The Be website has been updated and now mostly contains stock info and other legalese. Also hints at a liquidation auction to be held on January 16th are to be found in the new pages. The http://free.be.com (BeOS) sub-domain does not work anymore, and all the developer info, BeBook, Developer’s newsletters, sample code etc, are all gone from that server. However, you can still access the old web site from archives.org and their old ftp site from PlanetMirror. In the meantime, Palm’s David Nagel (the person who leads the subsidiary that Be engineers are working under, and he also has control over Be’s IP) has said that parts of the Be technology will be used in a new, 32-bit, PalmOS, but sources say that he has firmly declined any further desktop versions of BeOS, as the desktop is not Palm’s focus.
The End of a Chapter for Be & BeOS
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
must come to an end.
I love my M505 and I look forward to an ARM based device with BeOS power under the hood.
I see it as a new beginning!
ciao
yc
Everytime I think of BeOS I can only remember that stupid announcement. Internet Appliances. ARGH! BeOS was my last true hope. Now I’m looking at OS X. Thanks a lot Be, you damn idiots.
<optimist view> David Nagel did not decline 3rd party licencing of BeOS, did he? </optimist view>
Is Be dead now? Well I still have that tiny spark of hope in me that BeOS-sources will be licenced to a “third-party”. I will keep my BeOS-Computers running as long as possible…my main-machine is BeOS-only
…. but I guess I also have to watch out for alternatives….uhhmmm I guess I will get a Apple Cube, mod it to DualG4 … but till then I have to save my money… cuz apple is to expensive for me yet. Maybe I’ll update my O² before I get the cube 
BeOS rulez, BeOS is cool…
keep that in mind.
Matthias “LoCal” Schonder
will miss you Be
:::
At last someone has spoken about BeOS. Doesn’t amke a lot of sense though. He states that M$ is doing it’s level best lock Palm out of using Visual Studio, while still trying to say that it’s an open environment. Plam have a development environment in BeOS, why not port the tools to it?
Keep the faith !!
It’s been hard trying to keep the faith lately!
I must admid that lately I’ve been shifting to Mandrake Linux with Ximian GNOME. It’s been hard without the cool and smooth UI and superfast bootuptime!!
I’m gonna miss BeOS alot and I still keep a tiny hope that somehow the latest beta of BONE and OpenGL is gonna show up and be widely/easy accessable to the rest of us who keep BeOS installed on a partition -just in case…
MAN! I would have loved to play NewerWinther Nights in BeOS! As how it looks like now, I guess that’s not gonna happen…
the best os is os x.
i think i’ll go buy an apple.
shame to see innovation die.
-j
the parts of it that Be actually wrote can be open source. There is a lot of licenced code in the OS as a whole, but the important parts, like the app server, the tracker, and the BeOS kernel could, and should be opened, perhaps under a licence like mozilla. The idea behind BeOS is good, but Jean-Louis Gasse must be a freakin’ idiot not to realize that without a hardware monopoly a la apple, or a huge amount of brand recognition a la microsoft, he cant hope to survive, let alone compete, without something huge up his sleeve, like the raw, seething power that is the open source community. I say, open it up, and bring it into the fold. Perhaps we can make it better, faster, or even <gasp> a viable competitor for the Evil Empire.
–send all flames to /dev/null
David Nagel, according to my sources in the media, flatly denied that any current Palm partners have expressed any interest in licensing the BeOS. This does not address the BeUnited business offer we sent to Palm. We are STILL waiting for SOME kind of REPLY (not answer, reply!) from Nagel about our proposal. Mr. Nagel has not once referred to BeUnited or our proposal. I have suspicions about that but no point in talking about that right now. Keep an eye on http://www.beunited.org for the news as we get it. If Palm and Nagel officially tell us that they do not want to license BeOS to us, we will announce that there.
Either way, Palm has been making it clear that they do not intend to fight MS on the Desktop, just the handheld. We BeOS supporters are wondering if they are even scared of having a licenser compete with MS on the Desktop….
-Jace
So, now we’re stuck with Windows or a UNIXy system for our x86 hardware. Joy.
Oh how I hate computers and what the industry has become. My hobby has become my prison.
– chrish
BeOS might be dead as an operating system, but its legend lives on in AtheOS and OpenBeOS. Both might have long ways to go before becoming usable, but as someone who became interested in BeOS a bit too late, I am eager to see these two operating systems when ready.
BeOS had a proprietary 3d Kit.
They replaced it with a standard OpenGL API.
BeOS had a proprietary TCP/IP stack.
