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From the article: > All of this was designed to run in 128k of RAM. > Makes you really wonder why Windows 2000 > requires 128 MEGS to run. Indeed. Is th

From the article: > All of this was designed to run in 128k of RAM. > Makes you really wonder why Windows 2000 > requires 128 MEGS to run. Indeed. Is this because the infamous recent JavaScript bloatation isn't unique to JavaScript --- that OS developers too tend to rope in greater and greater amounts of libraries, frameworks, etc., to accomplish the same thing? It's true that today's operating systems do more, but it's still drawing text and shapes on a two-dimensional screen. Do today's advances in multitasking, color, and so on, really need 1,000 times as much memory (100 MB) --- or even 100,000 times as much (10 GB)?

mikestew 10y ago
Well, in this example I don't wonder at all. Sure, Mac OS ran in 128K of RAM, but IMO it ran kind of poorly. At a minimum, it seemed right on the edge of being under-provisioned. In contrast to Win2K, which could pre-emptivively multitask applications, serve up files to other computers, allow remote access to the user land desktop, and had color. So no, actually, I don't "really wonder" why Win2K required 128Mb of RAM. Sure, there was probably some bloat in there, but there was also a lot of utility that came with those higher RAM requirements. EDIT: and in response to parent's edit, no, the utility I list should not require 100K x the RAM of the original Macintosh. We could probably do a lot of it with 100 times less. But you'll be waiting another twenty years while we figure out how to cram all that into a smaller space. Or we could just say "fuck it", build it now, and just bloat the RAM requirements. That doesn't excuse >100Mb web pages, but I'm willing to put up with some bloat if my apps can be segregated from one another such that they don't take the whole machine down (as just one example of where I'm willing to compromise).
- yuhong 10y ago
  It took until after the 1988 DRAM shortage ended in 1989-1990 (that started just after OS/2 1.0 was released) before more than 1MB to 2MB of total RAM became common. Then for years 4Mbit DRAM prices was stuck at the $12 to $14 range, which is part of why NT 3.1 did not catch on. Then DRAM prices declined fast starting in 1996 until 1998.
- mmphosis 10y ago
  Well before Win2K, System 7 could cooperatively multitask applications, serve up files to other computers, allow remote access to the user land desktop, and had color. http://toastytech.com/guis/mac755.html http://toastytech.com/guis/mac755.html Debates continue today on preemptive vs cooperative. https://vorpus.org/blog/some-thoughts-on-asynchronous-api-design-in-a-post-asyncawait-world/ https://vorpus.org/blog/some-thoughts-on-asynchronous-api-de...

mikestew 10y ago

Well, in this example I don't wonder at all. Sure, Mac OS ran in 128K of RAM, but IMO it ran kind of poorly. At a minimum, it seemed right on the edge of being under-provisioned. In contrast to Win2K, which could pre-emptivively multitask applications, serve up files to other computers, allow remote access to the user land desktop, and had color. So no, actually, I don't "really wonder" why Win2K required 128Mb of RAM. Sure, there was probably some bloat in there, but there was also a lot of utility that came with those higher RAM requirements. EDIT: and in response to parent's edit, no, the utility I list should not require 100K x the RAM of the original Macintosh. We could probably do a lot of it with 100 times less. But you'll be waiting another twenty years while we figure out how to cram all that into a smaller space. Or we could just say "fuck it", build it now, and just bloat the RAM requirements. That doesn't excuse >100Mb web pages, but I'm willing to put up with some bloat if my apps can be segregated from one another such that they don't take the whole machine down (as just one example of where I'm willing to compromise).

yuhong 10y ago
It took until after the 1988 DRAM shortage ended in 1989-1990 (that started just after OS/2 1.0 was released) before more than 1MB to 2MB of total RAM became common. Then for years 4Mbit DRAM prices was stuck at the $12 to $14 range, which is part of why NT 3.1 did not catch on. Then DRAM prices declined fast starting in 1996 until 1998.
mmphosis 10y ago
Well before Win2K, System 7 could cooperatively multitask applications, serve up files to other computers, allow remote access to the user land desktop, and had color. http://toastytech.com/guis/mac755.html http://toastytech.com/guis/mac755.html Debates continue today on preemptive vs cooperative. https://vorpus.org/blog/some-thoughts-on-asynchronous-api-design-in-a-post-asyncawait-world/ https://vorpus.org/blog/some-thoughts-on-asynchronous-api-de...