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OS/2 Shareware BBS: 16 Announce
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16-Announce.zip
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IBMMS.ZIP
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IBMMS.TXT
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1990-04-24
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TITLE STATEMENT OF DIRECTION FOR DOS, OS/2 AND LAN OFFERINGS
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1.4 STATEMENT OF GENERAL DIRECTION
IBM and Microsoft today announce a broadening of the scope of their
development partnership and have agreed to develop jointly a consistent, full
range of systems software offerings for the 1990s. These software offerings
will include enhancements to DOS, OS/2 and local area network products.
This statement of direction will help customers choose the appropriate
software solution for their requirements and assist them in planning a smooth
transition to the advanced personal computing platforms of the 1990s.
Together, IBM and Microsoft view the "platform for the '90s" as hardware
systems with Intel 386 and i486 microprocessors, 4 megabytes (MB) of memory
and 60 MB fixed disk drives with OS/2 and the Presentation Manager graphical
user interface.
To reaffirm this, IBM and Microsoft announce that the majority of their
application and systems development resources will be applied to OS/2
solutions. Beginning in the second half of 1990, IBM and Microsoft plan to
make their graphical applications available first on OS/2.
Specifically, the companies jointly announce:
o The intent to deliver a version of OS/2 that exploits the advanced
capabilities of the Intel 386 and i486 microprocessors in 1990. This
version will have advanced features such as demand paging and the ability
to run multiple DOS applications concurrently, and it will allow
applications to exploit the 32-bit flat memory model. Today's emerging
Presentation Manager applications will run unmodified on the new version
of OS/2.
o Availability of early development support for this new OS/2 version by
year-end 1989 with a common development toolkit. Software developers
starting new high performance or server applications targeted toward
386SX/4MB or larger systems should build directly on the advanced
Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) of this forthcoming 32-bit
version of OS/2.
o The intent to develop OS/2 32-bit technology that is portable, along with
applications, to other hardware instruction sets, e.g. RISC (Reduced
Instruction Set Computing) architectures.
Today's OS/2 1.2 is recommended for systems with at least 3MB of memory and
30MB fixed disk drives. IBM and Microsoft are committed to continue to expand
the range of OS/2 capable systems. As a first step, the companies announce
that more than 512KB of the memory used by the OS/2 "DOS Compatibility Box"
will also be usable by OS/2 applications when the DOS program is inactive.
This capability will be available this year. Both companies are making a
concerted effort to enable OS/2 for 2MB entry systems, and customers should
plan to use Microsoft Windows to implement graphical applications on platforms
with less than 2MB of memory.
On systems with 4MB of memory, customers can take full advantage of advanced
system features such as the High Performance File System, expanded LAN client
features and advanced applications. OS/2 is currently best suited for
customers using or building database applications, needing full
multi-application and background processing support, or using distributed
processing solutions requiring full LAN client support.
OS/2 is also recommended for all server applications. The new 32-bit version
of OS/2 will be further enhanced for server requirements. In addition,
certain advanced operating system features such as Department of Defense
security, full object oriented capabilities, and symmetrical multi-processing
will be available only in future releases of 32-bit OS/2.
DOS and Windows are recommended for systems with 1-2MB of memory or fixed disk
drives smaller than 30MB. For these customers, Windows is an excellent entry
graphical workstation, because it is an easy installation upgrade to DOS,
allows the user to run existing DOS or Windows applications, enables limited
multi-application support and provides function for a basic LAN client. While
Windows will provide the Systems Application Architecture user interface, it
is not planned to include the full range of SAA support that OS/2 will
provide.
Microsoft's position is that Windows is not intended to be used as a server,
nor will future releases contain such OS/2 advanced features as distributed
processing, the 32-bit flat memory model, threads or long file names. OS/2 is
the recommended operating system environment for new or existing 286/386
systems with 3MB or more of memory.
IBM and Microsoft believe customers with OS/2 capable systems and software
developers with Windows applications will want to migrate to OS/2. IBM and
Microsoft will provide support through tools, seminars and technical
assistance to help with the migration.
IBM and Microsoft recommend that software developers implement for the
platform that best meets their application system requirements. Software
developers, other than those with current Windows projects under way, who plan
to implement offerings for both environments, are recommended to begin with
OS/2.
In addition to these announcements that focus on the desktop environments, IBM
and Microsoft also announce:
o The two companies will work together to ensure that the Database Manager,
Communications Manager, and LAN Requestor and Server functions of IBM's
OS/2 Extended Edition are available to all OS/2 users. These functions of
IBM's OS/2 Extended Edition continue to be primary participants in IBM's
System Application Architecture strategy.
o For local area networks, the two companies intend to converge IBM's OS/2
LAN Server and Microsoft's LAN Manager. These LAN products will be
designed to run on the base OS/2 operating system in both Client and
Server configurations as LAN Manager does today, and will exploit 386/i486
functions.
In summary, IBM and Microsoft are reaffirming their commitment to provide a
graphical user interface on all platforms and significantly extending the
functions of OS/2 to provide a consistent systems software base for the
hardware platforms of the '90s.
Actual plans are subject to review. Announcement of any product will be based
upon business and technical judgment, and continuing review of customer
requirements.