The first OS (Operating
System) was written in 1970s and it was known as CP/M (Control Program/
Monitor) written by Gary Kildall as early computers were built from kits and
ran single program at a time. CP/M was later updated to DOS which was later
purchased by BILL GATE and hired the professor who updated the OS. Below is the
true story about Gary Kildall and Windows narrated by BigTexun who worked for
Gary and was alive when at the beginning of windows era.
“I used to work for Gary Kildall land I worked with some of
his people from DR. I was Gary’s personal electronic engineer, building his
custom embedded system as he was designing the earliest smartphone back in
1987… called the INTELPHONE people confusing called it a PBX. I was the
hardware designer. What I designed was both the handset of the smartphone and
the central switch gear (the switch gear was similar to PBX) but it was just
the support infrastructure for the actual invention, the button free smartphone
years before apple had Ipod. Gary had eliminated button in favor of the
“application defined user interface” … rolls right of the tongue … his design
look just like the modern smartphone only no switches or buttons at all. Prototypes
were larger of course, we had to get to get the design working before the
electronics would eventually be crunched into small package needed to to make a
phone WE WERE 90% THERE BEFORE THE PROJECT TO GO WORK FOR IBM …
But the story of Gary out flying the plane before IBM
visited isn’t actually what happened. 90% of the work Gary did at that time was
for IBM. He met with IBM dozens of time and sold them dozens of Operating
Systems and other software. IBM was Gary’s main customer. It was possible that Gary missed a meeting,
why would missing one meeting out of literary thousands he attended doesn’t
make such a difference? He met with IMB
constantly in those years and he had people on staff whose job was to manage
that. The Operating system with PC wasn’t the only job he had with IMB at that
time, far from it.
And you missed the whole PC at story. When you booted the
original IBM AT, it said on the screen “IBM
Multi-User System.” What was the IBM Multi-User System? Why was the IBM
AT was not designed to run MsDOS? It was designed to run a new multiuser OS.
The AC would ship with 16 port serial cards and Wyse had a PC emulation built
into their dump terminals that allowed a single AT to be used as a computer for
a whole room of people. it was a multitasking OS that would have made areally
large difference in the computing landscape. What happened?
The sad story there is that Intel was having problems with
the 286 chips. The prototype chip that IBM was using for development worked
fine, but the yield was too low for the chip, that Intel had to redesign the CPU
die to improve yield for production run for the AT. When IMB finally got the
redesigned chip that had been testing the system using the prototype chips and
didn’t spot problems the new chip created until the warehouse was full of
assembled system. It turns out that the new 286 had an issue with running
protected mode instructions, so on 11th hour decision, IBM execs
decided to open all of boxes, remove the OS kit, and replace it with a DOS
disk… in one fatal moment, a spec change caused the new OS to be temporarily
pulled. The OS did get used, but it was only used in IMB brand grocery store
scanners registers, it never find used as major advanced in DOS technology that
it was. Eventually DR named the new OS concurrent DOS and put it up for sale
next to DR Dos, but as sad stories goes, the pretty blue box it shipped in
probably didn’t find many desktop to grace.
And no story about this would be complete without talking
about the Microsoft windows …
When Windows come out, it was not much more than a buggy toy
OS. However, a small number of people discovered that DR DOS running under
windows was a winning combination, because DR DOS had a memory manager that
made windows much better on DR DOS platform. Windows 3.1 was shipped with code
to detect what OS it was running on and to create a fake blues screen if the OS
was DR DOS.
Gary was a generous educator; Bill was a shrewd business
man. Gary instinct was to share information and make his fortune by making the
right decision at the right time. Great engineer VS great Business man! Had my
own experiences with that, engineers don’t make the best business men, too
honest and idealistic.
Gary died a wealthy man, his house in Austin had a glass
garage housing his own collection of famous race cars lovingly restored by the
original crew … his house in pebble beach is where he kept his Lamborghini
collection …big collection, big garage. So yeah hew stabbed his toe with the
events mentioned but he was well on his way to being a decade early with truly
groundbreaking smartphone tech…
I gloss over so many details…. Would love to have a
conversation about Gary’s/actual or mental state of and activity just before
his death. He did have ban scars from the unfortunate events we discuss, but
his state of mind or what he was doing at the time was so much complex than the
stories out there, and if not for his death, THE NEXT CHAPTER WOULD HAVE RE-RWITTEN TECH
HISTORY.”
The begging of an era was the end of another. Comment
on your view of Gray’s death coinciding with the starting of Windows?