They replaced it with a BSD standard one.
BeOS had a proprietary Web browser.
They replaced with a standard norvegian one.
BeOS had great engineers and users.
They replaced with standard idiots.
Well, it was pretty clear that Palm would have never restarted the BeOS development, their PDA business is tough enough.
There is still a licensing possibility, even if their use of BeOS-based code on the next PalmOS could create some problems (given the usual corporate way of thinking).
Anyway there are the 2 BeOS derived projects (OpenBeOS and BlueOS), which could give back to users the BeOS way of Operating Systems.
If we look closely to BeOS as it is now, we see 2 important points which contributed to its success among current users: its Amiga-style responsiveness and the mostly clean API.
Currently the BlueOS projects seems to follow these 2 targets more closely, while OpenBeOS aims at a closer binary competibility, which I think is it really necessary due to the limited software base and which would require a lot of time to fine tune).
All in all, anyway, there is still a possibility to keep the vital aspects of BeOS rolling in the future and I would consider this a good thing after all.
The best thing about beos was the icons!
At least they will live on!!
it sux .. was so little that beos needed to be really good…
i ran 4.52 as my only os for like 6 months… wish i could run 6.0 now or something like that… when will we see the true power of an os again?
sure not in xp.. windows feels like running a ugly troll eventhough xp looks ok,. beos felt like running with an angel or something…
i will always remember that darn fast bootup time mmmm
beos rocked my world it was as fun as when i used my c-64 way back…
Go back to efnet you belong there Ano…
Opera is actually one of the best browsers out there
And BeOs…Ill miss you
I’m having a great time in BeOS. Using it 98% of the time and XP 2%. Imagine when BlueOS comes out, all those drivers, all that spiffy hardware you’ll be able to use. This is life on the frontier. I don’t envy you generic OS users.
Mmmm….wonder if BlueOS will run on PPC systems. Anyone know? Stands more of a chance than OpenBeOS I would think.
Nothing prevent BlueOS to run on PPC or other platforms, but we are mainly developing on x86 platform. We need developers who use PPC to be sure that nothing break the compatibility.
BlueOS can use a FreeBSD kernel too. Only few changes on the KernelKit are needed.
MPX: I am writing this comment on Opera right now: it’s a great
browser. I didn’t say the Norwegian browser or the APIs from
Silicon Graphics or BSD are inferior to the BeOS ones.
I stated only that, as an alternative OS, BeOS began to decline
when the engeneers at Menlo Park opted for porting standard
technologies available to all other platforms and decided
to give away the Personal Edition for free, clearly abandoning
the prefessional market.
When are we going to see some news coming from the BlueOS dev team? I’d just like to see a staus report now and then …
yea id like some blueos news too…
hey guillaume how’s my license doing? and when will the new app server be ready?
-j
>>The idea behind BeOS is good, but Jean-Louis Gasse must be a freakin’ idiot not to realize that without a hardware monopoly a la apple, or a huge amount of brand recognition a la microsoft, he cant hope to survive, let alone compete, without something huge up his sleeve, like the raw, seething power that is the open source community. I say, open it up, and bring it into the fold. Perhaps we can make it better, faster, or even a viable competitor for the Evil Empire.<<
I can agree with Apple on the issue that they killed off the Mac clonemakers, but your comment on Microsoft and ‘brand recgonition’ is a little bit funny. I think that Webster Dictionary should have a picture of Bill Gates right beside the word definition of ‘monopoly’ or at least the Microsoft logo!!!
Listen guys I see everyone saying “BeOS I’ll Miss you!”. God damn you people have little faith. You can still use BeOS, you can still find the BeOS 5 PE installation files. You can still develop for BeOS.
And if you were looking for the Pro Version, Be Inc. is holding a liquidation auction on the 16th of January, show your support and buy a couple copies.
BeOS is far from dead, as long as there is an active community is in existence I think that an OS or piece of software can survive.
WE can develop drivers, WE can develop software, the people of BlueOS and OpenBeOS see this, why can’t others?
Well, Be may be dead, but tehcnology still lives. I recall this:
http://forums.begroovy.com/showthread.php?s=2c8e5de62cb673a4bd4dbed…
Imagine, just plug your FireWire-equipped iPod-like handheld to any box and boot up your desktop with all your favourite software and documents. Anywhere.
Just wonder does Palm have R&D team…
|jBett|: You are right when you are saying BeOS isn’t dead, but IMO that’s not meant with “BeOS I’ll miss you”. The bad thing is, that if Plam will not licence it to a third party developer [beunited.org!] then it will stay where it is.
