4 ms·

This. I think the author is making the mistake of comparing it with what I would call "new world" OSs. Very broadly I would categorize most OSs of the 90s int

by ris 6y ago

This. I think the author is making the mistake of comparing it with what I would call "new world" OSs. Very broadly I would categorize most OSs of the 90s into old-world and new-world, common traits of the old-world being: - Minimal or no memory protection - Minimal or no real user separation - Usually desktop-focussed - Cooperative multitasking at best - Heavily reliant on assembly and hardware specifics with vendors one by one realizing they had to make a big compatibility-breaking leap to introduce the features now expected for a desktop OS. (cue tens of replies pointing out exceptions, sure) As an old-world OS, in 1991, I do still think that RISC OS did a pretty good job from a user's perspective. My memories are of it being fast, attractive (anti-aliased fonts?!) and intuitive (often ingenious). With an extremely powerful inbuilt BASIC implementation, to add. The more I've looked in to RISC OS more recently, the more I've realized how many compromises had to be made to achieve this, and I'm sure they were running out of headroom to evolve it towards a new-world OS. But really this was true for most old-world OSs I can think of. (again, cue exceptions)

NikkiA 6y ago
I think part of it is that RiscOS had some new-world features, and like the other 'straddling' OSs of the early 90s (OS/2, Desqview/GEM) maybe felt they didn't need to make a big leap to adapt to changes in user expectation, and failed because they had a klunkiness as a result.
- pmyteh 6y ago
  My suspicion is that, by the time it became obvious that such things would be essential (maybe 1994 onwards) then the writing was already on the wall. RISC OS was a relatively niche system even in the late 1980s, and it was clear to even to those of us who were enthusiasts as early as 1993 or so that it was going to be left behind. Acorn had weak sales as PCs became standard in schools (its previous strength), the OS was tightly tied to the existing hardware, and there was no money to do whatever radical overhauls that would be necessary to make the 'big leap' for a small market. I used a RISC OS machine as my primary computer all the way through to 2004, but it was seven or so years past its best by then, and probably twelve since RISC OS was even a potential world-beater.
alexisread 6y ago
Ok, so I'll take you up on the challenge with MINT: Gem and Tos weren't really developed much by Atari, but they did buy in MINT which has preemptive multi tasking and memory protection. With the Aes being retargetable (graphic cards), gdos vector fonts and postscript printing, tcp and lan networking stacks, shell, global shortcut system, posix compatibility and multi-user capabilities, it managed to evolve Tos to something quite modern! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MiNT https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MiNT

by ris 6y ago

NikkiA 6y ago

I think part of it is that RiscOS had some new-world features, and like the other 'straddling' OSs of the early 90s (OS/2, Desqview/GEM) maybe felt they didn't need to make a big leap to adapt to changes in user expectation, and failed because they had a klunkiness as a result.

pmyteh 6y ago
My suspicion is that, by the time it became obvious that such things would be essential (maybe 1994 onwards) then the writing was already on the wall. RISC OS was a relatively niche system even in the late 1980s, and it was clear to even to those of us who were enthusiasts as early as 1993 or so that it was going to be left behind. Acorn had weak sales as PCs became standard in schools (its previous strength), the OS was tightly tied to the existing hardware, and there was no money to do whatever radical overhauls that would be necessary to make the 'big leap' for a small market. I used a RISC OS machine as my primary computer all the way through to 2004, but it was seven or so years past its best by then, and probably twelve since RISC OS was even a potential world-beater.

alexisread 6y ago

Ok, so I'll take you up on the challenge with MINT: Gem and Tos weren't really developed much by Atari, but they did buy in MINT which has preemptive multi tasking and memory protection. With the Aes being retargetable (graphic cards), gdos vector fonts and postscript printing, tcp and lan networking stacks, shell, global shortcut system, posix compatibility and multi-user capabilities, it managed to evolve Tos to something quite modern! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MiNT https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MiNT