kurt@tc.fluke.COM (Kurt Guntheroth) (12/24/87)
Does multitasking have any advantage over TSR desk accessories, interrput controlled print spoolers, carousels of programs, etc? Of course. Ever try to write a TSR application? AARRGGHH! On the Amiga there must be a hundred different little clock programs, and how many of you can say you never use one of them? Same thing goes for screen blankers and terminal programs. Sure, most of the time I'm doing only one thing. Or am I? The disk is working in the background, validating disk writes underneath other free time like when my application is waiting for it's next keypress or mouse move. That is a major hassle to program without multitasking; you wait for the disk to validate, or do without validation. That game I'm playing does vector calculations while the blitter is drawing vectors. Most of this advantage comes from hardware multitasking, but you use the same synchronization tools as you would for software multitasking, so it's nice to have them in the OS. Whether your amiga program LOOKS like one thread of control or not, chances are pretty good that it's multitasking somewhere. It is far easier to write multitasking programs than it is to simulate multiple control thread programs on a single-tasking OS. This translates to the user as lower cost software that is available sooner, and a higher quality library of PD programs. If multitasking is such a lose, why is Atari trying to do a unix workstation, along with Apple, IBM, Commodore, and everybody else? Why is OS/2 such a big noise? Why buy 386's? Get with the world.