3 ms·

It'd be interesting to know where Apple would be if they had bought Be, Inc. Would we have iOS? Would Apple be successful? All very interesting!

pjmlp 12y ago
Assuming that Apple had been successful, it would mean both major desktop systems wouldn't be UNIX based. On the other hand, Mac OS X being NeXTStep is what brought many back to Apple world in those hard years. I was at CERN when Apple used to visit us showing how Mac OS X was a good fit for UNIX developers, given its BSD heritage. So the BeOS route might have meant failure to recover from their situation. However as a fan of OS architectures, the alternative reality of a successful Apple with BeOS is quite interesting.
- laumars 12y ago
  BeOS had a bash command line and partial POSIX compatibility, so it might still have faired well with UNIX developers. Particularly given that Linux was still playing catch up at that point in time.
  - pjmlp 12y ago
    It gave first class treatment to C++ and I doubt you could implement cleanly features like fork() or signal handling in its thread model. Sadly the "The Be Book" is not clear on what was supported, and I don't remember it any longer.
laumars 12y ago
If I remember correctly, NeXT was largely bought for Steve Jobs rather than NeXTSTEP. Also the iPod and the iPhone (or rather the iPad, as that was what Apple were originally working on before they miniaturised it and released it as a smart phone) was Jobs' concept. Obviously prior art existed, but the digital music player and tablet markets were pretty underwhelming to the average layman before Apple released their products. So I don't think Apple's business would have exploded like it if they bought Be Inc. However Be's core business was multimedia (like Apple's was per-OS X) and that industry has since felt a little neglected by Apple as they seem to be concentrating more on gadgets than power users. So if I had to speculate, I'd say Be Inc / Apple's business would have grown with the media industry and stayed more faithful to their core users. I also think Apple would have consumed more of Linux's market share than it has done now because an Apple owned BeOS would still have retained, at least, partial POSIX compatibility meaning the leap from UNIX / Linux would be equivalent as it is now, but there would have been less fanboyism which was largely drummed up by Jobs to increase sales. I think, perversely, that has put many new users off from migrating to Apple from the FOSS community who want to use an open API without the corporate BS. Lastly, I think Macs might have become the de facto standard web developers machine. Partly because of being more true to it's core multimedia business (and the web now being as much a multimedia platform as any other these days), partly because of it's POSIX compatibility meaning it would be trivial to run the same Linux / OS X develop tools, partly because of it taking business from Linux (see above), partly because I think Apple would have continued to allow 3rd party manufacturers to build Apple-compatible machine (IIRC that was one of the first things Jobs terminated when he rejoined Apple), and partly because Windows users would feel less threatened making the switch (BeOS always felt a less significant paradigm shift from Windows than OS 9 / OS X did). So in short, I think OS X would have had a greater market share if Apple bought Be Inc, but I think Apple would have been less successful as a company since their biggest market at the moment is consumer gadgets (specifically the iPhone). This is all just guesswork, obviously. But sometimes it's fun to speculate.
- georgeecollins 12y ago
  I do not think that is correct. Apple needed a new OS badly. I developed game software for PCs in the Win 98 / OS8 era for both platforms. Macs were still a nice experience but their performance relative to a PC was terrible. Steve Jobs at that time did not have the reputation he does now, or even had a few years later. Many people view Next as a business failure at the time. They were still in business, but relative to the huge investment they had gotten they were doing pretty poorly. There is a book written at the time, "Steve Jobs and the Next Big Thing." That sums up conventional wisdom circa that time. The fact that they were considering Be and Next at the same time tells you that they were looking for an OS.
  - laumars 12y ago
    I suspect you may have misread my post since you're offering a counter argument to points I wasn't discussing. I wasn't suggesting that Apple shouldn't have bought nor released any new OS. I was speculating about a future where Apple bought Be instead of NeXT (hence my frequent references to Be Inc) However on the (unrelated) points you raised, I do completely agree with you.
KMag 12y ago
Well, if they had gotten Steve Jobs but had BeOS, I imagine there would have been something iOS-like. The BeOS kernel is much lighter weight than Xnu.

