OS/2: the Open Source Laboratory

Remember OS/2? It was the going to be the “real” operating system that took over from the mickey mouse Windows.... Somehow, that never quite happened (can't imagine why), but OS/2 aficionados remain as loyal to their OS as any Mac fanboy. One interesting suggestion that crops up periodically is that IBM should open source OS/2....

On Open Enterprise blog.

Sun Shines Again

Further to my general encomium on Sun, here's more good news:

Sun Microsystems... today announced the upcoming availability of the StarOffice 8 Conversion Technology Preview plug-in application for Microsoft Office 2003. The early access version of the OpenDocument Format (ODF) plug-in, available as a free download, will allow seamless two-way conversion of Microsoft Office documents to ODF.

...

The StarOffice 8 Conversion Technology Preview is primarily based on the OpenOffice.org platform, the open-source office productivity suite developed by the OpenOffice.org community including the founder and main contributor Sun Microsystems. Sun offers distributions and configurations of and support for OpenOffice.org under the StarOffice brand. The initial plug-in application will support the conversion of text documents (.doc/.odt) only, but full support of spreadsheet and presentation documents is expected in April. The conversion is absolutely transparent to the user and the additional memory footprint is minimal.

This is particularly welcome since there are already noises that Microsoft's ODF plugin for Word is not as faithful in the translation process as might be desired.

And if that isn't enough, here's news that an OS/2 port of OpenOffice.org 2.0 is nearing completion. What more do you want? (Both via Erwin Tenhumberg.)

One Door Closes, Another Door Opens

Tomorrow is the end of an era - though you might be forgiven if you failed to notice. Back in July, IBM announced that it was ending support for its OS/2 operating system.

Now, for younger readers, this may not mean much: after all, few today use OS/2. But once upon a time, OS/2 was the Great White Hope - not just for IBM, but apparently for Microsoft too. Both positioned it as the "serious" version of Windows, which was merely a kind of mickey-mouse entry-level system. Of course, it didn't quite work out that way.

What's amazing is not so much that Microsoft managed to outwit IBM (again - after doing it for the first time with MS-DOS), but that IBM stuck with its poor old OS/2 for so long. What's also interesting - and yet another straw in the wind - is that in its migration page, IBM suggests GNU/Linux as the most natural successor.

But it is much more than merely a make-do substitute. OS/2 being closed, dies tomorrow. The open GNU/Linux can never die (though it might go into hibernation). A similar observation was made by this perceptive story on lwn.net in the context of browsers, rather than operating systems.