The Original Microsoft Windows 1.0 Press Release(mashable.com)
mashable.com
The Original Microsoft Windows 1.0 Press Release
http://mashable.com/2010/10/15/the-original-microsoft-windows-1-0-press-kit/
13 comments
Notice how the focus was on the benefits the product brought to the end user and the industry, not on how it actually worked.
Technical people tend to get this wrong with pitches that are all about the "how", when they should be about the "why".
We hackers tend to love the details of how something works. Regular people just care about the benefits that a black box brings to them.
Technical people tend to get this wrong with pitches that are all about the "how", when they should be about the "why".
We hackers tend to love the details of how something works. Regular people just care about the benefits that a black box brings to them.
GEM was still so superior.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_Environment_Manager
If ever there was a good lesson it's this - DRDos was lighyears ahead, and far superior to MSDos. GEM was ridiculously more advanced than Windows, yet they lost. Having the better product doesn't always translate to winning.
Of course things like this helped MS:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AARD_code
(MS put some code in place to detect DR-DOS and make things not work properly).
"Microsoft Senior Vice President Brad Silverberg later sent another memo, stating: "What the [user] is supposed to do is feel uncomfortable, and when he has bugs, suspect that the problem is DR-DOS and then go out to buy MS-DOS."
It'd be great to see a movie made of this period of time when MS were engaging in so many dirty tricks.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_Environment_Manager
If ever there was a good lesson it's this - DRDos was lighyears ahead, and far superior to MSDos. GEM was ridiculously more advanced than Windows, yet they lost. Having the better product doesn't always translate to winning.
Of course things like this helped MS:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AARD_code
(MS put some code in place to detect DR-DOS and make things not work properly).
"Microsoft Senior Vice President Brad Silverberg later sent another memo, stating: "What the [user] is supposed to do is feel uncomfortable, and when he has bugs, suspect that the problem is DR-DOS and then go out to buy MS-DOS."
It'd be great to see a movie made of this period of time when MS were engaging in so many dirty tricks.
100% agree, i still have my x86 GEM's 5 1/4" floppies somewhere (with the additional painting and writing apps, i guess it was an "ultimate" edition).
Another interesting thing is that the GEM release i had already contained a basic interpreter with windowed graphics support (not complete as visual basic that was released in 1991).
EDIT: Looks like i had GEM2, the "lawsuit friendly" version. DRI had been sued by Apple for similarities between the MacOs of Lisa and GEM, they removed some features like overlapping windows on the desktop and a few animation effects.
EDIT: Looks like i had GEM2, the "lawsuit friendly" version. DRI had been sued by Apple for similarities between the MacOs of Lisa and GEM, they removed some features like overlapping windows on the desktop and a few animation effects.
[deleted]
> Having the better product doesn't always translate to winning.
As the DoJ proved so aptly, it's the least ethical salesforce that wins.
DR-DOS and GEM was sold to end users. MS-DOS and, later, Windows, was sold to OEMs in the form of the Microsoft tax, sucking out any opportunity for competitors.
> It'd be great to see a movie made of this period of time when MS were engaging in so many dirty tricks.
It would take a five-season series for that...
As the DoJ proved so aptly, it's the least ethical salesforce that wins.
DR-DOS and GEM was sold to end users. MS-DOS and, later, Windows, was sold to OEMs in the form of the Microsoft tax, sucking out any opportunity for competitors.
> It'd be great to see a movie made of this period of time when MS were engaging in so many dirty tricks.
It would take a five-season series for that...
I cut my teeth on GEM at age 6 or 7. It was awesome. We had the later version that ran on top of DOS on an Amstrad machine of all things. Got brought home from work by my dad when it has been long obsolete.
Originally called Windows Premiere Edition...
Interesting that even in 1985 (with relatively few products released) Microsoft still couldn't resist from using fluff terms like "Premiere"
Windows Vista Enterprise Premium Gold Edition.
Interesting that even in 1985 (with relatively few products released) Microsoft still couldn't resist from using fluff terms like "Premiere"
Windows Vista Enterprise Premium Gold Edition.
Premiere = First Performance
So they were technically correct.
The jury is still out on that "Premium Gold" part, though.
So they were technically correct.
The jury is still out on that "Premium Gold" part, though.
For me, it was Windows 3.0 that was the game changer on the IBM platform. While Windows 1.0 was neat, it was the mac-like GUI on 3.0 that really got people going.
Still, I miss being a command line encyclopedia.
Still, I miss being a command line encyclopedia.
> it was the beginning of an era that brought personal computing to billions of households worldwide.
This is plain wrong.
This is plain wrong.
It would funny to get stats on how much usage newer features of today's windows get compared to the core features that were already in that win 1.0 release. I think we'd find that a large portion of PC users could do just fine today with win 1.0 and a $50 PC hardware architecture it requires.
Having visited some offices and friends homes, most of them use the computer to browse the web, watch videos, play games and also use Office.
I don't think Win 1.0 can run Pro 9 or play a HD movie. I don't think also that $50 hardware at enough to open 3/4 browsing tabs.
I don't think Win 1.0 can run Pro 9 or play a HD movie. I don't think also that $50 hardware at enough to open 3/4 browsing tabs.
Maybe they'd get more stuff done then?
This is soo true. I wonder if we could have a discussion of the social consciousness level of consumer software product managers at MS. Windows is stuffed with features that I sometimes think are more there for selling hardware and third party applications that to really improve people's lives. Then again, people should vote with their dollars for what they need most.
Um... can I install the latest Firefox on it and surf Youtube?
Well, notepad and calc haven't changed.
If Notepad understood Unix newline characters, I'd have no complaints.
Microsoft justifies this by saying "Notepad is for notes" (in the same way that a Stickies dashboard widget is.) That is, Notepad is "Microsoft OneNote Extra-Lite," in the same way that Wordpad is "Microsoft Word Extra-Lite." Hackers think Notepad is actually "Visual Studio Extra-Lite," but it's not, and it's not trying to be. I think everyone would be happier with debugging and automating a default Windows install if Microsoft just shipped a SciTE-like accessory separately from Notepad, and defaulted .ini files and such to opening in it.
As of Win7, calc is drastically different.
Another feature that was finally updated in Win7 was the "Add Font" interface, which as late as Vista was still using the Win3.1 UI: http://www.imgur.com/lGSIA.png
Another feature that was finally updated in Win7 was the "Add Font" interface, which as late as Vista was still using the Win3.1 UI: http://www.imgur.com/lGSIA.png
Where I live license plates are three letters + three numbers. Whenever I see XXX 311 I cannot help but think about Windows for Workgroups… And then the nostalgia for blue two-panned Norton Commander screens kicks in. Yep, I got passionate about computers around 1990…
I have a similar attachment to 403 because of SunOS 4.0.3.
Someone working on Tron Legacy must have a similar feeling as if you look really closely at the desktop in the trailer you can see it shows "SolarOS 4.0.1".
Someone working on Tron Legacy must have a similar feeling as if you look really closely at the desktop in the trailer you can see it shows "SolarOS 4.0.1".
If ever the quote "A picture's worth a thousand words" resonates, the original press release vs. the video of Windows 1 in action it is.
> Windows 1.0 was the beginning of the Control Panel and the Clipboard
Wait, what?
Wait, what?
Yeah, those were definitely present in the first Mac.
Mute!
At any rate, on very interesting part of the document was that it emphasized that it was created on Windows Write. Often I open promotional PDFs for Office 2010, iWork, and more just to look at the properties, and usually they're created in Adobe InDesign, not the program they're promoting. Would make more sense to show you're "eating your own dog food" and make your promotional materials in your own program as they did here.