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>The agreement with Novell only covered “Windows 3.1”. That is why the second, finished, working edition of Windows for Workgroups, a big version with massive c
by RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago
>The agreement with Novell only covered “Windows 3.1”. That is why the second, finished, working edition of Windows for Workgroups, a big version with massive changes, was called… Windows for Workgroups 3.11.
>And that’s why NT was also called 3.1. Because that way it fell under the Novell agreement.
I am calling BS on this story. I was around during when NT 3.1 came out, and even in the the trade magazines there were no mentions of anything like this. It was called NT 3.1 basically to parallel Windows 3.1
In addition, the legal reasoning doesn’t make sense. The law isn’t like source code where clever hacks are just mechanically executed. If you go before a judge and try to tell them that your completely new product is covered by an old agreement because of some clever naming, it is not going to go very well for you.
So based on the above, I think this story is wrong.
- rnd0 5y agoI agree. Additionally, if it was true then I'd imagine they'd name Windows95 "windows 3.11/32" or somesuch.
- lproven 5y agoWindows 3.11 was a thing, separate from Windows for Workgroups. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_3.1x#Windows_3.11 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_3.1x#Windows_3.11 But I think this also explains why Windows for Workgroups was also only version 3.1 and 3.11. WfWg 3.11 was a _major_ rewrite, with a whole new 32-bit filesystem (called VFAT and pulled from the WIP Windows Chicago, AKA Windows 95), a 32-bit network stack and more. But they kept the version number. How mysterious, huh?
- lproven 5y agoI wrote it. I also deployed NT 3.1 in production. I was there, too. :-) It was common industry gossip at the time, but no, I can't prove it. I have seen an answer on Quora which said exactly the same thing, for what little it's worth.