pjmlp 12y ago

Assuming that Apple had been successful, it would mean both major desktop systems wouldn't be UNIX based. On the other hand, Mac OS X being NeXTStep is what brought many back to Apple world in those hard years. I was at CERN when Apple used to visit us showing how Mac OS X was a good fit for UNIX developers, given its BSD heritage. So the BeOS route might have meant failure to recover from their situation. However as a fan of OS architectures, the alternative reality of a successful Apple with BeOS is quite interesting.

laumars 12y ago
BeOS had a bash command line and partial POSIX compatibility, so it might still have faired well with UNIX developers. Particularly given that Linux was still playing catch up at that point in time.
- pjmlp 12y ago
  It gave first class treatment to C++ and I doubt you could implement cleanly features like fork() or signal handling in its thread model. Sadly the "The Be Book" is not clear on what was supported, and I don't remember it any longer.

laumars 12y ago

If I remember correctly, NeXT was largely bought for Steve Jobs rather than NeXTSTEP. Also the iPod and the iPhone (or rather the iPad, as that was what Apple were originally working on before they miniaturised it and released it as a smart phone) was Jobs' concept. Obviously prior art existed, but the digital music player and tablet markets were pretty underwhelming to the average layman before Apple released their products. So I don't think Apple's business would have exploded like it if they bought Be Inc. However Be's core business was multimedia (like Apple's was per-OS X) and that industry has since felt a little neglected by Apple as they seem to be concentrating more on gadgets than power users. So if I had to speculate, I'd say Be Inc / Apple's business would have grown with the media industry and stayed more faithful to their core users. I also think Apple would have consumed more of Linux's market share than it has done now because an Apple owned BeOS would still have retained, at least, partial POSIX compatibility meaning the leap from UNIX / Linux would be equivalent as it is now, but there would have been less fanboyism which was largely drummed up by Jobs to increase sales. I think, perversely, that has put many new users off from migrating to Apple from the FOSS community who want to use an open API without the corporate BS. Lastly, I think Macs might have become the de facto standard web developers machine. Partly because of being more true to it's core multimedia business (and the web now being as much a multimedia platform as any other these days), partly because of it's POSIX compatibility meaning it would be trivial to run the same Linux / OS X develop tools, partly because of it taking business from Linux (see above), partly because I think Apple would have continued to allow 3rd party manufacturers to build Apple-compatible machine (IIRC that was one of the first things Jobs terminated when he rejoined Apple), and partly because Windows users would feel less threatened making the switch (BeOS always felt a less significant paradigm shift from Windows than OS 9 / OS X did). So in short, I think OS X would have had a greater market share if Apple bought Be Inc, but I think Apple would have been less successful as a company since their biggest market at the moment is consumer gadgets (specifically the iPhone). This is all just guesswork, obviously. But sometimes it's fun to speculate.

georgeecollins 12y ago
I do not think that is correct. Apple needed a new OS badly. I developed game software for PCs in the Win 98 / OS8 era for both platforms. Macs were still a nice experience but their performance relative to a PC was terrible. Steve Jobs at that time did not have the reputation he does now, or even had a few years later. Many people view Next as a business failure at the time. They were still in business, but relative to the huge investment they had gotten they were doing pretty poorly. There is a book written at the time, "Steve Jobs and the Next Big Thing." That sums up conventional wisdom circa that time. The fact that they were considering Be and Next at the same time tells you that they were looking for an OS.
- laumars 12y ago
  I suspect you may have misread my post since you're offering a counter argument to points I wasn't discussing. I wasn't suggesting that Apple shouldn't have bought nor released any new OS. I was speculating about a future where Apple bought Be instead of NeXT (hence my frequent references to Be Inc) However on the (unrelated) points you raised, I do completely agree with you.

KMag 12y ago

Well, if they had gotten Steve Jobs but had BeOS, I imagine there would have been something iOS-like. The BeOS kernel is much lighter weight than Xnu.