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1994-11-16
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Alec Saunders in OSDEBATE at FIDONET stated that "It takes about 3
seconds to discredit that document based on the errors in it and the
public information about Windows 95." That document referred to
the OS/2 Warp vs Windows 95 whitepaper that IBM released in September.
There were no details provided just statements that this is wrong
or false. We think that it is weak just to say things are wrong or
false without explaining why. (eg. replace "this is wrong." with
"This is wrong because..."). Let us clarify our position on the points
that Alec chose.
The format of the reply is the Page number and Alec's point and the
answer which is our reply. Attached at the bottom is the original
post from Alec.
Page 6: the entire discussion of broken links is false
Answer: What did we say is wrong? Let us quote from the Infoworld
article on October 17th.
"It is true that the shortcuts simply aren't as integrated
into the operating system as file objects are in OS/2. Should
you move or rename the file a shortcut points to, the shortcut
will, in fact, lose track of the file." It is true that
Chicago goes out and looks and tries to re-establish the
link but the link should NEVER break in the first place. Let
us quote some more from Infoworld on their opinion of
the relinking
"This behavior is more of a parlor trick than object behavior
because it can be so easily subverted."
Page 6: Claim that Windows 95 doesn't support drag and drop is false
Answer: Let us explain the level of drag and drop support that Warp
provides. There is drag n' drop support for printing, shredding
faxing, business cards etc. Let us demonstrate with an example.
Drag a business card from the address book on top of a document.
Then you drag the document to the fax machine, FaxWorks
retrieves the fax number from the business card, and faxes
the document in the background. This is the level of drag and
drop functionality we were talking about that can be achieved by
ISV's by conforming to the SOM/DSOM standards. The three
applications; word processor, address book and
the FaxWorks package were written by three different
ISV's yet provide complete integration because they all
"inherited" their Drag and Drop capability from the Workplace
Shell SOM object. IS the Windows 95 desktop an OLE 2.0 object?
Will applications "inherit" Drag and Drop functionality?
Page 10: The API claims and diagram are wrong
Answer: What is wrong? Are you stating that there is only one API and
every call will work across, Windows 3.1, WFW, NT and Windows95?
Are there no API's to exploit the new shell in Windows95?
If there are will those API's work on NT 3.5? WFW? Win 3.x?
Page 12: The 32 bit Graphic Subsystem claim is wrong
Answer: Is there no 16 bit code in there? What about the GDI calls and
the User layer. Per our information as much as 50% of the
GDI calls are still 16 bit code?
Page 13: The pre-emptive multitasking claim is wrong
Answer: How is this claim wrong? Are you now stating that this is not
true? In the MS document AMYTH.ZIP on the win-news server
MS says that this is true but not important. Are you stating
that Windows95 will provide complete pre-emptive multitasking
for all running applications running to the different API
sets of Win16, Win32s, Win32c and Win32.
Page 13: Claim about Win16 device drivers is wrong
Answer: On the posts from the Internet before the whitepaper was
released many posters have pointed out that some of the
device drivers just plain don't work. That is where we
got this information from.
Page 13: Claim about number of 32-bit applications is wrong
Answer: I walked into Egghead Software, CompUSA and Computer City
and saw no applications claiming support for Windows95. In
each of the store I saw many OS/2 32 bit applications. When
I asked for native 32 bit application to run on Windows95 they
said they did'nt have any available. If you release a copy of
of Windows 95 to us we will be glad to help you verify
this.
Page 15: Comparison of IBM's launch pad to the Windows 95 taskbar
is specious is best
Answer: We agree with you. IBM's launch pad is much more advanced
than the taskbar in Windows95. The taskbar is nothing more
than a graphical representation of the active windows list.
The launch pad is much more with complete Drag and Drop support.
Page 15: the drag and drop deletion claim is wrong
Answer: It's about time you could drag to the waste basket.
This is something we had not seen documented and since we
don't have a copy of the Beta code could not try the feature
ourself.
Page 15: Drag and drop execution path claim in wrong
Answer: Same as the Page 6 answer dealing with Shadowed Objects.
Page 15: the parent folder closing options claim is wrong
Answer: We didn't know that Windows95 closes the parent folder
when a subfolder, or an object in the folder is opened, and
an option from any child folder to open the parent folder.
