[The Register] World finally ready for USB-bootable OS/2

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eComStation, the Dutch-owned company that offers a PC operating system based on IBM's OS/2, has floated the idea of a USB-bootable version of the OS.

The firm keeps the OS/2 torch burning by offering a PC OS that lets users run OS/2 apps. The outfit claims the likes of Boeing, Whirlpool Corporation and VMware use its software, usually in applications where they can upgrade PCs but still need to run OS/2 code.
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Rest of the article is here : http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/09/14/world_finally_ready_for_usbbootable_os2/
 
The firm keeps the OS/2 torch burning by offering a PC OS that lets users run OS/2 apps. The outfit claims the likes of Boeing, Whirlpool Corporation and VMware use its software, usually in applications where they can upgrade PCs but still need to run OS/2 code.
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Anyone still running OS/2 here in SA?

... IIRC a couple of banks used it back in the day but I don't believe it ever enjoyed a great deal of support here.
 
In the whole of my 20 years in the IT industry, I have seen OS/2 once. But hey, believe it or not there are people out there that still works on Win 98 and thin Ethernet as a company - kid you not.
 
The firm keeps the OS/2 torch burning by offering a PC OS that lets users run OS/2 apps. The outfit claims the likes of Boeing, Whirlpool Corporation and VMware use its software, usually in applications where they can upgrade PCs but still need to run OS/2 code.
Click to expand...

I don't get how a company like Boeing would still "need" to run OS/2 code. From the website it states that Standard Bank is also a customer. So strange.
 
realbigdreamer said:
I don't get how a company like Boeing would still "need" to run OS/2 code. From the website it states that Standard Bank is also a customer. So strange.
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ATM machines. Stable, secure and had crash detection with automatic reboot. Not so strange.

The first PC I bought with my own money in 1994 has OS/2 warp with win OS. Could run windows apps natively backed up by a very stable 32 bit kernel and plug an play features. An app would crash, but the OS would just keep running....indistinguishable from magic in its day. Came preloaded with lotus suite

If you want to make a case study on huge marketing failures, OS2 is a wonderful example
 
Eish. Memories (in protect mode). What many don't realise is that (a remnant of) OS/2 lives on most PCs. Until Win2K finally purged the references, NT up to NT4 was really OS/2 with a Win16 and later Win32 API replacing IBM's Presentation Manager.

SA had one of the highest penetrations of OS/2 in the world. I was personally involved in getting it into UBS, FNB, Std Bank, Volkskas, and all Saswitch-connected ATMs. A different universe.
 
Arthur said:
SA had one of the highest penetrations of OS/2 in the world. I was personally involved in getting it into UBS, FNB, Std Bank, Volkskas, and all Saswitch-connected ATMs. A different universe.
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For me it was NCR ATM's. Did the Diebolds and other ATM's also run OS/2?

And backend was NCR MPRAS Unix
 
my family own a petrol station. The software that connects them to the HO of the petroleum company requires them to run an OS/2 box.
 
imranpanji said:
ATM machines. Stable, secure and had crash detection with automatic reboot. Not so strange.

The first PC I bought with my own money in 1994 has OS/2 warp with win OS. Could run windows apps natively backed up by a very stable 32 bit kernel and plug an play features. An app would crash, but the OS would just keep running....indistinguishable from magic in its day. Came preloaded with lotus suite

If you want to make a case study on huge marketing failures, OS2 is a wonderful example
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Fascinating! Thanks for sharing some thoughts on the subject. On Wikipedia there is an interesting timeline of operating systems. It seems like OS/2 had its final release in December 2001.
 
imranpanji said:
ATM machines. Stable, secure and had crash detection with automatic reboot. Not so strange.

The first PC I bought with my own money in 1994 has OS/2 warp with win OS. Could run windows apps natively backed up by a very stable 32 bit kernel and plug an play features. An app would crash, but the OS would just keep running....indistinguishable from magic in its day. Came preloaded with lotus suite

If you want to make a case study on huge marketing failures, OS2 is a wonderful example
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Nope, their ATMs definitely run Windows. I've taken a few pictures of Standard Bank, ABSA and Nedbank ATMs have crashed - either a BSOD, on the boot menu asking if you want to start Windows normally or in Safe Mode, or an error dialogue over the ATM software.
 
[XC] Oj101;16088236 said:
Nope, their ATMs definitely run Windows. I've taken a few pictures of Standard Bank, ABSA and Nedbank ATMs have crashed - either a BSOD, on the boot menu asking if you want to start Windows normally or in Safe Mode, or an error dialogue over the ATM software.
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Yeah, I know many FNB ATMs run Windows XP today. However there might be some ATMs that run OS/2... I'll see if I can dig up Standard Bank's use for OS/2.

Edit: From what I can tell, Standard Bank has some internal systems that still use OS/2. Looks like the SA banks migrated their ATMs from OS/2 to Windows about ten years ago. Link
 
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OS/2 was a great os, better than windows at the time. They should have opensourced it!
 
ponder said:
OS/2 was a great os, better than windows at the time. They should have opensourced it!
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I agree, they should have.

But the code was also owned by Microsoft, and a goodly portion was brought forward into Windows NT, below the presentation layer. So it was not to be.

What's hobbled Windows since then is Win16/32. Underneath that it's elegant, fast, and stable. Nearly twenty five years later we're finally seeing that byzantine+rococo-on-stilts API set being slowly deprecated in favour of Universal (new name for WinRT) apps.

A month or two ago I finally shredded all my OS/2 diskettes, from early OS/2 1.0 (16-bit GUI-less) betas to OS/2 1.1, 2.0, 2.1 and 3.0 (after the JDA fell apart).

Strange but true: It was billg who persuaded me that OS/2 with Presentation Manager (part of the grand Systems Application Architecture schema) was the Future of Personal Computing, and that DOS+Windows just couldn't cut it.

Then Windows 3.0 happened. And everything changed. It's a long story. And ancient history. I still haven't seen it fully told.
 
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[XC] Oj101;16088236 said:
Nope, their ATMs definitely run Windows. I've taken a few pictures of Standard Bank, ABSA and Nedbank ATMs have crashed - either a BSOD, on the boot menu asking if you want to start Windows normally or in Safe Mode, or an error dialogue over the ATM software.
Click to expand...

Well a while back it was all OS/2 young man. Am well aware that they have changed most of their machines.
 
Arthur said:
SA had one of the highest penetrations of OS/2 in the world. I was personally involved in getting it into UBS, FNB, Std Bank, Volkskas, and all Saswitch-connected ATMs. A different universe.
Click to expand...

Back in the day OS/2 Warp 3 and later Warp 4 was installed on all of ABSA's NCR ATMs. There were much older ATMs that probably ran Warp 2.

Memories of Borland C++ for OS/2 and IBM's C++ for OS/2.
 
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