home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
Software Vault: The Gold Collection
/
Software Vault - The Gold Collection (American Databankers) (1993).ISO
/
cdr25
/
os2plan.zip
/
OS2PLAN.TXT
Wrap
Text File
|
1993-03-01
|
18KB
|
439 lines
OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2 OS/2
******** TEXT FILE BEGINS *******
Subject: OS/2 Issues Update
Following is a list of current issues surrounding OS/2 in the market
today, and attached below are comments about those issues.
1. OS/2 Quality
2. OEM
3. Performance
4. 1992 Product Plans
5. Response to MS Win 3.1 vs OS/2 Document
6. Preload
OS/2 QUALITY
OS/2 -- A QUALITY SUCCESS STORY
To produce the best possible quality product, a new development process
was instituted for OS/2 2.0. This new process included small, empowered
development teams and an unprecedented beta test program involving
30,000 users.
BUGS
OS/2 2.0 consists of about 3.5 million lines of code. Since we began
shipping, fewer than 10% of our users have called the OS/2 Support
Line. More than 75% of these calls are usage, installation, and setup
questions. Only about 7% have turned out to be related to substantive
product problems. We have identified approximately 50 issues that are
causing these calls. (Not all are bugs. Some are for specific device
support that we did not intend to include until later releases, but
we're now working on due to customer interest.)
Of these, 5 are significant impact problems -- such as failure to
install on a certain configuration or intermittent traps on certain
systems. These are associated with specific configurations that affect
a small percentage of our users. Two of these five have been fixed, and
there are temporary workarounds for the other three. About 20 can cause
a major function to be impacted, but the system continues to work,
albeit with an inconvenient workaround.
The remaining 25 or so are inconveniences which affect enough customers
that we have made them a priority. An example is failing to recognize
that a window has been closed prior to Shutdown. Upon reboot, the
window is open and the user would have to click the mouse button twice
to close it again.
SERVICE STRATEGY
We are continuing to work these problems in priority sequence and have
posted a number of fixes on COMPUSERVE, OS/2 BBS, and Internet.
Users who have a problem not yet fixed can call the OS/2 Support Line
to get registered for future fixes. We will notify them when it is
available.
In the fall there will be a Performance and Service Pack which will
include all available fixes plus some performance enhancements.
The Pack will be available either electronically or on diskettes for a
nominal charge (materials and handling).
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
FIXES CURRENTLY ON COMPUSERVE
o Can't install MFM/RLL (older family 1) disk drives
o If the swapper file expands to a partition boundary, it won't shrink
again until system reboot.
o Some Western Digital chip sets can hang during system install
o Some Tseng chip sets in SVGA mode experience display corruption going
to and from a full screen Virtual DOS Machine
o Intermittent trap in the Win OS/2 session after exiting WIN-OS/2 on
4MB systems.
TIPS AND TECHNIQUES
Now available on the bulletin boards: a new version of the OS/2 Tips
and Techniques document. It includes answers to the most commonly asked
questions on the support line.
SUPPORT LINE CALLS
The great majority (maybe as much as 80%) are from home users. This
percentage is no doubt skewed by the fact that home users don't have
IBM SEs or corporate help desks. However we view this as a positive
indication of OS/2's acceptance in a market segment not commonly
associated with OS/2.
OTHER ITEMS
In addition to the 50 substantive issues previousely mentioned, there
are a number of other items reported on the Support Line that we have
logged for consideration for future OS/2 releases. These items, which
account for the remaining 18% of the Support Line calls, fall into two
categories.
The first category consists of relatively innocuous bugs that have an
easy workaround. For example, icons in the Minimized Window Viewer are
not lined up. (The user can always handle this by selecting Arrange
from the popup menu.) The second category items are not bugs at all,
but are product suggestions or requirements -- for example, an alternate
method of performing a function.
There are also some reported problems that we have decided not include
as priority items for fixing. These involve very unique configurations,
often of multiple devices of uncommon brands doing strange things like
daisy-chaining a tape drive onto a diskette controller.
