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This reminds me of that old quotation: "Those who don't understand Unix are condemned to reinvent it, poorly."
by riffic 8y ago
This reminds me of that old quotation: "Those who don't understand Unix are condemned to reinvent it, poorly."
- oblio 8y agoWell, if you're going to trot out quotes from the 80s (more precisely, 1987, Henry Spencer), you should be aware that Microsoft made and sold one of the first commercial Unixes: Xenix. And they made it in 1980, long before your quote. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenix https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenix -> "In the mid-to-late 1980s, Xenix was the most common Unix variant, measured according to the number of machines on which it was installed.[1][2] Microsoft chairman Bill Gates said in 1996 that for a long time that company had the highest-volume AT&T Unix license" Microsoft definitely understood Unix and figured out there was no market for it for close to 2 decades.
- Fnoord 8y agoApple successfully leveraged UNIX to develop macOS (officially UNIX) from which they developed iOS. Google successfully managed to leverage the Linux kernel (Unix-like) and Java to develop Android. Windows Phone, on the other hand, flopped.
- oblio 8y agoMy original comment said: "there was no market for Unix for close to 2 decades". That was hyperbole, but: 1. 1980 to 1998 for Google, 18 years -> that's awfully close to 2 decades. 2.1980 to 2001 for Apple, 21 years -> that's more than 2 decades. So your counter examples confirm what I said. 3. Windows Phone and family failed because of marketing blunders, not because of tech. MS-DOS and Windows succeeded because of marketing prowess, not because of tech. 4. The mainstream market just wasn't ready for Unix for a long time. The biggest Unix success was Sun, for a long time, and Microsoft absolutely dwarfed Sun for most of their existence. Further proof that my statement was right.
- Fnoord 8y ago> Regarding Windows Phone: for technical reasons? Not really... Not alone, it was also the network effect, and Microsoft's terrible reputation they gained in the end of '90s and '00s. > 1980 to 2000 Yes, I noticed, but that isn't a representative range. If anything, what's relevant is their recent history: 1) Less proprietary software, more FOSS. 2) Data gathering is more important. 3) As the old cash cows dwindle (Windows and Office) new ones are attempted.