On Mon, 10 Mar 2008 00:39:50 +0200, Eero Ahonen wrote:

> Nicolas Alvarez wrote:
>> 
>> Saying "people don't restart the app all the time, so startup times
>> don't matter" is just like saying "computers are fast nowadays, so
>> optimization doesn't matter".
> 
> Heh, yeah, basically so. But when user uses multitasking to beat startup
> times (you don't need to start software often, 'cause you can keep them
> open at the background) makes optimization (especially memory-) more
> useful :).

Yeah, but for $50, you can add another 2 GB of memory to the machine, so 
why not?

One of the reasons for Microsoft's success in the industry is their huge 
programs.  Hardware vendors *loved* Microsoft in the early days, because 
in order to use the software, you had to buy the biggest, baddest, *most 
expensive* machine they could sell you.

Why on earth would HP, for example, recommend NetWare (a solid, stable, 
and secure network OS) in the mid 1990's?  It ran on a 386 with 16 MB of 
memory, and it ran forever.  There are *still* installations of version 
2.x and 3.x (current is 6.5) that are perfectly functioning because the 
damned thing *just works*.

Conversely, the earliest server releases of Windows required gobs of 
memory and processor, and each successive release required more memory, 
more disk space, more of everything.  The hardware vendors got a 
permanent customer upgrade cycle, service contracts, the works - because 
the system was overcomplicated, bloated, and a resource hog.

That's not to say there weren't other factors for Novell's decline (some 
of which were by all means self-inflicted), but having something that 
didn't make any of the hardware manufacturers any money certainly hurt.

It's a shame when the technologically superior product loses due to a 
case like this.  Even more so when anti-competitive behaviour comes into 
play (as is well documented fact).

im

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