DOS ain’t done ’till Lotus won’t run
An old story, unreferenced, but I've seen it elsewhere a few times.
It is too bad that magazines like Infoworld cannot (or do not) bring their old material into the World Wide Web. As the debacle unfurled, Infoworld sent an editor to interview the highest guy at Microsoft in charge of DOS. The interview went like this:
IW: "Lotus 1-2-3 is the most popular application running on PCs today. Your new version of DOS does not work with it. Didn't you do any testing?"
MS: "Yes of course we did testing."
IW: "What were the results of your tests?"
MS: "We knew there would be problems."
It was only afterward that the phrase "DOS isn't done until Lotus won't run" was exposed.
In case you didn't live through this history (I did):
Microsoft was a partner in the L.I.M. specification that allowed programs to access extended memory. L.I.M. = Lotus, Intel, and Microsoft.
Microsoft changed Windows and (and through it their new spreadsheet product, Excel) to do LIM access on word boundaries instead of byte boundaries. Then they changed the LIM driver to only work on word boundaries, and to cause a fault in the programs that attempted access on byte boundaries. Super conveniently, they didn't bother to notify Lotus (or Intel) that they implemented a we-are-going-to-break-all-your-programs change to the L.I.M. spec.
They shipped DOS first, and apologized later. Except they didn't apologize. They ran advertisements picturing a jet fighter pilot crash helmet. "Crash proof. Doesn't it make sense to get your applications from the people who make your OS?"
More history: the first time you launched Lotus 1-2-3 in Windows with the new DOS, the dialog box said "This program has violated system integrity. You should reboot to ensure proper operation of the system. If it happens again, consult with your application vendor."
Clearly the blame was pointed at Lotus 1-2-3 by Microsoft in Windows. But what changed?
DOS was finally done when Lotus wouldn't run.
Infoworld also interviewed people at Lotus. Infoworld asked if Lotus was going to sue, and the Lotus person said no, for two reasons. One, that Lotus was still dependent on Microsoft and DOS (reading between the lines, it looked like they were saying they've sabotaged us once already, and could do it again). Two, the lawyers at Lotus asked the engineers about the change, and came to the conclusion that Microsoft would claim they made the change because "it is better". Word boundaries for memory access are easier than byte boundaries.
The evil here is that the change was made with malice aforethought toward Lotus, AND, the notification of the change was withheld from Lotus.
Lotus would probably have agreed that word boundaries were better. The crime was they were denied an opportunity to prepare for the change.
But proving to a judge (and this was before judges were at all tech-savvy) that Microsoft didn't innocently bungle a line of communication or two was not a case the Lotus lawyers thought they could win. The technical argument "it is better" would have to be offset by "no it's not. it is memory wasteful" which in the age of 2MB RAM machines meant something.
As for your claim that people wouldn't buy the new DOS - they didn't. Microsoft slip-streamed the new version of DOS to Hewlett-Packard, Compaq, et. al. They told HP (and everybody) "Here is a new version of DOS. Include it with your new machines instead of the old version of DOS." As the debacle unfurled, HP had to quick issue old versions of DOS to everyone that that got screwed. (I was one of those HP customers at the time).
I realize that you are probably a Microsoft shill that will always attempt to discredit the deliberate damage Microsoft inflicted on it's biggest competitor. Which is why I am going to call you out on it. If you don't want to be called a shill, then you need to not be a shill.
The truth is Microsoft changed DOS and knew it would completely screw over Lotus. They had tested it. They wrote a Windows error message to shift the blame to Lotus 1-2-3.
Frankly, it was a huge dis-service to the whole world that Lotus did not take Microsoft to court. Crime shouldn't pay.
All we can do now is remember that Microsoft cannot be trusted.
Shall I tell you about the FIVE different ways Microsoft wrote / altered programs to screw Novell? And then there is IBM and OS/2. Stac and DoubleSpace. Sun and Java. Netscape and Navigator. There is more....
Microsoft cannot be trusted.
Say it with me again: Microsoft cannot be trusted.