Bob Munck writes:
> > Uhm, Bob, don't take this the wrong way, but NextStep is a
> > UNIX-based operating system... A damn good one in some ways, too.
>
> I wouldn't define it that way. NeXTSTEP runs on top of the Mach
> kernel, sometimes called the "microkernel." Mach, of course, was
> written by the people at CMU without reference to prior UNIX
You're splitting hairs; the point is that NextStep was based on
the UNIX design, not that it runs on a UNIX kernel or in any way uses
code from the original UNIX.
(And yes, I'm familiar with Mach; my house is within walking
distance of CMU and some of the folks who worked on the Mach project
were acquaintances at one point.)
There are a number of alternative approaches to OS design - the
Gnu Hurd project is one of the more interesting I've heard about
lately, which has a variety of servers running on top of a microkernel
(like Mach) to provide the services usually expected from an operating
system. Perhaps it would be more acceptable to describe NextStep
using the phrasing the GNU Hurd web page uses to refer to operating
systems like Linux as "UNIX-like".
> > I've always thought it was a shame that more of the NextStep
> > concepts didn't flourish.
>
> Gotta agree with you there. The O-O aspects of the app interface
> were fantastic. I was disappointed, though, with the way the
> GUI worked out in practice. I was always a big fan of PostScript,
I feel that the GUI never really had the wrinkles ironed out
because it never really got a chance to be tested and developed by
generations. On the other hand, that's never a guarantee.
> > (* Although I do really dislike the way Microsoft has appropriated the
> > perfectly normal and general world "Windows" to mean their specific
> > product. It's MICROSOFT Windows, dammit!).
>
> Another echo from the anti-IBM rhetoric of the 60's and 70's
I was around in the 60s and 70s but I sure as hell wasn't
involved in any anti-IBM rhetoric (I'm not *that* old :-). This is
simply my writer's side showing through; I get annoyed when anybody
tries to abrogate the english language. It's just that Microsoft is
far more given to such excesses of arrogance than most of the computer
industry.
> What we really should do is come up with a better word (or term).
> These things don't work like real windows; have you ever seen
> a house with multiple overlapping windows of different sizes?
> I kind of like "pages," and the other use of pages for VM
> management is so buried in the OS that no one will see it as
> a misuse. If a screen is a "desktop" (another metaphor that
> I'm uncomfortable with), then the rectangular things scattered
> around it are "pages" or "sheets" or "documents," not windows.
Pages might get awkward, given that a) most programs also have to
deal with output and pages in that context and b) most displays can't
actually display a whole page (in the output sense).
Documents is far more focused on the underlying logical concept
than on the display.
Sheets is rather vague.
Hypercard called them "cards", and KMS called them "frames", many
systems for programming GUIs (be they X, MS or Mac) refer to
components as "panes" (thought that's obviously derived from the
window metaphor).
The challenge is to find a term that is not already heavily
loaded within the task domain but is common enough that it will be
easily recognized and used, and related enough in form or function
that it will be accessible (what some people describe as "intuitive").
Steven J. Owens
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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