Part of the DaveNet Mail website. San Francisco CA USA. 12/23/96.

Let's Have Fun -- Now! RE: IT'S ABOUT INVESTMENT

Sent:12/23/96; 4:43:47 PM
From: MarkWomack@aol.com

Dave,

I've always thought, even when Apple was talking about Copland, that they ran a very strong risk of losing many of their developers and a lot of users, particulary large sites that have made large investments in Mac. If you were an IS director and you were told that in one year all the Mac software and a good portion of the hardware would be obsolete, what would you do? You'd look very seriously at Windows '95 or Windows NT 4.0, that's what you'd do. At least what you buy today will be more compatible in one year's time. It's a similar story for developers. Spend lots of time re-writing software for a new OS or port to Windows and make money...

As far as Be vs. NeXT, forget about NeXT OS. We won't be using that (at least I hope we won't). We are going to be using Mac OS with the NeXT OS technology underneath it. Maybe there will be a new API or the Copland API or a NeXT API. I don't know. But I think there is a better chance of success with a base that is shipping and already has a lot of the features we need today (needed 3 years ago...). My impression of Be was that it was cool (and probably more modern than NeXT) but that there are still holes missing before it could be a mature OS. Maybe I'm wrong there. Also, there is probably a better chance of backward compatibility using some version of the AUX software running on top of the Unix part of the NeXT OS.

It's very surprising and dizzying the way all this has gone down, but I think we are in a stronger position. But delivery time is KEY.

Take care,

Let's Have Fun -- Now!

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