought me my first lessons in async multiprogramming.
Not to digress, but your comment reminded me of the vague Apple and Apollo deal of the late 80s: Apollo porting System 6 GUI (QuickDraw & Finder) to Apollo’s Domain/OS — OS may have still been called AEGIS at the time. In exchange, Apple could sell Apple-branded Apollo workstations running Domain/OS.
References:
http://lowendmac.com/orchard/06/answers.htm
http://lowendmac.com/orchard/06/john-sculley-years-apple.html
Domain/OS was not based on Unix, despite the articles. I’d say it was closer to PRIMOS (also derived from Multics).
I apologize, the above is totally off subject but your comment sparked my interest, and this is an OS site and we are all OS nerds. 🙂
It is hard to find info about this: all sites points to this text:
http://www.os2bbs.com/os2news/OS2Warp.html
but this looks like only source of this information… pretty strange.
BTW good text about OS/2 @ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/11/27/the_os_wars_os2_25years_old…
FOR FUN: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnLmtuA42N8
Edited 2013-02-17 21:53 UTC
A link between Commodore and IBM probably explains the ARexx (Amiga Rexx) scripting language included with Amiga OS.
Yes, too.
there is no direct link. Rexx was well documented and specified language, someone read said documentation and specifications and implemented a version for Amiga. RTFM used to be a very common happening back then…
Rexx made it to DOS 2000. ( DOS 7+ Rexx ). A powerfull scripting language.
The design for OS/2 was multi-tasking, and it shone at this, but the main use turned out to be mainframe connectivity, and it shone at that. BUT microsoft’s preditaory practices, and the lag of OS/2 drivers essentially killed it.
I remember running Windows 95 and Windows 98, under warp, as well as a webserver/file server, and not noticing that other users were on, until they hit the disk…It was good, but Windows 2000 turned out to be rather mature, and skinny by todays standards.
Actually REXX was first included with IBM PC DOS 7.0. I know this because my first computer was an IBM that came with DOS 7.0
Just poking around the mainframe at work I have seen REXX supported on z/OS, but I think JCL is ubiquitously preferred.
What about OSFree?
Never made it past the bootloader stage…
OS/2 was awesome.
I was heavily into the BBS scene back in the early 90s and OS/2 was perfect for running multiple DOS based BBS Software packages.
Loved the OS and it is a shame it never took off.
It actually did take off for a while, and it won a lot of awards, but when IBM pulled the plug on what little support it was giving the OS it became harder and harder to stick with it.
I used it as my primary OS between mid-1992 and 2006 or so, but once the magic smoke leaked out of my primary PPro box I moved to various Linux flavors. I really miss the WPS and my old 4OS2+FileJet command line setup, but Midnight Commander and bash can also make me happy. 🙂 And I have to admit that the FOSS ecosystem has far surpassed my expectations. Linux distros have come a looong way since the mid-90’s.
Edited 2013-02-12 23:13 UTC
I used OS/2 and later eComStation from 1995 until 2012, then I switched to a Linux distro, OS4 http://www.os4online.com which I absolutely love. Tried Linux Mint, tried vanilla Ubuntu but with OS4 it was love at first boot. With OS/2 and eComStation a niche OS, I think that OS4, OpenSUSE and Red Hat Linux are pretty much poised as the ultimate OS/2 replacement
… but it’s really rehashing a lot of previous articles on OS News. I think most would know “OS/2 became eComStation” and that IBM has repeatedly refused to opensource the code.
Nice to see an article about eCS once in a while.
Twenty years now I’m running OS/2 rsp. eCS as my main system with no regret.
Never needed any antivirus software although I’m nearly 24*7 online. I’m always quite fond of malware news.
Yes, nothing compares to the WPS.
No, I’m not unlucky. It’s feeling nice – high above the crowds.
I got screenshots for the curious: koryphi.net/ecs .
How would you say it compares to doxbox for running dos games?
First, I have to confess that I’m not a gamer and never have been.
If you are talking of DOSBox the emulator I don’t have any experience with it. For my development work I always used the OS/2 rsp. eCS built-in DOS which is faster and more versatile than every other DOS including the varieties of MS, Novell, and Caldera.
But there were kids in the nineties who asked me to install lots of DOS games on the family OS/2 PC. That machine had one single ISA sound card and I remember they could play several DOS games concurrently and have all the different sounds playing concurrently without interfering with eachother. It was quite bad for my ears.
