NeXT Step 3.0 video with Steve Jobs

huck · #1 January 29th, 2005, 09:47 PM

I find it ironic that Steve Jobs comments on how the NeXT Step OS drastically improves corporate productivity, yet years have passed and Apple has struggled in this segment.

I am in amazement at how advanced this OS was and how much of OS X is really based on it.

peace.

RacerX · #2 January 29th, 2005, 11:42 PM

NEXTSTEP is/was an incredible operating system. It really was far ahead of it's time.

Sadly, the cost of ownership was the main hurdle back then. In those pre-Linux revolution days, a Unix based operating system carried a pretty heavy price tag. NEXTSTEP was about $800.00 (add on another $5000 for the developer tools).

While this sounds extraordinarily high considering that System 7 and Windows 3.1 were both about $100, Apple's Unix variant of the time, A/UX, was running about $900.

Back then, there was simply no way for me to afford a NEXTSTEP system... even on PC hardware. I used NeXT systems at school/work and Macs at home.

These days, I carry an OPENSTEP system with me to school.

Of course I own almost as much NEXTSTEP/OPENSTEP software as I do Mac software. Most people who see NEXTSTEP/OPENSTEP/Rhapsody running these days have no software and then wonder (often aloud) how they could possibly be useful as an operating system.

It is always fun to see people looking at operating systems I use daily as a blast from the past.

drunkmac · #3 January 30th, 2005, 01:59 AM

Do you have a link to the video/NexT Step Website?

RacerX · #4 January 30th, 2005, 02:23 AM

You can find it here.

**fryke** · #5 January 30th, 2005, 07:11 AM

The video's post-stamp sized, though. Sadly, we don't see much of the interface like this... However: It's nice how Steve Jobs bashes both Macs and PCs in the video.

I sometimes wish Steve had been as aggressive as Bill back then. If the _first_ step of NeXT would have been to release the OS for 486-based hardware at a lower price than Windows, we probably wouldn't talk about Windows or Macs today. (Of course, there probably wouldn't be an iPod, either...)

MisterMe · #6 January 30th, 2005, 03:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fryke

The video's post-stamp sized, though. Sadly, we don't see much of the interface like this... However: It's nice how Steve Jobs bashes both Macs and PCs in the video.

I sometimes wish Steve had been as aggressive as Bill back then. If the _first_ step of NeXT would have been to release the OS for 486-based hardware at a lower price than Windows, we probably wouldn't talk about Windows or Macs today. (Of course, there probably wouldn't be an iPod, either...)

Steve Jobs was and is smart and agressive. No matter how agressive he was, there were some things that he cannot do. Releasing NeXTstep first on a 486 is one of them. Steve released the original NeXT cube in 1988. The 486 was did not go on the market until 1989.

Natobasso · #7 January 30th, 2005, 11:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MisterMe

Steve Jobs was and is smart and agressive. No matter how agressive he was, there were some things that he cannot do. Releasing NeXTstep first on a 486 is one of them. Steve released the original NeXT cube in 1988. The 486 was did not go on the market until 1989.

Usually it's the demand for the product, not the creators of a product, that determines the success of a product. Circumstances dictated that Microsoft became a behemoth because they figured out through licensing their software system that they could be on many types of computers.

If Apple had just licensed it's computers/op systems with success (see the failed PowerComputing, et. al. for proof!) they might have more marketshare today.

RacerX · #8 January 31st, 2005, 01:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Natobasso

If Apple had just licensed it's computers/op systems with success (see the failed PowerComputing, et. al. for proof!) they might have more marketshare today.

Well, I've seen some very good arguments as to why there was really no way for the Macintosh operating system to successfully run on PCs of the 80's and early 90's (this being a good example). And considering that NeXT's operating system faced the same challenges (as did SGI's operating system of the time), Motorola processors really were the only choice for graphic computing back then.

And it should be noted that most PCs of the time were designed for the operating system that they were forced to license with them... MS-DOS (by forced I mean forced, this was the root cause of the original DOJ case against Microsoft).

Quote:

Originally Posted by fryke

I sometimes wish Steve had been as aggressive as Bill back then. If the _first_ step of NeXT would have been to release the OS for 486-based hardware at a lower price than Windows, we probably wouldn't talk about Windows or Macs today. (Of course, there probably wouldn't be an iPod, either...)

As for guessing as to the What if of NeXT and their products, it should not be over looked that NeXT was legally barred from selling desktops or competing directly with Apple in the desktop market.

Given that NeXT was unable to sell desktops to the public, there was little chance of the public getting their hands on a NeXT system. NeXT was forced into the workstation market, which was already beginning to evaporate thanks to the increasing power of desktop systems and the advances of Linux on Intel's 386 architecture.

To my knowledge, Apple never relaxed the restrictions on NeXT for selling within the desktop market, even after NeXT stopped making hardware and had a version of NEXTSTEP for 486 based computers.

NeXT was a late comer into a dying market and was barred from competing in a growing market. NeXT fate was sealed with their settlement with Apple. I don't see any (legal) way around their problems back then short of Apple disappearing off the face of the Earth.