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CP/M creator Gary Kildall's memoirs released as free download

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Re: CP/M creator Gary Kildall's memoirs released as free download

#71

Post by WalterBright »

acdha wrote: post #61
WalterBright wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's little doubt that Ms Gates suggested that IBM look into Bill Gates, but I seriously doubt that IBM made the major business decision to contract with Gates because of his mother's suggestion.

None of us know what was said but I have no reason to doubt it based on the reports of his subsequent conversations with lower-level IBM executives. It probably didn’t seem like an especially consequential decision both because neither Gates nor Kildall were especially proven at that time by the standards of a Goliath like IBM and the mainframe guys were notoriously dismissive of PCs (Opel came up through S/360). I’v…

Ms Gates wasn't on the board of IBM, she was on the board of another company. That isn't nepotism.

There is no way successful IBM would commit to Microsoft without a thorough vetting.

Few remember, but IBM also sold CPM/86 for the PC. Kildall had his chance, and muffed it with the high price.

Re: CP/M creator Gary Kildall's memoirs released as free download

#72

Post by WalterBright »

0xEF wrote: post #53
WalterBright wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's little doubt that Ms Gates suggested that IBM look into Bill Gates, but I seriously doubt that IBM made the major business decision to contract with Gates because of his mother's suggestion.

So, and correct me if I am wrong, you don't think a little old fashioned nepotism happened like it does in pretty much every major industry?

Nepotism certainly happens, but companies that practice it rarely thrive.

Ms Gates was not associated with IBM.

Re: CP/M creator Gary Kildall's memoirs released as free download

#73

Post by WalterBright »

stevekemp wrote: post #58
WalterBright wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Um, it is necessary to compile a program before being able to interpret it. I don't know how early BASICs were implemented, but the usual method is to compile it to some sort of intermediate representation, and then interpret that representation. D's compile time function execution engine works that way. So does the Javascript compiler/interpreter engine I wrote years ago, and the Java compiler I wrote eons ago. The…

It is not necessary to compile a program, in the general case, before executing it. Many programming languages parse their program to an AST then walk that AST interpretting as they go. But for BASIC you can parse/execute statement by statement - no need to parse the whole program ahead of time, and certainly zero need to compile to either machine code or any internal representation. Remember at the time we're talkin…

The parsing, even if line by line as necessary, is still compiling.

Re: CP/M creator Gary Kildall's memoirs released as free download

#74

Post by WalterBright »

eichin wrote: post #57
WalterBright wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Um, it is necessary to compile a program before being able to interpret it. I don't know how early BASICs were implemented, but the usual method is to compile it to some sort of intermediate representation, and then interpret that representation. D's compile time function execution engine works that way. So does the Javascript compiler/interpreter engine I wrote years ago, and the Java compiler I wrote eons ago. The…

> necessary to compile Um, no? your experience is probably at least two decades after the time period in question.. The more advanced versions of, for example, the TRS-80 BASIC (part of this "microcomputer BASICs that all share a common set of bugs") did no more than tokenize - so, `10 PRINT "Hello"` would have a binary representation for the line number, a single byte token for PRINT, then " H E L L O " and an end-o…

Tokenizing it and interpreting the token stream is still a compilation process. Even if it re-tokenized it each time it executed a line.

Re: CP/M creator Gary Kildall's memoirs released as free download

#75

Post by whobre »

rbanffy wrote: post #63
xen2xen1 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gates had a version of DOS ready in 6 weeks, while DR was still planning DOS. MS got things going much faster.

No. He ran out and acquired 86-DOS, from Seattle Computer Products. It's easy to have something when you buy it already complete. And DR had CP/M-86.

DRI did not have CP/M-86 at that time which is the reason Tim Paterson developed 86-DOS in the first place.

Re: CP/M creator Gary Kildall's memoirs released as free download

#76

Post by WalterBright »

whobre wrote: post #52
WalterBright wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember the early IBM PC days. PC-DOS was $40. CPM/86 was $240. Both were available, people simply picked the cheaper one. I used both, and there was nothing better about CPM/86. Due to inflation, this is like $113 vs $679 today. It was a no-brainer to buy MS-DOS instead. Kildall clearly was a businessman wanting to make money off of it.

It was IBM who set the price. According to Kildall’s right-hand Tom Rolander, they were shocked when they saw the price difference.

> It was IBM who set the price

Not what I heard at the time - IBM accommodated what Kildall wanted. Kildall could have sold it separately at a competitive price.

Re: CP/M creator Gary Kildall's memoirs released as free download

#77

Post by WalterBright »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #69
WalterBright wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's little doubt that Ms Gates suggested that IBM look into Bill Gates, but I seriously doubt that IBM made the major business decision to contract with Gates because of his mother's suggestion.

One way to look at it is that if IBM considered licensing MS-DOS and CP/M to be equivalent, which is to say either one would serve there purposes. Then I can easily see the Chairman of IBM putting a finger on the scale to swing it toward Ms. Gates son. It's like a two-fer[1], IBM is going to do a deal anyway and they figure either OS would work, and he gets a 'favor' point from a fellow board member who he might some…

Ms Gates was not on the board of IBM. She was on the board of United Way.

Re: CP/M creator Gary Kildall's memoirs released as free download

#78

Post by serf »

hackmack10 wrote: post #22

The kids should not be removing some of their Dad's work. His struggles with alcoholism are well defined in the public and him describing his struggles could help another facing similar problems.

ABSOLUTELY AGREED.

In fact I think all now-dead authors should have their work as-is protected to a fair degree.

Dollars to donuts that the anecdotes revealed something either embarrassing or personally connected to the family members, it's just easier to posthumously blame the drinker.

I absolutely agree that shining light onto the subject of alcoholism is nothing but good for those seeking to avoid the horrible problem.

Re: CP/M creator Gary Kildall's memoirs released as free download

#79

Post by WalterBright »

ghaff wrote: post #70
WalterBright wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We'll never know the truth.

Past some point, even people with some first-hand knowledge may not know the whole truth, filter things through their own biases, may just misremember, etc.

My dad kept a diary during his combat tour in WW2. Decades later, he read it and was shocked to discover that it did not quite line up with his memories.

When I prepared a "history of D" for a paper a while back, I went looking through all my documents and emails and the D forum history looking to pin things down. I, too, discovered that my memories didn't match the facts as well as I wished it did.

Memory is a funny thing.

One should always be skeptical of accounts written long after the fact. I sometimes wonder how much of our written history is false. I support statutes of limitations because of this.

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