Looks like 95: With task bar on the bottom, Windows NT is only differentiated by its multitasking ability and memory management shown by the many open applications.

Window of opportunity for suppliers in operating systems

LAS VEGAS -- Windows NT rules.

Having been a Mac man for more than a decade, I have no predisposition to write such a sentence. But after touring the floor of NEXPO '96, I've concluded that Windows NT has the chops to rule the world of servers.

While not yet dominating output like PostScript nor image handling like Adobe Photoshop, Windows NT is moving up fast as the operating system more suppliers are choosing for their servers.

Why Windows NT? For an industrial-strength operating system that didn't exist at the start of this decade, and has received far less hype than the overblown Windows 95, it has come a long way in a short time.

(As a newcomer to the land of Windows NT, I will not list the top 10 reasons why it is better than UNIX or Novell Netware for running a server; I can only report what various suppliers were doing at this year's NEXPO.

(As a Mac pro, I will throw in a few kind words for the new Apple servers that run UNIX, and have a hardware design that will run all the other popular server operating systems.)

When asked about NT, suppliers and resellers alike seemed to chant the same mantra: "Robust interoperability, scalability, ease-of-use, true multipurpose."

Although that doesn't sound much like Allen Ginsberg chanting "om," it seemed to be having a similar hypnotic (or was that calming?) effect on many NEXPO exhibitors.

Well, you do get the multithreading, multitasking, stable and secure environment that systems folk are demanding these days, where euphemisms like "right-sizing" have left such people with a lot more hardware and software to maintain.

There's also the advantage of big iron. Bringing big guns to the "Which OS?" shoot-out are Digital Equipment Corp. of Merrimack, N.H., with the AlphaServer's speed from 64-bit, 266-MHz Alpha chips, and Tandem Computers Inc. of Cupertino, Calif., with its Himalaya series based on Mips R4400, 64-bit 200-MHz chips.

Along about now UNIX aficionados must be thinking, "But UNIX always was able to do these things. The phone system, after all, is just one big networked thing. This upstart Microsoft has been around only since 1975."

Or, as Steve MacKay, vice president of the Solaris products group at SunSoft said in a recent issue of Byte magazine, "NT does not have the reliability and scalability required to run business-critical applications on networked servers that may have hundreds of thousands of users hitting on it every day, which is where we are with Internet-based applications."

That point may be well taken if you are the New York Times with a huge circulation and a World-Wide Web site that may generate more than 100,000 hits a day. But for the average newspaper, NT is plenty reliable and scalable, and the price is right.

Microsoft has embraced the per-seat license concept of the old proprietary systems providers with prices for the software that are affordable for almost any paper shopping for an OS. A 100-seat version of the NT server software costs $3299 per seat, according to information from the Microsoft web site.

With that start, pre-press software and hardware for a 100-seat system could cost less than $500,000.

OK, NT's good, inexpensive and backed by one of the most savvy 800-pound gorillas currently in the business.

But what is it?

Windows NT is a stable, secure 32-bit operating system that can multitask. Its stability and security come from borrowing the good idea Apple had when it introduced the Macintosh in 1984: Let's have some rules that all software should obey.

NT can run "obedient" software from old Windows 3.1 and DOS environments, but since this old software isn't written for the 32-bit operating system, you won't see much of a speed boost, no matter what hardware configuration you have.

For Intel-based and compatible systems, that hardware should be a '386 25-MHz or higher processor (higher is better) and 90 megabytes of available hard-disk space. RISC-based systems should have a RISC processor compatible with Windows NT Server 3.51 (Alpha AXP, Mips Rx400, PowerPC) and at least 120 megabytes of available hard-disk space.

All systems should have at least 16 megabytes of memory, a CD-ROM drive and a VGA, Super VGA or video graphic adapter compatible with Windows NT.

The current version of NT for servers is 3.51. A beta version, 4.0, should be shipping by the end of the year. It will have most of the user-friendly features of Windows 95, although 3.51 already allows clients to attach to several operating systems: MacOS, MS/DOS, OS/2, UNIX, Windows 3.x, Windows for Workgroups, Windows 95 and, of course, Windows NT Workstation (the client version of the NT server software).

Connecting all these operating systems to one powerful, stable bit of server software is a big selling point for newspapers, which these days have a variety of shrink-wrapped applications producing print and web versions of their products. Getting them all easily connected on a speedy network is a big step toward the nirvana of all being connected to a huge and robust multimedia database, where the data can be combined and recombined in various ways to satisfy many wondrous revenue-enhancing needs.

That old pioneer saying, "Give me men to match my mountains," has now turned into end-users crying, "Give me servers to match my software!"

All the most amazing software tricks are no substitute for a good box in which to catch the programmers' lightning. That's why several choice words about servers are necessary.

