ibm – The Retro Gaming Treasury

The Deal of the Century (or, The Alliance of Losers)

On February 7, 2020February 8, 2020 By Jimmy Maher

+ = ? I think [the] Macintosh accomplished everything we set out to do and more, even though it reaches most people these days as Windows. — Andy Hertzfeld (original Apple Macintosh systems programmer), 1994 When rumors first began to circulate early in 1991 that IBM and Apple were involved […]

Doing Windows, Part 9: Windows Comes Home

On August 17, 2018September 4, 2018 By Jimmy Maher

This series of articles so far has been a story of business-oriented personal computing. Corporate America had been running for decades on IBM before the IBM PC appeared, so it was only natural that the standard IBM introduced would be embraced as the way to get serious, businesslike things done […]

Doing Windows, Part 7: Third Time’s the Charm

On August 3, 2018September 4, 2018 By Jimmy Maher

Microsoft entered the last year of the 1980s looking toward a new decade that seemed equally rife with opportunity and danger. On the one hand, profits were up, and Bill Gates and any number of his colleagues could retire as very rich men indeed even if it all ended tomorrow […]

Doing Windows, Part 6: Look and Feel

On July 27, 2018September 9, 2018 By Jimmy Maher

From left, Dan Fylstra of VisiCorp, Bill Gates of Microsoft, and Gary Kildall of Digital Research in 1984. As usual, Gates looks rumpled, high-strung, and vaguely tortured, while Kildall looks polished, relaxed, and self-assured. (Which of these men would you rather chat with at a party?) Pictures like these perhaps […]

Doing Windows, Part 5: A Second Try

On July 20, 2018September 4, 2018 By Jimmy Maher

The beginning of serious work on the operating system that would come to be known as OS/2 left Microsoft’s team of Windows developers on decidedly uncertain ground. As OS/2 ramped up, Windows ramped down in proportion, until by the middle of 1986 Tandy Trower had just a few programmers remaining […]

Doing Windows, Part 4: The Rapprochement

On July 13, 2018September 9, 2018 By Jimmy Maher

We’ve seen how the pundits had already started speculating like crazy long before the actual release of IBM’s TopView, imagining it to be the key to some Machiavellian master plan for seizing complete control of the personal-computer market. But said pundits were giving IBM a bit more credit than perhaps […]

Doing Windows, Part 3: A Pair of Strike-Outs

On July 6, 2018September 4, 2018 By Jimmy Maher

Come August of 1984, Microsoft Windows had missed its originally announced release date by four months and was still nowhere near ready to go. That month, IBM released the PC/AT, a new model of their personal computer based around the more powerful Intel 80286 processor. Amidst the hoopla over that […]

Doing Windows, Part 2: From Interface Manager to Windows

On June 29, 2018September 4, 2018 By Jimmy Maher

Bill Gates was as aware as everyone else of the abundant deficiencies of his own company’s hastily procured operating system for the IBM PC. So, in September of 1981, before the PC had even shipped and just a handful of months after VisiCorp had started their own similar project, he […]

Doing Windows, Part 1: MS-DOS and Its Discontents

On June 22, 2018September 4, 2018 By Jimmy Maher

Has any successful piece of software ever deserved its success less than the benighted, unloved exercise in minimalism that was MS-DOS? The program that started its life as a stopgap under the name of “The Quick and Dirty Operating System” at a tiny, long-forgotten hardware maker called Seattle Computer Products […]