OEM STATUS
We are committed to ensuring OS/2's widest possible acceptance in the
industry, across all computer manufacturers. To that end, we have been
testing OEM machines to verify compatibility with OS/2. To date, more
than 222 OEM machines have passed compatibility testing on OS/2.
In addition, we are aggressively pursuing a program to sign contract
with OEM vendors to preload and/or resell OS/2 with their equipment.
Larry Rojas, the director of OEM business development in Boca Raton,
has a group of field marketing reps calling on OEMs for the purpose of
gaining these commitments. To date, they have signed contracts with
Scandic Products in Sweden and Reply in the U.S.. Negotiations are in
progress with Olivetti, Dell, Compaq, ICL, AST, NEC, CompuAdd, and
Northgate.
PERFORMANCE
The Microsoft advertisement on Windows 3.1 vs OS/2 performance is
misleading. The scenarios in the ad are a narrow subset of the kinds
of work that a user might perform. It is true that when running Windows
applications one at a time with nothing else on the system, OS/2 will
run about 20 to 25% slower
However, DOS apps run faster on OS/2.
And when more than one task is being done, OS/2's performance advantage
becomes evident. Because of OS/2's superior multitasking, it can run
background tasks -- such as file copying, communications, or spreadsheet
recalculation -- with no visible impact on foreground work. With
Windows, the cursor movement can lag behind the mouse movement, and
displaying of characters can lag behind keyboarding to the point where
the system becomes almost unusable until the background job is done.
An illustrative scenario from National Software Testing Laboratories
(NSTL):
To load MS Word for Windows on a Mod 57 with nothing else running takes
7.2 seconds with Windows 3.1 and 9.3 seconds with OS/2 2.0. If you do
the same load with an XCOPY in the background, Windows load time jumps
to 41.1 seconds, compared with 15.3 seconds for OS/2.
In addition, we're continually working to improve performance. In the
fall, we're planning to improve performance for all systems, but
especially those with the minimum configuration of 4MB RAM.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
MS TESTING METHODOLOGY
-An objective performance tester would question the methodology.
- The results published are for very small subtasks
- The test scenarios appear to be Microsoft's own, not that of an
objective third party. They say the scenarios are "like PC World's",
but what does that mean?
- They have not identified the vendor performing the test
- They did not indicate the specific configuration. This makes it
difficult for another party to replicate and validate the tests.
OS/2 APPLICATIONS
As applications become available that take advantage of OS/2's
capabilities, e.g. multithreading and 32 bit, OS/2 performance can be
expected to get even better.
*********1992 OS/2 PRODUCT PLANS **********
There will be a lot happening in the OS/2 product line through the
remainder of 1992.
ENHANCEMENTS TO THE BASE PRODUCT
In the fall: 32-bit graphics engine; Windows 3.1; device drivers to
support XGA, SVGA, and 8514 displays in seamless mode.
PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENTS
We're continually working to improve performance. In the fall, we're
planning to improve performance for all systems, but especially those
with the minimum configuration of 4MB RAM.
NEW PACKAGING
In the fall, OS/2 will be available in a package containing 2 diskettes
and a CD.
EXTENSIONS
Available in June, the Multimedia Presentation Manager/2 extensions and
a toolkit. IBM OS/2 Pen Extensions and a toolkit are planned for
availability in late '92 or early '93.
DISTRIBUTED SYSTEMS ANNOUNCEMENTS
OS/2 is already the Integrating Platform on the desktop. These new
announcements will build upon OS/2's networking capability to extend
that integration to another dimension -- the Integrated Enterprise
Network.
FOR DEVELOPERS
Device Adaptation Kits to aid in the development of device drivers for
SCSI devices (June), displays (in the fall), and printers (fall). A
Developers Migration Kit for migrating Windows 3.0 applications to OS/2
will be available this summer.
PERFORMANCE AND SERVICE PACK
We'll package up the available fixes to known OS/2 problems together
with the performance improvements and make them available in the fall
in a Performance and Service Pack.