When you talk servers, you just gotta talk UNIX. It was and is the original, industrial-strength, multitasking operating system that can delve into those big relational Sybase or Oracle databases and come up with reports, data and relationships up the old wazoo.

But getting these UNIX servers up and running is a real chore. UNIX commands resembled no known language, real or imagined, and as different hardware evolved, so did various flavors of UNIX -- perhaps more than Baskin-Robins has flavors of ice cream.

Sun Microsystems and Hewlett-Packard (neither was at NEXPO) have done well in the UNIX server market. A new sprout in the UNIX field was Apple, which was showing features of its two new UNIX servers (which use AIX -- IBM's flavor of UNIX) like new cars at an auto show.

The server was on a pedestal, and the emphasis was on the engineering of the box ... hot-swappable internal drives, hot-swappable power sources -- even hot-swappable fans. Added features include expandability to 256 gigabytes of storage, 512 megabytes of memory, various levels of physical security, a slide-out expandable logic board and an upgradable processor card.

To subtly emphasize the swappability of operating systems, the Aix UNIX for Apple Networks is being sold separately on both models.

Yes, it's a great box, but there's a great box for Windows NT as well.

DEC's Alpha servers are the fastest around, running NT as well as Digital's flavor of UNIX. On display were the newest models, the 4100 series.

The size of a small file cabinet, these servers take full advantage of NT's multithreading, multitasking abilities, as well as the blinding speed that multiple processors running at 300- or 400-MHz can bring to database manipulation -- not to mention 64-bit data paths and up to 4 gigabytes of memory.

While more than 1900 applications for Windows NT are available, not nearly that many are able to run on Alpha servers because of differences in the way the 32-bit data path is handled by the 64-bit Alpha machines.

But that will change. The future for servers in general -- NT in particular -- is NT 4.0, and clustering. Clustering refers to several servers grouped together so that clients see them as one device. DEC now can cluster its Alpha servers running Windows NT; Microsoft will have its own clustering technology for NT by next year.

And a 64-bit version of Windows NT is in the offing.

Right now, the 32-bit NT platform proved most accommodating at NEXPO.

Cybergraphic Inc. of Burlington, Mass., was running its Genera editorial and classified systems on the NT platform. CText Inc. of Ann Arbor, Mich., announced an NT version of its Dateline editorial system, which had been available only in OS/2.

Freedom Systems Integrators of Wichita, Kan., had its Oracle SQL database running under NT. The Javelin store-it-all SQL database from Digital Technology International of Orem, Utah, also knows Windows NT.

All of the circulation management software from Newspaper Technologies Inc. of Calgary, Canada, runs under NT. Harlequin Inc. of Cambridge, Mass., released a new PostScript-compatible NT RIP running on DEC Alpha servers.

There's CanOPI NT from Information Presentation Technologies Inc., one of many OPI (open pre-press interface) server products for Windows NT.

The AdFast.com server for remote classified order entry from Mission Critical Technologies of Concord, Mass., is a Windows NT user.

Hmmm. Maybe this list should be of suppliers who are avoiding NT. But frankly, this is one bus that almost everyone will ride for some part of the trip down Publishing Technology Road.

About the only item NT doesn't have yet is Adobe Type Manager; although it does support Type 1 and TrueType fonts, ATM could get the jaggies out from screen displays. In the meantime, NT fans will have to wait until the end of 1996, or just stick to Windows 95 for the time being.

On balance, Microsoft has done with Windows NT what Apple didn't do with MacOS (or won't until the advent of Copeland -- System 8 -- in 1997):

Gates & Co. stressed true multitasking and made NT connectable to a variety of other operating systems.

When version 4.0 arrives, the circle will close, and NT will have the look and feel of Windows 95. MacOS isn't dead, but likely it will be just another client for NT's server.

And then Windows NT will rule.

-- George Powell

Apple Computer Inc.,
(408) 974-4611;
CText Inc.,
(313) 677-4700;
Cybergraphic Inc.,
(617) 221-0077;
Digital Equipment Corp.,
(603) 884-3706;
Digital Technology International,
(801) 226-2984;
Freedom System Integrators,
(316) 722-8100;
Hewlett-Packard Co.,
(415) 857-1501;
Information Presentation Technologies Inc.,
(805) 541-3000;
Microsoft Corp.,
(206) 882-8080;
Mission Critical Technologies,
(508) 287-0018;
Newspaper Technologies Inc.,
(403) 234-0230;
Sun Microsystems Corp.,
(415) 336-3507;
Tandem Computers Inc.,
(408) 285-6237.

From THE COLE PAPERS, July 1996, Copyright © 1996, All Rights Reserved.