I’m using BeOS since the first R3 days and I will use it as long as possible, but with no active development, how long will that be? Two years maybe three, sure I can and will use it longer, but it will be impossible on my main machine.
I really enjoy BeOS, especially as the company I’m working for is forcing me to use Win2k which is horrible for me. As a Java-dev I could also use OS X, Solaris, *BSD, Solaris,…… [sometimes even BeOS!] But the company uses to much M$ scum [Exchange, IIS, M$ Proxy which is configured IE only].
But for home I have and love BeOS, but again for how long? I guess the best CPU for it is the latest Pentium III with 1.33 Ghz in a dual board or if possible a quad board. K, that will help over the next three years…..and then?
Maybe I should note, that the 32Bit-age for x86 comes to its end…and then?
Again I will use BeOS as long as possible, but if theres no “third-party-licence” from Palm, it’s days as my MainOS are counted. I still have to look for alternatives.
My O² is nice, but SGI Hardware is quite expensive and SGI itself isn’t “healthy”!
Windoze is horrible for me……no I don’t want it at home for anything else then gaming.
OS X is nice, hardware is expensive but in three years I maybe can afford a nice Mac
But maybe there will be a miracle [it’s Christmas-time
] and BeOS-development will go on. And then there is OpenBeOS and BlueOS, both are great and I hope they will grow huge, but the development work is tiny small compared to the work to get the respect of the industry [ just look at Be, Inc.! ]
BeHappy:)
LoCal
Many many cool OS are dying.
>> GUYS, PLEASE, WE HAVE TO STOP THIS SITUATION <<
I think the OpenSource community could benefit from the release of the code from thoose OS.
So, 1st of all, please read and sign thoose petitions:
http://www.petitiononline.com/OS24FREE/ – for OS/2
http://www.petitiononline.com/beosos/ – for BeOS
Tell to any1 u can… we have to reach at least 1,000,000 signs to reach the goal…
Help us, help yourself, help the world…. go OpenSource !!!
Palm will release something only if the new CEO is not a dumb one. How much Palm pay in licence and software to m$? If they would use BeOS they would save money on that (not to mention all the computer crash). The would also buy software from THEIR community of programmer. It would simplify bug tracking because they would work in THEIR OS.
Also all employee that change position to work at another company would bring BeOS skill with him, spreading the seed. Company do not see very far, they are too busy about quarterly revenue. That is why M$ do so much money, they don’t care about it, they always plan how to screw you many year in advance.
Palm need to put processor in their handheld that can rival desktop computer (when plug into AC) and allow us to plug a monitor in it and a keyboard, even, cluster the palm (in allowing buying one without screen, or better screen sold separatly). If that happen i could care less for a desktop OS.
…Palm doesn’t pay anything to Microsoft. Their products run PalmOS. Microsoft is one of their competitors already
Look, Palm doesn’t have anything to gain by taking on Microsoft on the desktop–they’re already in a tough fight for handhelds, and that started out as their home territory. I hope they’re willing to make a source license to BeUnited, but if that happens I expect it to be a slow and painful process. The saga of third-party licensing of OS/2 might be instructive: it ultimately happened, but Stardock tried unsuccessfully for years to get terms that included all the technology rather than merely what had already been released as Warp 4. (eComStation is essentially using Warp 4’s core, not the more advanced Warp 5 Server.)
I’ve argued in the (increasingly distant) past that Be made its share of mistakes in competing, mostly coming down to the “one big win or nothing at all” mentality that caused them to completely shift course when it became clear they weren’t going to immediately get a million units shipped on their own, or by Power Computing, or Dell. By the time it was Sony’s turn not to ship a million units of BeIA, they were out of funds–and given their undeniable track record of knifing developers in the back in their “focus shifts,” I suspect they were out of friends, too.
Even so, it’s difficult to blame companies for not being willing to take on Microsoft in a market where they have over 90% dominance, and the most serious competitor to them–Apple–largely survives by virtue of competing with the hardware Windows runs on rather than going head-to-head on the same platform. Palm has no reason to do it, Apple has no reason to port OS X to Intel as a “Windows killer,” and both corporate and non-corporate efforts to ride the open source wave onto the desktop have been running aground.
It’s my suspicion that Microsoft isn’t really going to get knocked off the mountain until there’s a paradigm shift that catches them unawares–a new model of human-machine interaction that catches on and catches on big.
Beos Ill miss you i never meant ” Beos ill miss you now goodbye”
BeOs is still a great os and i still use it daily…if only my winmodem would work :/
Hey when is blueOS going to be………uhm giving out something? Not a beta but…….dont know the word….