APPLETS PACK
In the fall, we plan to offer a package of approximately 200
productivity applications, tools, utilities, games, and bitmaps.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
ENHANCEMENTS TO THE BASE PRODUCT
Available to installed customers for a nominal fee (media and handling).
Free (except for connect time) via electronic download.
PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENTS
The focus will be on improving performance in those tasks and functions
in which the user interacts with the screen (as opposed to background
processing).
NEW PACKAGING
Expect to see us continue to make use of CD packaging in the future.
The added capacity of the CD makes it easy to bundle other programs
with OS/2, allowing us to get creative in promotions with application
software vendors, as well as in bundling our own offerings.
MULTIMEDIA MMPM/2
.. adds audio and limited image capabilities to the OS/2 2.0 32-bit
base. It exploits the features that OS/2 delivers that are required
to make multimedia effective. This includes multitasking and the flat
memory model -- required for handling data objects many megabytes
in size.
The MMPM/2 architecture enables new functions, devices, and multimedia
data types and formats to be added as technology advances.
PEN The IBM OS/2 Pen Extensions provides OS/2 2.0 support with special
features for pen-based personal systems. The software allows the user
to annotate images online, use gesture commands to invoke fastpath
operations, soft keyboards for quick updates to spreadsheets and notes,
as well as use of freehand drawing, handwriting/ink capture, and
character recognition for limited data entry. Included are utilities
for a pop-up keyboard which allows customization of the soft keyboard.
LAN SYSTEMS ANNOUNCEMENTS
Coming this fall are a new release of LAN Server, enhancements to
Communications Manager, a Developers Toolkit for Distributed System
Services, Lotus Notes, and LAN Enabler 2.1. The CID (Configuration/
Installation/Distribution) product will greatly enhance the ease of
installation of OS/2 and other products across networks, by offering
automated and unattended configuring, distribution and installation.
DEVELOPERS' MIGRATION KIT
This kit will make it possible to port applications and drivers with
little or no code changes. The developer can generate applications and
drivers for Windows 3.0 and OS/2 2.0 from a single source. The kit
includes - Conversion utilities for resource files, definition files,
icons, cursors. Bitmaps and help files. - MIRRORS.DLL (debug) -
Headers, libraries, samples - Documentation.
SERVICE AND PERFORMANCE PACK
Available to installed customers for a nominal fee (media and handling).
Free (except for connect time) via electronic download.
APPLETS PACK
We're currently in the process of selecting these applets from the many
submitted by software vendors and IBMers, so we can't mention any
specifics, but stay tuned to this space. We'll probably offer a CD
version of this also.
RESPONSE TO MS DOCUMENT ON WINDOWS 3.1 VS OS/2
There is so much misleading information in this document that it is hard
to know where to start. Following are some brief responses to individual
items.
RELIABILITY
- Microsoft claims that Windows 3.1 eliminates UAE (Unrecoverable
Application Errors). It doesn't eliminate them, it renames them to
GPFs (General Protection Faults). When a GPF occurs it still
recommends that you reboot your system.
- Win 3.1 still does not make use full use of the 386 hardware
protection as OS/2 does.
MINIMUM CONFIGURATION COMPARISONS
- MS's tables are apples to oranges comparisons - The tables quote
system requirements for the most basic, limited-function mode of
Windows' three modes. Then, when functions are compared, MS quotes
the function of the mode with the largest system requirements.
THE NUMBER OF OS/2-CAPABLE MACHINES
- MS quotes Infocorp as a source. Infocorp says they do not recognize
the number attributed to them.
- Infocorp says 28% of the install base is OS/2-capable
- The majority of machines shipped today are OS/2-capable. This
percentage will grow very rapidly in the next few years.
- Microsoft's numbers for Windows-capable machines include 286s, which
don't support the full Windows capability.
OS/2's OBJECT-ORIENTED WORKPLACE SHELL
- MS says the OS/2 Workplace Shell requires a learning curve.
- This depends on where you're coming from. MAC users are usually
instantly productive, new users likewise learn quickly.
