User Group Urges IBM To Open OS/2

axonis writes "A report on Tom's Hardware tells of one of the last active OS/2 user groups, which has announced an initiative to garner support for IBM to release its long-neglected OS/2 operating system into the open source community. IBM announced earlier this month that it will withdraw its operating system OS/2 officially from sale on December 23 this year and will offer support only through 2006." From the article: "Making OS/2 Open Source will benefit all IBM customers that had invested in this OS...Customers that are willing to continue using OS/2 will get the benefits of an open OS that will be continuously developed by individual developers and/or software companies, their ownership fees will decrease and they will have the enhanced security of an OS that will continue to be relevant due to the open-ended nature of open source (following the BSD and Linux examples)."

Re:Is IBM is stupid?

[xlr8ed]

The title of you post overflows with irony....

Re:Is IBM is stupid?

[Nom du Keyboard]

IBM can't release the source code. So many non-disclosure agreements

Are you saying that IBM doesn't own OS/2 outright? That doesn't sound like IBM at all.

Re:Is IBM is stupid?

[DoctorPhish]

Yeah, next thing you know someone will start a petition to open source Solaris!

One IBM developer was heard muttering

[Anonymous Coward]

"oh, shit, how are we going to explain that it's just a bunch of cats taped together?"

Aw, come on...

[AtariAmarok]

For example (I admit, I don't know), but does OS/2 support: USB? High End Video Cards? Wireless Networking?"

Aw, come on. No-one really needs anything other than a 25-pin RS-232 serial interface and 16-colour VGA. Wireless networking? Dangerous, man! The waves will cook you. Also, you should really be happy only with a single-speed CD-ROM drive. Anything faster, and the disk melts from the centrifugal force. Cd Burner, yeah right. You really have to pay a lot more in homeowner insurance for that. I won't even touch "firewire", not without asbestos gloves anyway.

Re:Is IBM is stupid?

[EpsCylonB]

U read the RTFA ?

Dude thats cheating !

Re:Is IBM is stupid?

[faqmaster]

Yep. Microsoft "owns" the TCP/IP stack they stole from BSD.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Is IBM is stupid?

[springbox]

Maybe he just forgot to add commas:

The title of you, post, overflows with irony....

Almost makes sense..

Re:OS/2 Info For Fellow Clueless

[m50d]

Maybe you need the wikipedia article on karma whoring [wikipedia.org].

Of course they can't open source it...

[afstanton]

it has SCO code in it!

Re:Is IBM is stupid?

[stoph ct]

Is ironic the most misunderstood word or what ?

It's like rain on your wedding day
It's a free ride when you've already paid
It's the good advice that you just didn't take
Who would've thought... it figures

Some scalawags* back in the 60's...

[hullabalucination]

...had a parody of IBM's semi-famous bumper sticker/desk plaque/poster. It read: "Thimk."

*Scalawags are a subspecies of Sperry-Remington engineer. I'm pretty sure.

Re:The Only Stupid Question...

[anaesthetica]

Yes, just like in Jurassic Park, when they filled in the dino genome with frog DNA, Open Source folks could fill in the OS/2 code with Linux, thus creating OS/2nix (pron. Oh-Ess-Tunics). This idea can't fail!

Re:You're an idiot

[PaxTech]

Are you new here too? It's also the slashdot way to wildly generalize about slashdot posters as though they are a single gigantic hive mind. :D

You're on target with the way you called me names and insulted my intelligence while posting as an AC though, that's definitely also the slashdot way. ;)

Re:The Alanis Morisette effect

[wheany]

That song works so much better when you replace all instances of the word "ironic" with the words "a bummer."

Re:Is IBM is stupid?

[sharkey]

Yeah, right. That's about as likely as Apple switching to the x86 platform.