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I had two problems with this post. First: 'NeXTStep was not “just warmed over UNIX”.' It was, and so was Mac OSX. What Gruber doesn't seem to get is that warme

I had two problems with this post. First: 'NeXTStep was not “just warmed over UNIX”.' It was, and so was Mac OSX. What Gruber doesn't seem to get is that warmed over unix provides a much more stable OS than Windows NT or DOS. He should be proudly admitting its warmed over unix. Second: "It’s almost impossible to overstate just how wrong Bill Gates is here, but Isaacson presents Gates’s side as the truth." It should be mentioned more clearly that Gates was saying this on a sales call - his ultimate goal being to have every consumer computer made running Windows NT. If he stretched the truth a bit, he shouldn't be blamed for being ignorant, only ambitious. This is what often irks me about Gruber - he makes disagreeing with Apple out to be an act of incompetence. Most engineers that don't like Apple products simply want greater customization over their tech, something Apple denies their users to promote ease of use.

gnaffle 15y ago
It wasn't, unless you're completely ignoring the one thing that made OSX and NeXTStep unique, the OpenSTEP framework and Display Postscript/PDF GUI engine. That they were able to use these components made it possible to provide an operating system with a nice, well performing GUI running on a stable UNIX foundation. Had NeXTStep only been a warmed over UNIX, wouldn't it have been better for Apple to just use Linux and X11, or even better use A/UX which already had a Mac-like interface? Gruber is not really blaming Gates, he's blaming Isaacson for not doing proper research. He could have literally asked anyone for more information about this, and the answers he would have gotten would have provided more insight into what really happened and why Apple succeeded. It enabled Apple to have OSX running on Intel from day one, and it made launching the iPhone and iPad possible without reinventing the wheel (which is what Nokia, Microsoft, RIM and Palm all had to do in response to the iPhone).
- sauravc 15y ago
  So is Ubuntu a new OS since it has it's own window manager?
  - gnaffle 15y ago
    No, not necessarily, but do you think Android or PalmOS both fit the description "a warmed-over Linux distro"? The fact that they both run Linux is not what makes any of them unique or interesting.
jonhendry 15y ago
"This is what often irks me about Gruber - he makes disagreeing with Apple out to be an act of incompetence." No, you're missing the point. The incompetence is not "disagreeing with Apple", it's "presenting Gates' assertion as fact when it demonstrably is not." Isaacson's task was not to convey what Gates said on a sales call. It's not a book about Gates. Isaacson was using the quote from Gates to make a point about Jobs and Apple, and because Gates was wrong (even if justifiably so given his motivation in context), Issacson misinformed the reader. Isaacson ought to have checked out Gates' claims, with someone who would know, like Avie Tevanian, or Glenn Reid, whoever.

gnaffle 15y ago

It wasn't, unless you're completely ignoring the one thing that made OSX and NeXTStep unique, the OpenSTEP framework and Display Postscript/PDF GUI engine. That they were able to use these components made it possible to provide an operating system with a nice, well performing GUI running on a stable UNIX foundation. Had NeXTStep only been a warmed over UNIX, wouldn't it have been better for Apple to just use Linux and X11, or even better use A/UX which already had a Mac-like interface? Gruber is not really blaming Gates, he's blaming Isaacson for not doing proper research. He could have literally asked anyone for more information about this, and the answers he would have gotten would have provided more insight into what really happened and why Apple succeeded. It enabled Apple to have OSX running on Intel from day one, and it made launching the iPhone and iPad possible without reinventing the wheel (which is what Nokia, Microsoft, RIM and Palm all had to do in response to the iPhone).

sauravc 15y ago
So is Ubuntu a new OS since it has it's own window manager?
- gnaffle 15y ago
  No, not necessarily, but do you think Android or PalmOS both fit the description "a warmed-over Linux distro"? The fact that they both run Linux is not what makes any of them unique or interesting.

jonhendry 15y ago

"This is what often irks me about Gruber - he makes disagreeing with Apple out to be an act of incompetence." No, you're missing the point. The incompetence is not "disagreeing with Apple", it's "presenting Gates' assertion as fact when it demonstrably is not." Isaacson's task was not to convey what Gates said on a sales call. It's not a book about Gates. Isaacson was using the quote from Gates to make a point about Jobs and Apple, and because Gates was wrong (even if justifiably so given his motivation in context), Issacson misinformed the reader. Isaacson ought to have checked out Gates' claims, with someone who would know, like Avie Tevanian, or Glenn Reid, whoever.