[BC] RCA Busted Up??

[Rich Wood]

------ At 01:47 PM 12/31/2006, Tom Dimeo wrote: -------

>Wasn't it in the late sixties and between RCA and IBM? Seems
>to me I remember hearing the the resolution was allowing RCA
>to make anything made by IBM except the electric typewriter
>and IBM could make anything made by RCA except a color
>television set.

I think you're thinking of Amdahl. They made IBM compatible 
mainframes for a fraction of the price and better performance. I 
believe IBM tried to restrict their use of software. The Feds 
required IBM to make the source code available to all comers. As I 
recall complaints from businesses that wanted to buy Amdahl machines 
complained it would cost millions to rewrite software in the days 
when almost everything was custom.

I remember wanting to make a small change in ABC's mainframe 
database. I was told the simple addition of a field would cost $20,000.

Rich

Rich Wood
Rich Wood Multimedia
Phone: 413-454-3258