who was first, apple? 2 may 2001 by johnmichael patrick monty monteith

It is quite amusing the emails I receive sometimes. Today, for example, I received an email proclaiming that I was a Windows zealot, and another email claiming I was an Apple lover. I resisted the temptation to forward the emails to each other. The truth is that I am not a fan of either platform, nor of the companies behind the products. Apple Computer's executives strike me as the worst kind of computer snobs, and I highly doubt Microsoft has ever done anything that was not geared toward making money. As you might have understood from my last article, I am doing my share of Microsoft bashing. But as my last reader pointed out to me, this web site has gotten decidedly pro-Apple lately. Time to fix that.

I will admit that Apple's products are some of the hottest things out there right now. Whether it be their new iBook, it's Titanium brother, or the slick OS X, everything at Apple seems to be a piece of art. And I suppose it should come as little surprise that Apple and the fans have been extremely vocal lately. Often saying things that are untrue. While I could write a two hundred-page article refuting every one of them, I am going to just tackle one issue today:

"We were first."

This phrase comes in many forms from Mac users. Whether it be the famous, "WinTel got all of their ideas from the Mac", or the latest, "Windows XP is a copy of OS X". There are a billion variations of these themes, but I think you get the point.

This article is a short list, not all-together complete, of the top fifteen items where Apple was not first. Where Apple played catch-up with the computer industry. A little reality check for Cupertino, if you will.

1. Color
The rest of the computing industry had color years before the Mac. Some had it a decade before. When the Mac was still in Monochrome an Amiga was displaying 4096 colors at once, and with animation. IBM Compatibles could display as much as 256 colors at once. Next time you see some fancy QuickTime color animation, remember that every other computer had it before the Macintosh.

2. Animation
Computer animation is the cornerstone of the Commodore Amiga, not the Macintosh. Amiga was the number one computer for animation before Apple had discovered how to display a fraction the colors of the Amiga, let alone animate it. It was not until the mid-90's (after Commodore went under) that the Amiga finally took a back seat in this field. In fact, professional ray-tracing and computer animation software were available for the lowly WinTel systems before they made any head-way on the Mac. Scary, but true.

3. Pre-Emptive Multitasking
True pre-emptive multitasking is something the Mac did not see until a few weeks ago with the release of OS X. Microsoft had it in Windows since Windows 95 and every operating system there after. The Amiga could do this Mac-elusive trick fifteen years ago in 256K of RAM. That is one quarter a meg of RAM, or five hundred times less RAM than the OS X system requirements.

4. Unix based modern OS
Yes, Linux fans might claim this prize, but the fact is that NeXT and Windows NT really deserve the credit here. Both were modern operating systems that have roots in the Unix world (NeXT more so than NT). And there is no question that NeXT had the most impressive user interface of it's day. Some say it is still the best looking. Regardless, every other major OS player beat Apple to the punch years ago.

5. Taskbar
OS X picked up a number of tricks from Windows, despite what Mac fans would like you to believe. I will not bother rattling them all off, but the biggest thing to hit a graphic OS since the desktop was the Windows task bar, which is now a standard feature in the Mac world. I am certain Bill Gates would not mind a thank-you card.

6. Batch Files
With a Unix base, the Mac finally can do something that the OS has needed for a long time. Batch files. A staple in the Microsoft world since the original version of DOS. Sure, it may not make front page news, but it is a feature that was needed years ago.

7. Video Editing
While you may see Apple commercials touting video editing as though they invented it, the truth is that the Amiga had people creating home movies and doing video editing ten years before. In fact, the Amiga Video Toaster, despite being over a decade old, is still an extremely impressive video-editing tool used by cable television studios to this day. (And, I might add, the cost when the Video Toaster was released, with Amiga, was less than a monochrome Macintosh.)

8. Standardization
While the new, improved, and understanding Apple embraces industry standards, Macintosh roots are quite the opposite. Apple is long known for developing Macintosh ports and peripherals that were different for no reason but to be different. Standardization on hardware and software was a game Apple did not play. It was not until the rest of the computer industry stuffed standards down Apple's throat that they had to obey. Fortunately the Apple of today not only follows standards, but sets some of them. Nonetheless, Apple was last to the standardization party.

9. Emulation
Apple fans are quick to point out just how amazing Macs are because they can emulate a Windows environment and run Windows software. Many speak as though this was an unheard of feat. Reality is that emulation has been around for nearly as long as computers. The very nature of assemblers to machine code is a type of emulation. In fact, the Atari ST and Commodore Amiga had very impressive Macintosh emulators available years ago when purchasing an Amiga and Mac emulator cost less than a new Mac. (And ran faster, too.)

10. CDRW
Every Mac commercial singing the virtues of burning CD's gives me reason to chuckle. Apple did not realize the importance of CD burning until years after it was a standard feature on WinTel computers. This is one area where Apple made a big mistake, and lost enormous numbers of potential customers. They are trying to make up for it now. In spades.

11. DVDRW
Once again - the commercials are nice, but cannot cover up the fact that the hardware was available in the WinTel world years before. Dell would have happily installed a DVDRW drive before Apple even knew what they were, let alone started writing software for them.

12. CLI
Remember all of the Mac user proclamations that the Macintosh would never ever ever ever ever have a command line interface ("DOS" type text command prompt). Welcome to the truly modern OS world, Apple. The CLI is a standard feature in OS X, and long overdue. Fact is that typing commands is more efficient than a mouse, and the geeks of the world have made this feature standard equipment on every modern OS. I suppose I should not bother mentioning this dual CLI / graphic environment was a standard feature on the Amiga, and even the Windows 3.1 operating system.

13. Modern OS Design
Apple would like to think that it invented the 3D modern graphic look, but that is far from the truth. Not only did Windows 95 beat Apple to the 3D punch, but the true leader in this department was NeXT. We cannot overlook that NeXT, the Steve Jobs company, is now part of Apple, any more than Apple fans should overlook that Apple was years behind nearly every other OS vendor in this regard. The newest wave of looks can be seen in OS X and Windows XP, both of which were developed simultaneously. (Apple went to market first only because Microsoft is making certain they actually ship a finished product - drivers and all.) But both companies stole their design ideas from a dozen different OS design examples on the market today. Yes, Apple and Microsoft will make it mainstream - but neither invented the look.

14. OS Online Updates
One of the biggest features of Apple's OS X is the ability to update the operating system through the Internet. No longer will Mac users need to purchase and install every update to fix the problems with the OS. Perhaps the most important feature considering OS X shipped when it was not really completed yet. Funny thing is, this feature has been available in Windows for years. Welcome to the twenty first century, Apple. Next feature on the Apple OS horizon: Online registration verification. What an amazingly original idea.

15. The Macintosh
This really goes without saying, but I will say it anyway. The entire idea behind the Macintosh was 'invented' when Steve Jobs took a look at a graphic user interface that Xerox had invented. Jobs saw the future of computing in that GUI OS and went to work inventing the Macintosh based on that idea. It is noteworthy that the Macintosh graphic operating system did not attain credibility until Microsoft released a graphic user interface of their own a few years later called Windows. Apple sued Microsoft. Xerox sued Apple. Microsoft was the big winner. The rest is, as they say, history.