mozek,
...the same innovation which is threatening Sun's overpriced
server business with high-powered, inexpensive hardware and
software.
I've got news for you, SUNW's low-end servers and workstations
are now competitively priced with high-end PC's running NT.
In fact, for licenses of 30 or more end-user workstations, SUNW
servers running Solaris are less expensive than PC's running
NT. In fact, SUNW's Ultra-5 & 10's ($2200-$10000 range) are
selling so fast, SUNW is at manufacturing capacity & back-ordered
on them right now. SUNW Enterprise 450 servers, which are
competitively priced w/high-end CPQ 8-way multiprocessor PCs
still outperform them by a factor of 2-to-1. PC-makers are NOT
going to win a hardware price-war with SUNW. That is because
hardware is for all practical purposes a commodity. SUNW can
make them as cheaply as CPQ or Dell. As for software, MSFT is
not selling its workgroup solutions cheaply: the last I heard,
they charge per seat licenses, so the price mounts as the group
gets bigger. In the last 6 months, SUNW has successfully shored
up its low-end in the corporate market against the supposed
"onslaught" of PC's in the workgroup market. IT customers buy
price & quality & SUNW has Wintel beat on both counts.
I'd be interested to hear of any API you found that was exploited
by a Microsoft application to the detriment of its competition.
Check with your CT @MSFT, there were a number of "undocumented
features" to MS-DOS that were not divulged to the public in an
official form until MSFT published the MS-DOS spec, after it
had outlived its usefulness I might add, for $130. They can be
found in "DOS Programmer's Reference 2nd Edition" by Terry
Dettman & Jim Kyle published by Que Corporation. You may be
interested to read the dedication by Mr. Dettman at the beginning
of the book:
"This book is dedicated to friends who were hackers before
'hacker' became a dirty word, for without them much of the
information in this book would not be as freely available as it
is."
Take the book & compare it to the "official" documentation of
MS-DOS from MSFT & you'll see the difference for yourself. In
fact, the reason the book was published in the first place was
because there was a market for PC developers who couldn't get
their hands on enough documentation from MSFT to support their
efforts.
The fact this book exists at all is a perfect illustration of
how MSFT began to leverage its OS in order to sell their own
applications. Contrast that with Unix, which has always been
fully documented, and in fact, the source code for BSD Unix
is free to the public.
I can't comment on Windows 95, since I left the PC camp long ago.
If Microsoft published specs the way Sun published Java's, then
anyone who read them would be at risk of being sued.
I don't think you have an understanding of the open systems
development process. Stick with MSFT, you have found a home. |
