NETHERLANDS REPORT


by Reinout van Schouwen
Honselersdijk, Netherlands
r.m.van.schouwen@caiw.nl

Here's my column again. As you may have noticed, sometimes I skip a month (or two) between two reports. That's mostly because I don't always have something to write about. This time however, I have some nice things to share with you.

An encounter with Paul Giangarra

To most of you, the name Paul Giangarra will be unknown, or perhaps it will vaguely ring a bell: you may have seen this name before in the Who's Who of OS/2 section. No, you don't have to click, I'll tell you right now to whom this name belongs: Paul is the lead developer of OS/2! And the reason that I am mentioning him here, is that back in June (I can't recall the exact date) he visited The Netherlands. It was a work related visit, but he was so kind to make some time free to give a lecture on OS/2, Java and Network computing!

On short notice, the Holland User Group OS/2 arranged a location, and everybody who was interested could attend for free. Relatively many people came to the congress center that night including myself (of course). If you look at the audience, you can spot me a little right of the middle, second row, next to the guy with the glass in his hand. And this is Paul himself. At Mensys' web site, you can find two other pictures that were taken that evening.

Paul had brought his ThinkPad with him ("his only computer", as he said!), which he connected to an overhead projector. One of the first things he started to talk about, was how firmly IBM stands behind OS/2. Because 50% of IBM's total revenue comes from customers who (amongst other products) buy OS/2, they feel that its important to keep those customers happy. Many OS/2 customers are banks, and - in my personal opinion - unfortunately for the end-users, the latest multimedia features in OS/2 aren't what the average bank cares about. However, it does also mean that IBM is very serious about Java on OS/2: It offers their big customers a way to keep their existing OS/2 applications running, while at the same time allowing them to build and use applications with the latest technology. Paul even told us that IBM is gradually trying to replace the existing OS/2 API with the Java API!

He went on about Bluebird, the next version of OS/2 which is due this year. In fact, Bluebird is nothing more than a repackaged OS/2, which can be a server and a client at the same time. This way it becomes easier to manage.

Next to showing the audience how his group made a German bank happy with a Java applet that calculates custom loans, and creating an animation with Lotus BeanMachine right before our eyes, Paul told us several anecdotes. One was about BeanMachine, which is 100% pure Java, but in an act of utter stupidity is packaged as a Win32-only archive. In the middle of a trade show, he found a guy from Lotus, and with his help he got the program to work on OS/2. The Lotus guy was astonished that this was possible!

Another anecdote was about the PC Company. As we all know, this division of IBM is quite fond of Win95. Whenever they (the PC Co.) have a new ThinkPad model, they send Lou Gerstner (IBM's CEO) a sample for free. However, Lou himself uses Warp as his desktop OS. But, he has an assistant who takes care of trivial issues like replacing the pre-loaded Win95 with OS/2. One day, this assistant got fed up with removing Win95 each time, and gave Lou the ThinkPad the way it was delivered. When Lou fired up his new ThinkPad, he was amazed and asked "What's this? Where's my OS/2?" His assistant told him, "Well, this is the way they come!". Next day, Lou had executives from the PC Company in his office. Since that moment, support for OS/2 on IBM PC's has been a lot better than it was before...

After the lecture, I shook hands with Paul, and a little group of people stayed to talk to him. I specifically asked about OS/2's font rendering engine, which, unlike many other OS', doesn't have anti-aliasing. This problem also affects Java applications, which should make it especially important for IBM to improve this. Paul's reply was that they know they still have some work to do in that area, and that there may be something going on in that area, but he didn't give a conclusive statement about when or even if to expect this feature.

All in all, I can look back on a exciting evening. My impression is that Paul is a witty and friendly person, and that OS/2 development is in good hands with him.

I write articles, too

If you have visited Warp City's web site recently, you will probably know that they have a review of Truespectra Photo>Graphics authored by me. This came as a kind of coincidence, because I had written this review earlier for pc-active, the Dutch magazine I work for (next to my study). After SPG's sudden abandonment of the OS/2 market, Warp City wanted as much information as possible on alternatives for ColorWorks. One of Warp City's contributors, Gerben Bergman, knew of my article and asked me if it was alright to translate it and publish it on Warp City.

So now you know the "story" behind the Photo>Graphics story on Warp City. Inspired by IBM's enthusiasm about Java, I have also written a background article on Java for the pc-active. Who knows who is going to re-publish this piece... just kidding!

That's it for now. I wouldn't count on a Report from me next month, because I'm moving next week, and I have some exams to make in August. Keep your fingers crossed for me please...

Please do not hesitate to send me any news and information pertaining to the Netherlands you would like mentioned in this column.

- Reinout van Schouwen


Reinout van Schouwen is a student in the Netherlands and is interested in Artificial Intelligence. He started using OS/2 in November 1994 and became an active Team OS/2 member a few months later.