As we go to publish this issue of OS/2 CONNECT, the summer holidays are coming to an end in the United States. Schools are starting back up, the baseball season is winding down, the football season is imminent, and Comdex in Las Vegas is just around the corner. As for me, I was able to sneak away with my son for a nice little fishing trip. As for OS/2, significant changes were quietly made by IBM. The first was the announced departure of Richard Seibt as General Manager of OS/2 who had the job for approximately six months. A long time OS/2 advocate, Richard is returning to Germany in September to work with another software company. Richard is replaced by Patricia Sueltz, the General Manager of the recently merged Network Computing Software Division who will now have control over both Java and OS/2. Pat's forte has been predominantly in Java though; it is uncertain as to her commitment to OS/2. What makes this unsettling to OS/2 users is the recent Sun/IBM announcement of JavaOS for Business, a new operating system for thin-client computers jointly developed by IBM and Sun. Although I haven't seen the product yet, other than the information conveyed on the web and the press, one cannot help but wonder if JavaOS represents the heir apparent to IBM's WorkSpace On-Demand for thin-client computing.
The only significant OS/2 news announced by IBM this summer came on the server side where the company announced it is ready to register users for the Beta release of "Aurora," the next release of OS/2 Warp Server. This is welcomed news by the OS/2 community particularly since the completion of Microsoft's Windows NT 5.0 doesn't appear to be anywhere in sight.
Let's see if we can put this altogether:
FOLLOW-UP TO YEAR 2000
Shortly after my editorial last month on Year 2000 issues, IBM distributed a press release on how OS/2 supports Y2K. The press release lists web sites describing IBM's commitment to Y2K:
Keep the faith!
Copyright © MBA 1998
