
Gary Kildall - shawndumas
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Kildall
======
smacktoward
The failure of Digital Research and IBM to reach a deal to bundle CP/M with
the original PC provides one of the great "what-ifs" in computing history.

If that deal had been made, Microsoft wouldn't have gotten the big infusion of
capital that turned it from a niche vendor into the behemoth it eventually
became. Which means Windows, Office, and IE (if they were ever developed at
all!) would have had to compete in the marketplace without MS being able to
use their monopoly over PC operating systems as a lever to boost them up over
the competition. Which in turn means a whole host of products whose names are
just footnotes today -- Netscape, OS/2, GEM, TopView, DESQView, DeskMate,
GEOS, Lotus 1-2-3, WordPerfect, Ami Pro, and on and on and on -- would have
had access to the oxygen that could have turned them into the Next Big Thing.
Oxygen that Microsoft was only able to deny them because of the muscle the
failure of that original deal had given them.

Who knows what the computing world would look like today if that deal had been
reached?

~~~
WalterBright
But CPM/86 WAS shipped for the PC, by IBM. When I bought my IBM PC, I had a
choice of PC-DOS or CPM/86\. I chose the former because it was $40 and the
latter was $180 or something like that.

It was the price that killed CPM/86, as nobody could give a reason why someone
should pay so much more than for PC-DOS.

~~~
vangale
Don't forget UCSD Pascal! (Or maybe we should)

~~~
jpindar
What was so bad about UCSD Pascal?

~~~
WalterBright
S----L-----O-----W

It was basically Java before machines got fast enough to make Java practical.

~~~
nsxwolf
Definitely ahead of its time. For awhile it was possible to run the same
applications on IBM, Apple II, TI-99/4A and more but it was cumbersome and it
never had a "killer app".

It was also difficult to transfer files between disparate platforms in those
days. If there had ever been a p-code applications market, distribution would
have still required separate boxed copies for different platforms.

------
fizixer
Highly recommended (though the Gary Kildall bit is very short):

\- A movie: Pirates of Silicon Valley ([https://youtu.be/BI-
nzUIYIX4](https://youtu.be/BI-nzUIYIX4))

\- A documentary: Triumph of the Nerds
([https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLudrw8Z7-gFa7Is4YZitO...](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLudrw8Z7-gFa7Is4YZitOF7-AfLl2u8IA))

\- Not involving Gary Kildall, but about open source, gnu, and linux:
Revolution OS: ([https://youtu.be/fxjElWL8igo](https://youtu.be/fxjElWL8igo))

~~~
acomjean
I too would highly recommend Trimuph of the Nerds Documentary (That Cringley
Guy is involved in it). Lots of first hand accounts. Plus IBM Carols being
sung!

Triumph of the Nerds has some first person accounts from Jack Sams of IBM and
Bill Gates and Balmer (of the whole IBM/ Digital Research negotiation (or lack
thereoff). Its in part 2 (11 minutes in).

Basically IBM wanting programming languages and an OS from Microsoft. MS
didn't have an OS, so they sent IBM to Digital Research (Gary's Company). The
deal to get CP/M fell through Microsoft said, we'll sell you (IBM) and OS too.
Microsoft then bought the OS from a company across town. That os was basically
adapted from CP/M (the author used the cp manual as a starting point)

~~~
rmason
That's not exactly how it happened. IBM already knew about CP/M because it was
already powering the non-Apple PC market. Knowing IBM's desire for an OS as
well as Basic he sent Steve Balmer across town to license 86-DOS, aka Seatle
DOS which became his offering MSDOS.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/86-DOS](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/86-DOS)

IBM eventually offered three different OS on the original IBM PC but Gates
shrewdly made sure his was the lowest priced one and the rest is history.

