According to three separate sources who reported in yesterday
following our story covering
Microsoft's renewed interest in third-party operating
systems, Microsoft is doing more than just
looking....it may have already begun changing its development
model. According to one
source, "nobody will recognize Windows NT in 6 months." This
may be pioneered by
something called "domain classes," which are, apparently, a
new set of foundations upon
which MS will be building its software technologies.
One reasonably reliable source in the BeOS development world
suggests that at least one
Microsoft employee may have posed as a potential business
partner for Be, Inc. and several of
the BeOS platform's largest developers in the past month --
taking tours of the companies and
listening to information that those same corporations would
never have knowingly shared with
a representative of Microsoft. A reliable Apple source has
been following several "secret
society" meetings between Apple and Microsoft where several
Rhapsody developers he
recognized were present.
Considering that Windows, in almost all its incarnations, is
a graphical interface lain on top of
DOS -- originally QDOS, "Quick and Dirty Operating System" --
it wouldn't be shocking if the
rumors were indeed true, and even the legendary Microsoft was
finding it difficult to wring
anything more from that severely outdated technology. Not
that it would be shocking if
Microsoft managed to, nonetheless.
BTW, I snagged a beta of Office 97. Most impresssive. I just might have to
switch from my long standing relationship with NisusWriter.
Tim
--Give me back my bullets, put 'em back where they belong. ...Lynard Skynard
<> tbyars@earthlink.net <>