Haha, interesting – I’m not much of a gamer these days myself, but I wouldn’t mind trying it out.
When I was a kid, I actually knew about OS/2, which I guess basically showed my destiny to remain a geek. I think I even asked to get a copy of Warp, but it never happened. Maybe I’ll build an eComStation box one of these days after I relocate.
Not sure if the games that do dirty hardware tricks would run.
With the price of eCS, I would not say it fit in the hobby OS…. I know about all the licences and stuff, still, cost too much just to toy around with it.
And who would want to live in a 16/32bit world now? OS/2 is still filled with 16bits stuff, native code (lol @ Win 3.1 !!!).
If I wanted to live in the past, I’d prefer doing it with Windows NT 4.0 instead of OS/2. It was fine when the battle was between DOS and Windows 3.x / 95.
You obviously don’t know about this one:
That’s your PoV and it’s ok for you.
But why should other people share your tendency to be trendy? Do you buy a new car every year because you “don’t want to live in the past”?
My tendency is to keep good things as long as they are good for me. I really hope my tendency doesn’t upset anybody here.
For you. For me it’s still fine.
Your arguments are yours, not mine. Your life is yours, not mine. Is this a problem for you?
You’re going to tell me that a Live DEMO CD is the same thing as a fully working/installable free Linux distro? Or whatever other alternative OS you want to use that tend to be free?
In the end, you’re getting a free DEMO, that’s it. If you want to use it, you have to buy it and cost is still going to be a big issue.
And I’m not trendy, I’ve said that I would prefer to use Win NT 4.0 (1996) that is more modern (fully 32bit) than OS/2. At least you can run much more Windows apps on NT.
To each their own.
I’m sorry about misunderstanding your “cost too much just to toy around with it”. Didn’t know your “toy around” was meant to imply “fully working/installable”.
The meaning of the word “hobby” is another linguistic topic we seem to disagree. I don’t associate “hobby” with “free”.
Maybe it’s better for the OS/2 community if not everybody can just toy around with the OS. Sometimes value has its price.
He’s got a point. Toying around doesn’t mean spending 15 minutes playing and that’s it.
To truly take a measure of an os you’ve got to install it, hack it, change things install things, try different adapters and hardware, build some code on it etc. With live demos, you can’t really do any of that. The lack of change persistence is a non-starter.
The $149 price tag on the Home & Student edition is a lot to ask for an eCS license that covers software that is only marginally different from Warp 4.
I don’t think it needs to be free, but I think $50 is a more reasonable price for eCS.
Thank you, that’s what I’m trying to say.
If you don’t like the term “toy around” then maybe “take it for a test drive” would be better. And you can’t do that with a Live DEMO CD.
I takes more than 15mins for me to select my favorite distro, I like to edit files, move things around, change the decors.
$149 to be in a “select group” of eCS users? Well, I’m in way better group that don’t charge that much.
That’s ok.
I’m afraid, however, our semantics are different.
When you say eCS is too expensive for you, I can only accept your stance. Likewise you have to accept my stance of “the price is ok for me”.
But when you say “I’m in a way better group” I see two logical flaws. First, how do you know which group is better if you can’t toy around with eCS? Second, your “way better” group and the eCS users group are not disjoint sets. Many eCS users employ Linux, too. The Linux group doesn’t offer any advantage over the Linux⊕eCS group.
You seem quite defensive …not so sure about your choice?
And it’s not about trendy, it’s about what’s practical.
Anybody who’s even a passing technophile / geek / computer aficionado already knows that OS/2 morphed into eComstation. (e_e) Next.
Hi Howard.
I will like to add the open source software that we currently have running on OS/2-eComStation.
We have OpenOffice 3.2.0, Firefox 10, Thunderbird, OpenJDK 1.6, CUPS, Qt 4 libraries, a lot of open source Qt4 apps ported, GCC compiler, etc.
We may lack many apps and drivers, but we still have the foundation to keep using OS/2 today.
With eComStation 2.2 coming out on April (according to Mensys) and a new Live demo CD, I hope we can get more people in the community.
Regards
Martin
And rpm, the complete AMP suite, Watcom C and Fortran compilers, DFSee (the partition magician), and PMView (the fastest image viewer/editor on earth).
Ultimately, the underlying goal of OS/2 was to return to IBM the control over the PC market – so of course users and other vendors rebelled, Gang of Nine style, and chose the relatively friendlier option of MS Windows.