~~~
flomo
If I recall the story correctly, there was some confusion because IBM saw
"Microsoft CP/M" running on an Apple II. (MS licensed it from DR and sold it
with their "Z80 SoftCard". The Apple II+SoftCard was supposedly the most
popular CP/M machine.)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulQ4CWBfR_g](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulQ4CWBfR_g)

~~~
frik
Paul Allen (Microsoft co-founder) writes about the Z80 SoftCard and the early
Microsoft history in his book "Idea Man": [http://www.amazon.com/Idea-Man-
Memoir-Cofounder-Microsoft/dp...](http://www.amazon.com/Idea-Man-Memoir-
Cofounder-Microsoft/dp/1591845378/)

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talloaktrees
I love this video Computer Chronicles: Unix (1985) feat. Gary Kildall

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7P16mYDIJw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7P16mYDIJw)

~~~
michaelcampbell
Even today, years after that show has long since ended, talking about tech
that isn't necessarily relevant any more, it is still entertaining and worth
watching for anyone interested in the field or its history.

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rasz_pl
If you want to know how was he IRL I recommend watching Computer chronicles.
Gary Kildall Special:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tdj8gh9GPc4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tdj8gh9GPc4)

Whole playlist of episodes, its like watching non-fiction 'Halt and Catch
Fire':

[https://www.youtube.com/user/ComputerChroniclesYT/playlists?...](https://www.youtube.com/user/ComputerChroniclesYT/playlists?view=1&sort=dd)

------
bane
You can watch many of the Computer Chronicles episodes Kildall was in at the
Internet Archive. They're simply awesome snapshots of the state of the market
at the time.

[https://archive.org/details/computerchronicles](https://archive.org/details/computerchronicles)

And the episode celebrating his life
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVqBokd3l2E](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVqBokd3l2E)

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prestonbriggs
Before CP/M and such, he was a serious compiler guy who made contributions to
data-flow analysis, etc. E.g.,
[http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=512945](http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=512945)

~~~
prestonbriggs
More accessible: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data-
flow_analysis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data-flow_analysis)

------
seltzered
Oddly, I learned about Gary Kildall a few days ago after reading a wired
article about the "Halt and Catch Fire" tv series (
[http://www.wired.com/2014/05/halt-and-catch-
fire/](http://www.wired.com/2014/05/halt-and-catch-fire/) )

"Easter eggs: Gordon and Donna Clarks’ first initials and back story echo
those of Gary and Dorothy Kildall"

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marktangotango
Gordon Eubanks worked with Kildall during this time period, he talks about the
events surrounding the deal with IBM in this oral history. Fascinating stuff:

[http://www.cwhonors.org/archives/histories/Eubanks.pdf](http://www.cwhonors.org/archives/histories/Eubanks.pdf)

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davelnewton
He was one of my childhood programming idols lo those many years ago; cemented
after reading the original Programmers At Work.

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dribnet
If you've ever wondered why newlines are sometimes CR and other times CR+LF, I
think Gary is part of that answer.

~~~
CodeWriter23
It's because on a terminal, CR moved the cursor to the left column and LF
moved the cursor down one line. That was also true for dot matrix printers,
and paper-based terminals like a modded IBM Selectric or the DecWriter.

So if you wanted your file to display properly when type'd to the console or
pip'd to a printer, you needed CR,LF make it work. LF alone would give you
text in a barber pole pattern, and CR alone would give you the last line of a
file on a terminal, or a horrible mess of over strike text on a printer.

~~~
fit2rule
Ah, I remember those days. If someone made the mistake of just using CR alone
in a big file they spooled to the lineprinter, it sometimes quite literally
would halt and catch fire. There was a fire-extinguisher placed next to it for
a reason.

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webreac
It seems that IBM is in bad shape because of a non-disclosure agreement. Maybe
the lesson should be that NDA are bad.

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mappu
The article didn't ever mention the second listed spouse, Karen. Apparently he
underwent a second divorce after beating her with a pool cue <
[http://issorp.com/site/umour/garykildall.htm](http://issorp.com/site/umour/garykildall.htm)
>.

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simplicio
If nothing else, he was certainly one of the best looking of the early micro-
computer pioneers.

