[Sussex] NOW: So, who are the all-time greats? WAS Hello all

[Steve Dobson]

Geoff

On Wed, Feb 12, 2003 at 09:17:14AM -0000, Geoff Teale wrote:
<magor-snippage>
> I hereby challenge anyone on this list to name one thing Bill Gates has done
> that has actually changed the world of computing rather than the just the
> logo we see when we start a program.

Ooooo, a challenge.  Can I rise to the occasion?

First I have to say that I do agree with much, if not quite all, of what
you say about Bill.  But that is only the case now.  Many years ago Microsoft
was just a little startup commpany being run out of Ma & Pa Gates' garage.

In thoses days Bill was very much one of the programmers.  Back in those
days Apples, PETs and Sharps were all refered to as PCs - Personal
Computers.  CP/M ruled the PC OS market.  And dear old Bill [helpped]
write the BASIC, Cobol & other compilers / interprittors used on these
machines. Ever used a PET (or a VIC for that matter); the BASIC was his
[I believe].  [Point of Order: For this posting when I say PC I mean
any personal computer.  When I mean the IBM PC (which hasn't come out
yet in my story line) I'll say "IBM PC"],

At that time there was three levels of computing:
   1: IBM, which had over 70% of the whole computer market (just with
      it mainframe computers).
   2: Ever other commerical company, like DEC which had over
      50% of the rest.
   3: And a group of weirdos that though that PCs were rather fun to
      play with but everyone else didn't think much of.

The weirdos (in which I include people working for companies that were
developing little PC apps for there own use) were finding out how to do
some new and wonderful things.  Most commercial computting in those days
was under the control of the IT Dept.  They had big, expensive main
frames that, because they cost so much, had to be used by every other 
department.  My Dad (not a computer person) told me that it would take
around three days to get his jobs run.

If I remember my history correctly [I'm sure I'll be correctted if
I'm wrong :-)] one of the first killer apps was a spreadsheet for the
Apple ][.  It gave accountants a freedom they had never had before.  No
more grinding with a pencil and paper through column after column of
figures.  It freed them from the drudgery of the job.

As a result a completly new way of using computers was being explored.
There was a case being made for these small, one user at a time computers.
And IBM and completly missed this.  Like it or not Bill was part of that
small computer revolution.

When IBM did wake up to the small personal computer market their research 
showed two things:

  1) that IBM's internal procedures ment that it would take them 9 months
     to ship an empty box, and

  2) if they didn't have a personal computer on the market within 12 months
     IBM would have missed the personal computer boat completely.

IBM went open archeture on the IBM PC hardware because it was the _only_
way they could get something out in time.  Likewise with the software they
had to buy the OS and applications because they couldn't develop
there own in time.  But if there was nothing in the IBM PC that was
propriety to IBM then anyone could go out and buy the same bits IBM had
and build there own IBM compatable PC.  So IBM developed the only thing
they could in the time: the BIOS.  Of course there are ways of making
a copy of that legially, and the rest is history.

When IBM were putting the package together Bill & Mircosoft were one of
the people/companies IBM went to see.  Microsoft was the biggest provider
of languages for the PC market.  While there IBM asked him which OS he
recommend; Bill pointed them at CP/M.  IBM visitted the creator/owner
[sorry; his name excapes me] in San Fran.  I don't think he even saw them
because IBM required an NDA to be signed first, and he wouldn't sign.

IBM went back to Bill.  "He wouldn't talk to us." they told him.  Bill, 
never being one to look a gift horse in the mouth, said "Leave it with me
and I'll see what I can do."  Legged it accross town and bought the QDOS
source code.  Changed the name (because one can't sell IBM software with
the words like "Quick & Dirty" in the title) and the default drive letter
prompt.  As far as I know the rest was the same.  Legged it back to IBM
and sold them, as a bundled package, an OS and the Mircosoft tools that
IBM wantted in the first place.  What a deal for IBM, and it was.
Microsoft didn't start making much money on that setup until the clone
market came along.

So the IBM PC hardware was nothing more than an assembled kit of parts
with an IBM badge on the front.  They only software from IBM was the
BIOS.  Would corprate America really buy an over priced, less capiable
system just because in came in an IBM box, with an IBM sticker on the
front?  The answer was yes, and buy they did.

Within a few years of starting up the PC wing of IBM it was so large
that if split off in would have created the second largest computer
company in the world; second only to IBM mainframes.  The IBM PC out
sold all other so that the term PC came to mean IBM's PC (and it's clones)
rather than a generic term for personal computers in general.

I think that the PC (still using it in the general term) is important to
us all (us on this list).  Most of us have home networks today, wireless
in many cases, plus scanners and other add on devices.  We can do this
because the market for PC computers bits are so cheap.  They are cheep
because so many are made.  So many are made because they are so useful
to every office worker.

Now you could argue that Bill was just is the right place at the right
time and made the right deal.  Yes, I give you that.  My argument is
because he made that deal.  The IBM PC (and it's clones) became the PC
on the desktops of the western world.  If IBM had decided not to enter
PC market would we have the fast PCs today?  I say yes.  The market was
there before IBM released the IBM PC.

However, would we have such cheap prices?  That's more difficult.  I
think the market would have more players (we've lost Commordor, Sharp
and others).  With more platforms comes less sales per platform, and
thus high cost for the bits for that platform.  So I don't think that
prices would be as cheap as they are today.

So I think I've meet your challenge!  Bill strick the deal with IBM,
and that did change the way the PC market developed.  It lowered costs,
but put the technology back years!  Your challenge was to "name one
thing Bill Gates has done that has actually changed the world of
computing"; you didn't say that it had to be either a) technological,
or b) an advancement.

While writing this two people come to mind that I haven't seen on
the list.  The first is Babbage for comming up with the Analytical
Engine, the first valid concept of a programmable machine.

But above Babbage, at the top of list, should be Lord Byron's daughter,
Ada, Countess of Lovelace.  As Babbage said of her "[she] seems to
understand it better than I do, and is far, far better at explaining it".
To take from her own writings:
    The Analytical Engine has no pretensions whatever to originate
    anything.  It can do whatever we know how to order it to 
    perform.  It can follow analysis; but it has no power of
    anticipating any analytical relations or truths.  Its province
    is to assit us in making available what we are already acquainted
    with.
That as good a definition of software engineering as I know.  She got
programming before there was a computer to program on.  Therefore the
work of Knuth and Dijkstra, powerfull as they are, are just refinements
of Lady Lovelace's ideas on controlling a programmable machine.

Ta for reading
Steve