Hey Grumpy Fred, thanks for sharing your story and honored to be around
those who met with Gary. I recall some versions of the story was that he
decided to go flying that day since he was quarreling with his wife (or
that he decided to personally do that errands, just to "get out of the
house" sort of thing). That could be a culture thing - what I mean is,
that he didn't think it critical for IBM to make their decision THAT day.
And that's the other rumors to the story: that IBM did try to follow up in
days or weeks that follow. We'll probably never know the exact truth of
things - except that I do think everyone generally agrees that at least
Bill Gates did TRY to give CP/M a chance, which is somewhat admirable (in
acknowledging that "if you want the best, this is the guy you need to talk
to"). The autobiography of Paul Allen, he claims he strongly nudged Gates
into looking into QDOS. And for me, I'm convinced Tim do sufficient
independent work to make QDOS. But I'm baffled - CP/M was always "just"
a 64K OS. Meaning QDOS/PC/MS-DOS, to its credit, tackled the banking
challenge - that is, from a software developers perspective, you could
allocate 250,000 bytes (if the system had RAM) and the OS managed the
up-to-10 segments for you rather seamlessly. I never actually actively
used CP/M myself, but my understanding is in all the systems you find it on
- like even the OSBORNE-1, they are 64K systems. (the later concurrent
and DR-DOS obviously tackled that - by 1990 I was fully onboard with
DR-DOS, it really was better for a few years there than MS-DOS)
-SteveL (v*)
On Fri, May 3, 2024 at 8:30 PM Fred Cisin via cctalk <cctalk@classiccmp.org>
wrote:
> PL/M (think "PL/1") was a high level programming language for
> microprocessors.
>
> CP/M was also briefly called "Control Program and Monitor"
> It was written by Gary Kildall. (May 19, 1942 - july 11, 1994)
>
> Gary taught at Navy Postgraduate School in Monterey.
> He took a break in 1972, to complete his PhD at University of Washington.
>
> He wrote 8008 and 8080 instruction set simulators for Intel, and they
> loaned
> him hardware.
>
> In 1973? he wrote CP/M.
> He offered it to Intel, but they didn't want it, although they marketed
> the
> PL/M.
>
> He and his wife started "Intergalactic Digital Research" in Pacific Grove.
> Later renamed "Digital Research, Inc."
>
> CP/M rapidly became a defacto standard as operating system for 8080 and
> later
> Z80 computers.
>
> In the late 1970s, when CP/M computers were available with 5.25" drives,
> and
> there were hundreds, soon thousands of different formats, I chatted with
> Gary,
> and pleaded with him ot create a "standard" format for 5.25".
> His response was a very polite, "The standard format for CP/M is 8 inch
> single
> sided single density."
> I pointed out that formats were proliferating excessively.
> His response was a very polite, "I understand. Sorry, but the standard
> format
> for CP/M is 8 inch single sided single density."
>
>
> In 1980? IBM was developing a personal computer. (y'all have heard of it)
> One
> of the IBM people had a Microsoft Softcard (Z80 plus CP/M) in his Apple.
> IBM
> went to Microsoft, to negotiate BASIC for the new machine, and CP/M.
>
> Bill Gates explained and sent them to Digital Research.
>
> When the IBM representatives arrived, Gary was flying his plane up to
> Oakland
> to visit Bill Godbout. He hadn't seen a need to be present, and assumed
> that
> Dorothy would take care of the [presumably completely routine] paperwork.
> While
> visiting Bill godbout, and delivering some software was important, it WAS
> something that a low level courier could have done.
>
>
> There was a little bit of a culture clash.
> The IBM people were all in identical blue suits.
> The DR people were in sandals, barefoot, shorts, t-shirts, braless women,
> with
> bicycles, surfboard, plants and even cats in the office,
>
> The IBM people demanded a signed non=disclosure ageement before talking.
> Dorothy Kildall refused.
>
> When Dorothy got Gary on the phone, it is unreliably reported that he
> said,
> "well, let them sit on the couch and wait their turn like the rest of the
> customers."