Since we are not allowed to have a copy of the Beta and we have
not seen this feature documented we didn't know that it
exists. Glad to see that Microsoft is announcing this feature
for Windows95 in an attempt to replicate Warp functionality.
Page 16: the Image Viewer claim is wrong
Answer: The image viewer that ships in Warp allows you to view files
in the following formats
OS/2 BMP's
MS BMP's
GIFF
TIFF
TARGA
PCX
Kodak Photo CD
In addition to these format you can also view the following
software motion files:
Ultimotion AVI files
Indio 3.2 AVI files
MPEG files, if you have an MPEG card
FLC animation files
FLI animation files
Since we don't have the Beta we cannot try out all of these
format. Does the Windows95 Image Viewer support all of these
formats?
Page 17: the Internet claims are wrong
Answer: Per your newsletter on 10/10 we now understand that you intend
to ship utilities for FTP and Telnet but no Gopher, Newsreader
or a World Wide Web Explorer. Microsoft claims on what will
be in Windows95 for Internet support has definately waivered.
Let me quote from an article by Joseph Panettieri from
Information Week on August 11th 1994. "Officials at the
Redmond, Wash., company have admitted that Chicago will lack
an Internet interface, a feature that was in the original
plans."
Page 17: the word processor claim is wrong
Answer: Our document clearly states that a text processor is included
with Windows95. The IBM Works word processor that ships with
Warp includes support for tables (both cell and freehand),
different text colors, ability to drag and drop objects,
(bitmaps, charts, business cards), synonyms, mail merge
Word Count, Header/Footers, Macros, drawing tools
spell checker, import documents in nine different formats
like Wordperfect, Word and Amipro. Is Writepad
going to have all of this functionality included? In our
opinion these are key for an application to be considered
a word processor not a simple text processor.
Page 17: The PIM Claim is wrong
Answer: We have seen no public claims of what the Windows95 PIM will
be. The PIM included in Warp contains an address book, To do's
a yearly planner, calendar, a notepad, contact lists
appointments.
All of these applications are SOM enabled with complete Drag
and drop support within applications. If you drag a business
card onto a day on your calendar, it will automatically schedule
an appointment for that person on that day asking you to only
confirm the duration.
========================================================================
----- OSDEBATE FIDONET appended at 07:51:48 on 94/10/18 GMT (by IBMNET a
TOROVM1)
Subject: Honest Debate
Ref: none
NOTICE: This append originated outside of IBM. To reply to the original
author please include the following line in your append;
ECHO TO: ALEC SAUNDERS
*-------------------------------------------------
*From: ALEC SAUNDERS To: IVAN SCHAFFEL
IS>You now have IBM's OFFICIAL rebuttal to Chicago. Should be fruitful f
IS>for a long time. Fudsters can now retire and let honest debate begin.
Ivan -- I wouldn't put too much store inthe IBM doc. It takes about 3
seconds to discredit that document based on the errors in it and the pub
information about Windows 95. For instance, a quick glance through
reveals:
page 6 - the entire discussion of broken links is false
page 6 - the claim that Windows 95 doesn't support drag and drop is fals
page 10 - the API claims and diagram are wrong
page 12 - the 32 bit graphics subsystem claim is wrong
page 12 - who cares if Windows 95 doesn't have a non-locking input queue
it has multiple queues which get rid of that problem
page 13 - the pre-emptive multitasking claim is wrong
page 13 - the claim about Win16 device drivers is wrong
page 13 - the claim about number of 32 bit applications is wrong
page 15 - the comparison of IBM's launch pad to the Windows 95 taskbar i
specious at best
page 15 - the drag and drop deletion claim is wrong
page 15 - the drag and drop execution paths claim is wrong
page 15 - the object type templates claim is wrong
page 15 - the parent folder closing options claim is wrong
page 16 - the image viewer claim is wrong
page 17 - the internet claims are wrong
page 17 - the word processor claim is wrong
Alec.
Alec Saunders, Windows Marketing, Microsoft Corporation
"These are my opinions, and may not reflect Microsoft policy"
---
* WR # 313 * Windows 95 -- Power Windows on the InfoBahn ...
--- Platinum Xpress/Wildcat! v0.3d
* Origin: Ballybran Station (1:343/105)
**********************************************************************
Ashish Gupta AGUPTA@MSNVM1.VNET.IBM.COM
IBM Personal Software Products