2007 SP0.0 available

Actually, Parallels virtualization software for Wintel is apparently less expensive than for the Mac, just from reading their home page.

Worth looking into for a PC.

Rumor is that Apple may be making a deal with them to include Parallels product with all future Leopard (Mac OS X 10.5) releases, at least on the Pro computers.

Good Luck - Bo

Dale Dunn wrote:

Actually, Parallels virtualization software for Wintel is apparently less expensive than for the Mac, just from reading their home page.

Worth looking into for a PC.

Rumor is that Apple may be making a deal with them to include Parallels product with all future Leopard (Mac OS X 10.5) releases, at least on the Pro computers.

Good Luck - Bo

Dale Dunn wrote:

For the last year or so I have run Novell's Suse Linux Enterprise 64 bit on a dual core system. Narry a hiccup. Pretty good support too. Dual boot would be better I think so you can see what it really can do.

Dale Dunn wrote:

Actually, Matt, I suspect that UNIX would be Corporate America's favorite, which is still open source to some extent as I understand it. A number of CAD applications still run on UNIX as I've been told.

Someone else was mentioning Linux.

TCO Economics usually pushes corporations to do something.

Bo

matt wrote:

I'm not distinguishing between Unix and Linux. If Unix "would be" the favorite, why isn't it? It was far more prevalent 15 years ago than it is today. Most 3D CAD workstations even 10 years ago were Unix. Unix declined for a couple of reasons, one of which was because their camp was divided. You had HP, Solaris, IRIX, Digital, Linux, SCO, and probably some more all competing against one another.

Microsoft capitalized first on the low cost DOS computers, then the home PC market, and gained enough momentum in the later 90s to steamroll a lot of the traditional unix markets.

If Unix/Linux has a chance to make it big again, it's in the form of OSX. Apple is in the position to bring the *nix OS to the mass market of casual users. There's not a big growth prospect if all you sell is internet servers (where Unix has its best market share). Apple has a 2% PC market share. Interpret that how you like, it ain't much.

When I look at the stats for the OS of visitors to my website, well, here they are:

Windows XP 17964 80.27%

Windows 2000 3707 16.56%

Windows 98 250 1.12%

Other/Unknown 221 0.99%

Mac OS X 95 0.42%

Windows NT 58 0.26%

Linux 32 0.14%

Macintosh 22 0.10%

Windows ME 19 0.08%

Windows 95 7 0.03%

Googlebot 4 0.02%

Win CE / PocketPC 1 0.00%

That says a lot. Most of the traffic to my site is SolidWorks related. I'm aware that SW users are by definition also MS users, and so these stats are skewed by that, but if there was a pent up demand within the SW user community for either Unix, Linux or Mac, they would probably constitute more than 1% of the total hits on my site.

I'm not arguing that Windows is superior in any way to any of these OSes, I'm just saying that looking at info like this, the market share to compel SolidWorks to port to another OS is simply non-existent.

Matt, I agreed with your note.

The big thing that happened is that Bill Gates was the P.T. Barnum of selling "The Next Greatest Attraction", starting with NT in the early

90s, I recall hearing of Bill Gates' promises of "Windows" to developers of heavy duty software and how they were going to knock the socks off of everyone for the best business OS and applications environment in the world.

Then I talked to a couple software developer friends who attempted heavy duty applications based on what Microsoft said around 99 or 2000, but things kept breaking, and Microsoft kept scaling back delivery, having buggy features or dropped features. Those developers were fit to be tied, and told me if they knew MS was going to pull the rug out, they would have done their work in UNIX instead. These were major custom software projects for manufacturing in Fortune 500 firms.

Bill Gates had tremendous persuasive power, and he persuaded virtually a supermajority of developers to go with Windows. More than a few developers got slammed by Gates hitting them in the back.

We've now seen again in 2005-2006 where the promises of "Longhorn" are a "LongWay" from what is going to ship as "Vista".

History repeats itself. I do think open OS's eventually must succeed to the point of forcing every OS development to be a seriously professional product, or the laggards will dwindle away.

Bo

matt wrote:

Not just developers.

I never quite understood that persuasive power. Back in the old DOS days I kept telling people about AmigaOS which was far ahead of DOS. They would ask if it was PC compatible because they were convinced that anything new for the PC was going to run their old programs. Well it didn't. Then they got Windows 1, 2 and 3. It was a pain to get those DOS programs working on Windows. Some did, some didn't and the pif file was born to make DOS compatible. People went out and bought new versions of their old software. Try running DOS or Windows 3.1 apps today. My point is Windows isn't really PC compatible any more than the old AmigaOS programs were. People go out and buy new software when a new OS comes out. So why not switch to another OS even if it requires buying new software. You will do it anyway. This whole bait and switch routine is easy for any low level floor salesman to get his/her arms around because people don't walk around with a spreadsheet adding up all the costs.

I think the Gates persuasive power has to do with timing. If you can create a perception ahead of time that the old software you have will work on the new OS then people will go with the new OS. In order to create that perception you need only show a certain rudimentary compatibility of old applications with the new OS. You might only have to say it is compatible and not show it at all. Then you count on the fact that people will get fed up with the way the old acts or looks on the new OS and go out and upgrade. Sure the furniture from my old dorm room will work in my new house, but it sure doesn't look good there. The last thing Gates wants is for people to add up the cost of the new OS prior to purchasing it. When people start to think in terms of "New OS, all new software" then this may go away. A corollary to this is "New OS, all new hardware to run it".

Another thing Gates controls is the supply of OS software. Try purchasing DOS, Windows 3.1 or NT today. You can't get it from MSoft. When Vespa comes out you won't be able to buy XP any longer either. As soon as Vespa starts shipping it will be on all new Dells, HPs, IBMs, etc. You really won't have a choice. The same thing will happen with SWX. "New PC, all new software."

Bo wrote:

"Real" competition in the OS market would make the issue below either disappear, or would result in something to make it easier for users like Apple did with "Classic" when OSX appeared.

In spite of the gloom about Apple's current and past market share, I see an awful lot of Macs appearing in PC territory in the last year or two, and it seems to be accelerating, so we will see.

For me, the Mac is a VERY attractive Cost Effective way to avoid multiple expensive CPUs, today.

I personally think that the issues of using time wasting, counterintuitive OS software are so bad (& well known), that MS is under the gun to improve with Vista, and at least that is a start to where MS has to go if they are going to survive.

Bo

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