>
> It is also been said that DR people upstairs saw the IBM people marching
> up,
> and thought that it was a drug raid. I have stood in that bay window
> overlooking the front door, and can believe that.
>
> IBM chose to not do business with DR and went back to Microsoft.
> When billg was unable to convince them that Microsoft was not in the
> operating
> system business, Microsoft went into the operating system business. They
> bought an unlimited license to QDOS (Tim Paterson's work at Seattle
> Computer
> Products). They also hired Tim Paterson.
>
> DR was working on CP/M-86, but it was a ways off.
> Paterson had written QDOS ("Quick and Dirty Operating System") as a
> placeholder
> to be able to continue development while waiting for CP/M-86
> We've mentioned before, that Tim Paterson got the idea for the directory
> structure from Microsoft Standalone BASIC. As Chuck pointed out, that was
> not
> a new invention, merely a choice of which way to do it.
>
> billg knew how to deal with officious managers. It is unreliably said
> that he
> told the Microsoft people, "Everybody who does not own a suit, stay home
> tomorrow!"
>
> IBM insisted that Micorsoft beef up security. window shades, locks on
> doors
> that normally weren't, locks on file cabinets, etc.
> It is unreliably said that to throw off anyboy who heard about it, that
> Microsoft referred to the IBm project as "Project Commodore"
>
>
>
> dr continued to sell CP/M.
> When the 5150/:PC was ready, IBM announced it with PC-DOS, which was a
> renaming
> of MS-DOS,renaming 86-DOS, renaming QDOS.
>
> If I recall correctly theprice was $40 (or maybe $60?)
>
>
> DR pointed out that NS-DOS was extremely similar to CP/M.
>
> https://www.cs.drexel.edu/~johnsojr/2012-13/fall/cs370/resources/An%20Inside%20Look%20at%20MS-DOS.pdf
> IBM didn't consider it a problem, andsimply offered to ALSO sell CP/M-86,
> particularly since they were already also marketing UCSD P-System.
>
> CP/M-86 was not available yet, so everybody buying a disk based PC bought
> PC-DOS.
> But, most of us assumed thata CP/M-86 would become the standard once it
> came
> out, and PC-DOS was similar and let us use the machines while waiting.
>
> CP/M-86 took a long time to come out (6 months is a LONG time in such
> things).
> When it did, the price was $240.
> There are disagreemnets about whether DR or IBM had set the price point.
>
> Most decided to keep using Pc-DOs until CP/M-86 had caught on.
> But with the price differential, and the lead, PC-DOS remained the
> standard.
>
>
> dr continued, came out with MP/M-86, and eventually came out with
> "Concurrent
> DOS", and "DR-DOS", which was based on MS-DOS.
> Microsoft could not fault somebody for copying them, when it was the ones
> that
> they had copied.
> No, Microsoft could certainly not claim trademark status for "DOS"!
> In fact, although Microsoft trademarkd "MS-DOS", IBM did NOT trademark
> PC-DOS,
> saying that it just meant Personal Compter Disk Operating System, which is
> a
> description, not a unique name. In 1987, I visited the Patent and
> Trademark
> Office outside of Washington, DC, and personally confirmed that in their
> stacks.
>
> Many people have said that blowing off IBM was the stupidest move in the
> history of stupid moves.
> Other people insist that blowing off IBM was the BRAVEST move in history.
>
>
> A lot of people gave Gary flack about it.
> eventually, he bagan drinking.
>
> On July 8, 1994, Gary fell and hit his head. It is unclear whether that
> was
> during an altercation. (A lot of people fall during bar brawls) It was
> at the
> Franklin Street biker Bar & Grill, Investigation as a potential homicide
> was
> inconclusive.
>
>
> About 10 years ago, I was in Pacific Grove, and visited the DR house on
> Lighthouse street. An extremely hospitable fellow had recently bought it
> in a
> foreclosure sale. At the time that he bought it, he was unaware of the
> historical significance. He let me wander through the whole place,
> looking out
> the upstairs window at the walkway, etc.
>
> --
> Grumpy Ol' Fred ci...@xenosoft.com
>
