[email protected] (McKown, John) writes: > "has always been" -> "had always been". As you indicated, at first > software was written in order to sell the hardware. It was basically > "overhead". However, when PCMs such as Amdahl came along and simply > started redistributing IBM software (which they got for free since > they owned IBM hardware), IBM had to have some other way to recoup > their costs. Also, they started unbundling when the courts found them > guilty of a monopoly which included their refusal to distribute > software to non-IBM customers. At least, as best as I can recall after > lo these many years.
re: http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2012l.html 23jun69 unbundling announcement was result of various litigation, required starting to charge for application software, SE services, hardware maint., etc. Company managed to make the case that kernel software should still be free. misc. past unbundling posts http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/submain.html#unbundle FS effort in the early 70s was motivated by competition clone controllers (it was going to have been radically different from 370), The rise and fall of IBM http://www.ecole.org/en/seances/CM07 IBM tried to react by launching a major project called the 'Future System' (FS) in the early 1970's. The idea was to get so far ahead that the competition would never be able to keep up, and to have such a high level of integration that it would be impossible for competitors to follow a compatible niche strategy. However, the project failed because the objectives were too ambitious for the available technology. Many of the ideas that were developed were nevertheless adapted for later generations. Once IBM had acknowledged this failure, it launched its 'box strategy', which called for competitiveness with all the different types of compatible sub-systems. But this proved to be difficult because of IBM's cost structure and its R&D spending, and the strategy only resulted in a partial narrowing of the price gap between IBM and its rivals. ... snip ... misc. other Future System refs: http://www.jfsowa.com/computer/memo125.htm http://www.cs.clemson.edu/~mark/fs.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Future_Systems_project http://gdrean.perso.sfr.fr/papers/promises.html during Future System period, internal politics killed off and/or suspended 370 acitivty ... also I continued to work on 360/370 stuff ... and periodically ridiculed FS (which possibly wasn't the greatest career enhancing activity). The lack of 370 products was credited with allowing clone processors to gain market foothold. and misc. past posts mentioning Future System http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/submain.html#futuresys In the wake of the FS failure, there was mad rush to get stuff back into the 370 product pipelines ... this contributed to decisions to release various pieces of stuff that I was doing all during the FS period ... old email mentioning 360/370 stuff during FS period (one of my hobbies was providing production operating systems for internal datacenters): http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2006v.html#email731212 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2006w.html#email750102 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2006w.html#email750430 With the rise of the clone processors (made possible by the lack of products during the FS period) and with effort to get stuff back into the 370 product pipelines ... there was also a change in the decision to start charging for kernel software. This was going to be a staged conversion ... with new kernel add-ons being charged ... leaving base software free ... at least during transition period. One of my pieces selected to go out was my resource manager ... and it was selected as the guinea pig for starting to charge for kernel software (initially add-on pieces) and I got to spend some amount of time with business people about kernel charging policies. misc. past posts mentioning my resource manager and/or scheduling http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#fairshare -- virtualization experience starting Jan1968, online at home since Mar1970 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