- Much as DOS users had a short learning period to move to the next
generation interface -- Windows, Windows users will have a short (a
few hours) learning period to become familiar with the next generation
object-oriented Workplace Shell.
- Windows users who have become familiar with the WPS find the old
Windows GUI to be primitive by comparison.
- Users can always choose to have it the old Windows way and operate
with menus instead of objects. They can even choose an option which
gives the screen the look and feel of Windows.
CONNECTIVITY
- MS says OS/2 has limited host connectivity. Unsaid is the fact that
they're talking about the OS/2 base product only.
- The connectivity is delivered in OS/2 Communications Manager, the most
comprehensive host connectivity tool available:
- The connectivity is delivered in OS/2
- All the DOS/Windows asynch emulation packages work on OS/2 as well
NETWORK CLIENT
- No company has more experience and capability in networking than
IBM.
- OS/2 is the industry's best desktop client for connecting to complex
enterprise networks.
APPLICATIONS
- MS shows tables comparing the number of OS/2 graphical apps with
Windows graphical apps
- Since OS/2 runs DOS, Windows and OS/2 graphical apps, OS/2 will
always have the most applications
INSTALLING DOS-BASED APPS
- MS makes a point of the difficulty of installing DOS apps on OS/2 --
configuring settings, etc.
- Very misleading. We ship a default setting that will run most DOS
apps just fine.
- OS/2's settings capability gives you flexibility if you want it
- In our opinion, OS/2's DOS settings dialog is easier to use than
Windows' PIF editor.
FLEXIBILITY
- MS tries to turn a virtue into a vice by decrying the fact that OS/2
offers the user choices in interfaces: command lines, menus, or
object-oriented.
- We believe in letting the user have it their way.
WIN 3.1 ON OS/2
- MS says OS/2 runs a modified version of 3.0. One of the key
modifications IBM made is the kind of parameter validation MS touts
as a reliability improvement in 3.1.
- Win 3.1 on OS/2 will be available in the fall.
INSTALLATION
- It takes longer to install OS/2's 20 diskettes than Windows' 6. True.
That's because you get so more with OS/2:
- Three operating environments
- The Workplace shell
- Pre-emptive multitasking, Adobe Type Manager, etc.
- In the fall, OS/2 will be available on 2 diskettes and a
CD-ROM
- In the fall, automatic, unattended installation over a network will be
enabled with the CID product
WINDOWS HAS MORE DEVELOPMENT TOOLS
- OS/2 has a full complement of development tools.
- Many of the leading edge tools originated on OS/2
- OS/2 is the preferred development environment -- even for Microsoft.
WINDOWS SCALABILITY
- Pen Windows appls don't exist. NT doesn't exist. Their scalability is
not proven.
- The Microsoft portability guide clearly indicates problems running
DOS/Windows apps directly on NT.
DEVICE DRIVERS
- OS/2 print drivers support 205 printers, which address the vast
majority.
- More are coming later this year. - SCSI drivers are coming in June
- More display drivers are coming in the fall.
FONTS
- Windows uses the proprietary TrueType fonts
- OS/2 includes Adobe Type Manager, the universally accepted industry
standard.
PRELOAD
o OS/2 2.0 at no additional charge
o IBM Mouse at no additional charge
o System is ready to use right out of the box. No installation required
o The preload version of OS/2 has some additional features:
o Additional pre-installed information aids to help users get productive
quickly:
- Welcome and Quick Tour
- "For the DOS User" tutorial
- Application install tutorial
- Hardware system overview for hardware
- Service and support information
o Additional useful utilities
- Uninstall utility for easy pruning of unrequired features
- Bootable diskette and System Backup Utilities to easily allow you to
backup and protect your system
o Additional Workplace Shell folders to better organize the additional
features on your desktop
- Welcome and Quick Tour Folder
- Additional Tutorials Folder
- Features Folder
- Service and Support Folder
- About Your System Folder
- Applications Folder
- Configurations Tools Folder
******************** END OF FILE *************************