I don't think Apple's comeback (the OS-X based one) was miraculous. They took a basic Unix that the Plan 9 guys would have turned their noses up at, and put a

I don't think Apple's comeback (the OS-X based one) was miraculous. They took a basic Unix that the Plan 9 guys would have turned their noses up at, and put a reasonable user interface on it and worked their way through all the tedious parts of making a stable, useful operating system; and then, it did exactly what the linux zealots had been saying was possible with Linux -- it became very popular, and known for being more stable, easier to use, and more secure than Windows. The miracle is that Windows survived. Given that Apple had a focus on hardware lock-in and the high end of the market, that left Windows a big hole to live in; Linux should have copied OS-X "look and feel" down to every detail, made it run even faster on cheaper hardware, and given Windows a run for it's money. As one of those linux zealots, I intend this to be self-criticism. Ubuntu is going to eventually do that, I think. It is not OS-X compairable yet, but it is improving.