Just to conclude last month's topic (which was the danger of losing hardware support), the following list was compiled here in Brazil: it includes the vendors that are not giving any more support to OS/2:
This week IBM announced that OS/2 isn't dead at all. At a meeting in Acapulco, Mexico, IBM spread the idea that OS/2 is alive and well, mainly for the corporate market, where networking capabilities make OS/2 a strong participant. But it appears that the home market has been forgotten.
At least here in Brazil, by the information I have in my hands, the OS/2 users are in great part home users. They are programmers, Internet fans, etc., but they use the IBM operating system usually at home. Many of them complain constantly of having to use Windows systems at work, and they do what they can to change it. Based on the experience they have at home, they try to move their works' platform to OS/2, which is usually hard.
However, if IBM is really not giving support to the idea of domestic market, how can these guys help changing the "status quo" of enterprises using Windows? Since they are getting less and less support at home, they will be greater and greater discouraged to use OS/2, even more to try changing an entire work platform. I don't know exactly how it is going in other countries, but here this politics will possibly take OS/2 home users to a dead end.
This week is happening the COMDEX Rio '97, one of the biggest computer fairs of Latin America. In it, it is possible to find the newest hardware and software, as well as it is a showcase for well-known products. Usually it is a good place to OS/2 demonstrations, because many Windows users have their first contact with a system "they've heard of" but they didn't know exactly how good it was, until they see it. And many of them are so "converted." I hope IBM will make a good job in it, to help turn the table to our side. Next month, I'll tell you how COMDEX was, as well as the impact it had on the OS/2 world.
Please do not hesitate to send me any Brazilian specific news and information you would like mentioned in this column.
Rafael Donnici de Azevedo is graduating in Systems and Electronics Engineering at PUC-RJ and does research in the field of Parallel Proccessing. Rafael has worked with OS/2 since 1993, and has made many presentations of OS/2 versions 2.1 and 2.11 in a project between PUC and IBM. Currently, he is the Web Page Editor for the Rio de Janeiro OS/2 Users' Group.