MPX -> I’ve configured my winmodem when i could connect only that way. I have ASMAX modem. It’s based on some popular chipset (or something like that – my knowledge is poor at this area
. If BeOS can see it, You can try to write AT&T commands in settings and .. surf the net 
I have been using BeOS for a short time and is better than W$, Linux and any one else, and am really sad about this, so bye bye to BeOS.
Hi,
“News for Christmas” you asked. I will try…
We are still working on BlueOS, progress are “not bad”, even Good
The team is a little bit late, but a lot of promising things are in the good way
We will need few months to show something usable (full UI working + OpenTracker running).
SupportKit and StorageKit are partially completed.
The InterfaceKit didn’t evolve really since Frans decided to make a pause to finish Inferno, but classes like BView/BWindow and BBitmap made good progress.
I’m still working on the app_server, its architecture is “mature”, BWindow can be opened, BView and BBitmap created and basic functions like DrawBitmap were ‘finished’ yesterday (but improved during next weeks).
The ‘native’ window managing is near from completion, maybe will Eugenia comment it. We will have to wait few weeks before to merge the ‘native’ part and the app_server.
The MediaKit is still on the paper, but near of a full design ( Am I wrong Brice?).
The NetworkKit could be done quickly but noone seems to be interested, if you are, tell me.
New members joined us and works on tests and applications (Login, preferences…). The LocalizationKit is ‘in the pipe’.
I no more managing the team, I delegated this task but stay on of the ‘technical leader’ .
The website was not updated, no time to do it. What’s more a new (better) one will appear ‘soon’.
We always need new developers, but developers who have time and motivation to make BlueOS (the name will change) progress quickly. Where is the BeOS developer community?? (chating on mailing list ?
)
It appears to me that only users want to resurect BeOS, it’s THE big surprise of the year. (the death of BeOS was not surprising me …)
I hoped to deliver a public beta of the app_server but I didn’t find someone with more than 3 hours per day to spend on it. I will consider the release of the window managing if needed.
Happy Christmas!
Guillaume
Thanks for the Info BlueOS (BTW dont change the name of the os i think the name rocks
And Thanks sergio but thing is i got this connexant really true winmodem or somthing…..
>The ‘native’ window managing is near from completion, maybe will Eugenia comment it.
Yes, I had a pick on it, Guillaume (BlueOS) sent me a Linux test binary. So far, it is a banch of bitmaps behaving like windows and it is truly smooth. However, these are just that, bitmaps, and X usually stores bitmaps in the gfx board’s memory, so I will have to wait for some ‘real’ windows before I really comment further on the project. But yes, so far, it looks good.
And I hope that Frans comes back soon in the project to complete the Interface Kit.
The King is dead, long live the King.
Finally, energies will stop being wasted. Ok now, back to a REAL Os, Linux…
>Finally, energies will stop being wasted. Ok now, back to a REAL OS, Linux…
Give us a break, will ya? Spare us for this Christmas…
It’s my suspicion that Microsoft isn’t really going to get knocked off the mountain until there’s a paradigm shift that catches them unawares–a new model of human-machine interaction that catches on and catches on big. <p> </p>Wow. I think you nailed it, WattsM. The Linux crowd should really consider this.
Why is it, that all good things come to an end too soon, and all bad things seem to go on forever?
Linux is even slower then windows and has tons of bugs and uneccesary apps and its all talk…BeOs and QNX is the thing…Fast and almost no Bugs
I think the problem is that (some of) the Linux crowd think the paradigm shift they’ve already made–from proprietary to open source–constitutes a threat to the existing order that it really doesn’t. There will be a certain percentage of people who will switch for philosophical or ‘enthusiast’ reasons (i.e., seeking the bleeding edge), but most people won’t switch unless they feel they’ll be able to do nearly everything they use their computer for currently (a) in a measurably better way (b) with no reduced important functionality and (c) without a learning curve that represents significant lost productivity. Linux’s adoption beyond the enthusiast market has, I suspect, mostly been in the server market because that audience is most likely to find Linux meeting all three of those. You can make a case for it in the Unix workstation market, too, particularly as programs that used to be the near-exclusive domain of Irix migrate toward it. But on the desktop, BeOS does (or perhaps did) considerably better in the ‘low learning curve’ area–and it had started to get traction in the workstation market much faster than it took Linux to achieve the same level.
