The pivotal importance of IBM's PS/2 range on computers, even today
Not to understate the importance of the PS&#x2F;2, but...<p>To say OS&#x2F;2 failed because it didn&#x27;t run more than one DOS app at a time is not really accurate. Well before Windows 3 (or NT) was established, OS&#x2F;2 had its own app ecosystem and it was very pleasing to use, if you had a fast computer. Early OS&#x2F;2 was meh, but from Warp and on, it was a very nice desktop OS.<p>OS&#x2F;2 died because Microsoft cut deals with all big OEMs where they got Windows almost for free, as long as they didn&#x27;t offer OS&#x2F;2. It didn&#x27;t help that, in order to run Windows software, OS&#x2F;2 needed an expensive Windows license (and an almost full Windows).<p>There were other personal computers with GUI&#x27;s back then as well - the Mac is still with us (well, not really - all current Macs are more NeXT than Mac), but there were Atari&#x27;s and Amigas (and some Ataris and Amigas could run Unix). By then, any 386 with sufficient resources could run X (Sun had the 386i, running Unix and DOS apps side by side).<p>In the end, OS&#x2F;2 failed because Windows had to succeed, and Microsoft made sure it did.