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Comment by asveikau | Hacker News Reader

Less legacy, eh? Well, I guess there has been less emphasis on compatibility throughout the years, but NeXTSTEP is older than Windows NT...

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While I agree with your point, I'm not sure if Windows NT is the correct comparison.

- Windows 1.0 released November 1985 [1]

- NextStep 1.0 releaed September 1988 [2]

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_1.0 2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NeXTSTEP

Windows vista, 7 or 8 are based on Windows NT: they don't have much in common with Windows 1.0.

Just like Mac OS X is a rethinking of Mac OS based on NEXTStep and doesn't have much in common with Mac OS or even system 1.

So yeah, I think the parent's comparison is correct.

I felt NT was an apt comparison because not only is it the basis for the current Windows, it also was their first 32-bit offering, i.e. where stuff got serious. 16-bit Windows was a fairly different beast. 9x was certainly influential but (1) is now dead and (2) came after NT, borrowed lots from NT in the beginning. In light of this, drawing comparisons between 1.0 and Win8 doesn't seem all that appropriate to me.

I see where you are coming from.

I guess my hesitation was caused by the assumption that while windows before NT was all 16 bit / 32 bit hybrid; it's API's are still essentially the same which is what you would care about when re-platting an API.

However I will concede my argument like a true gentlemen, as I now realize the ABI is what we should care about. It is almost certainly different even if the API's haven't fluxed that much, and that is what a re-platt project would most care about.

Wait, how can years be a stronger legacy metric than backward compatibility emphasis?

My point was the legacy is there and it's pretty large, should not be understated. Apple may not care so much about compatibility between releases or with NeXT binaries from 1987 (though I don't think Windows code from '87 works so well on NT either), but the old code is there and if your argument is that sort of thing doesn't help binary compatibility, then that's a problem. I was making my point in shorthand fashion, so I didn't even touch on Mach which is very old as well.

People have this impression that OS X is flashy and new and immune to or not experienced in code rot, and I didn't think it rings all that true.

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