It’s possible a development group will use the Linux kernel as a base for a system that manages to achieve this, but I don’t think any of the Unix desktop environment projects will manage it. (I won’t rule it out, but I think only Eazel had a vision grander than ‘a better Windows than Windows,’ and we know how far that ony got IBM.) The realist in me suspects that if somebody does do that with the Linux kernel, it will be a commercial project, embracing the “closed source, open API” model people have actually made money with in the past. (Remember, they only have to release their modifications to the kernel; something that sits over it, like the equivalent of BeOS’s ‘servers,’ could remain closed.)
apple has finally figured out a way to make open source development practical. that’s pretty good.
-j
I think the problem is that (some of) the Linux crowd think the paradigm shift they’ve already made–from proprietary to open source–constitutes a threat to the existing order that it really doesn’t.
Exactly. The problem is that this is NOT a shift at all for the average user who just wants a working tool; it just looks like a step backward. Who cares about the philosophy behind an application’s development? Does the program I need work, or doesn’t it? (Probably not.) Will it ever reach version 1.0?? (Not before the Second Coming.) BeOS represented several steps forward in many areas; ease of use, ease of app installation, fast booting, ***FONT SUPPORT***, and on and on. I would use BeOS more if the only javascript-enabled browser wouln’t crash so much and supported modern web standards, there was a Java2 package available, etc. A lot of people would.
There will be a certain percentage of people who will switch for philosophical or ‘enthusiast’ reasons (i.e., seeking the bleeding edge), but most people won’t switch unless they feel they’ll be able to do nearly everything they use their computer for currently (a) in a measurably better way (b) with no reduced important functionality and (c) without a learning curve that represents significant lost productivity.
And Linux isn’t there. I wish it was (since BeOS is even further away now because of neglect).
Linux’s adoption beyond the enthusiast market has, I suspect, mostly been in the server market because that audience is most likely to find Linux meeting all three of those.
A very good place to use it.
I dunno about you, but I’m more in favor of the OpenBeOS project. Unless I’m mistaken, the BlueOS project is using the Linux kerne, right? Uh, BeOS is way more better than Linux IMHO. I can’t see Linux and BeOS molded into the same. Of course, that’s just _my_ opinion…
Sorry, Hillbillie, but don’t forget that BeOS is DEAD and Linux is THRIVING… Linux has device support. If you lose Linux, you lose device support. My fingers are too weary from typing to go into more detail…
-j
Sorry, Hillbillie, but don’t forget that BeOS is DEAD
Be the company is dead. The OS is still running. My copy of BeOS didn’t care about the closing of Be, Inc. It is falling behind rapidly, though, but it is still usable.
and Linux is THRIVING
But thriving where? On the server? Absolutely, and I think it will take over. In development activity? Yes (though sometimes it seems to go nowhere fast). On the desktop? Hardly, unless mandated by corporate IT policy. The Mac still commands a much greater share of the desktop than Linux, and will probably GAIN ground because of OS-X.
There are still far too many usability issues in Linux for most home & SO/HO users…issues that BeOS (and MS, to a lesser extent) resolved years ago. Frankly, I don’t think many in the Linux development community are paying attention to the needs of average users (several Linux developers have told me they just don’t care). If they don’t care about that market, fine, but in that case they shouldn’t be surprised when their efforts to make progress in that market fall flat. And flat it is.
An OS without developers will not be around for another year. You can’t just keep using old binaries forever…
I agree with you on Linux the OS. Hilbillie was talking about KERNEL. Linux kernel demonstrated its abilities on the server and desktop market… not every kernel (and certainly not the crash-prone BeOS kernel) is used all over the world on SERVERS
-j
An OS without developers will not be around for another year. You can’t just keep using old binaries forever…
I know, but some will try! BeOS’s only hope is in its open-source successors.
Linux kernel demonstrated its abilities on the server and desktop market…
Yes, but you can’t get anything done with just a kernel. The only fair comparison between any OSs must consider the whole OS, including user interfaces for the desktop. This is where Linux still needs work (maybe scrapping X and starting over?). The non-optional GUI is also one reason why MS products aren’t so hot on the server.
not every kernel (and certainly not the crash-prone BeOS kernel) is used all over the world on SERVERS
I can’t relate to BeOS being crash-prone, though there may be others here (who have been using it longer than I) who can. Linux (and FreeBSD) will kick MS’s butt off servers everywhere as more network admins get tired of their bosses screaming at them every time NT/2000 loses its mind. I don’t envy the lives of the NT sysadmins I know.
An OS without developers will not be around for another year. You can’t just keep using old binaries forever…
You know what? My company still sells product that runs Windows 3.11. And for what it does, it works fine.