WE LOOKED INTO THE FUTURE...AND IT WAS MURKY
by John Goldie, BOSKUG, June/July 1987

(A conference discussion on CP/M.)

There is an opinion that suggests the Kaypro 2, 4, 10, 1, or 2X
you've grown to know so well might be the end of the line for
CP/M machines.  On the other hand another opinion holds that,
with a little tweaking here, and a new board there, you may be
able to upgrade your old computer into a 80286-80386 class
machine, addressing 16 megabytes of memory, and rampaging along
at 12 MHz.

A panel discussion of CP/M aficionados discussed the past,
present, and future of the venerable operating system at June's
BOSKUG meeting.  The discussion, held in conjunction with the
BCS's CP/M, Commodore, and Osborne groups, really didn't resolve
anything definitive about the future of CP/M, but it did suggest
that there are widely divergent views on the future viability of
eight bit computers.

The participants were Karl Radov of the Osborne group; Bob Freed
of BOSKUG; Gerry Buzzell of the Commodore group and Jim Byram and
Jay Sage, past and present directors of the CP/M group.

THE HISTORY

The way Jim Byram tells it, Gary Kildall, the author of CP/M,
left Intel because the company did not want to develop an
operating system.  In 1976 Kidall's new company Digital Research
developed CP/M, version 1.3.  The operating system was extremely
buggy and it was followed by versions 2.0 and 2.1.  Byram says
2.0 "was a minefield," and that "2.1 came and went in a matter of
weeks."  Version 2.2, the version most of us are familiar with,
arrived in 1979.

The limitations of CP/M were manifold and public domain programs
developed rapidly to extend the utility of the operating system. 
As the microcomputer community grew, public domain programs were
widely distributed along with the original source code and a
standing invitation to tinker with the programs and make them
better.  The cooperative spirit that characterized the eight bit
world was a natural survival technique in microcomputing's
pioneering era; it is rare in the more competitive MS-DOS arena. 
Two things were reiterated throughout the evening.  One was the
cooperative nature of CP/M public domain programmers.  The other
was the fun and approachability of the CP/M operating system.

THE FUTURE

Karl Radov was pessimistic.  He feels that CP/M will eventually
wither because computer users are less often hobbyists and more
frequently business users.  These new users employ complex
application programs and depend on seamless interfaces that
insulate them from the operating system, in which they have no
interest.  In addition, marketing forces, by concentrating on MS-
DOS and Macintosh environments, have inexorably elbowed CP/M
computers out of the mainstream.  

Jay Sage, on the other hand, was less inclined to concede the
passing of CP/M.  Citing figures of 5000 CP/M computers per month
for Ampro's Little Board computers, Sage suggests CP/M sales are
holding their own, especially for industrial applications.  New
and innovative microprocessors like the Hitachi 64180 and the
recently released (but four years late) Zilog Z280 loom
tantalizingly on the horizon.  These microprocessors are capable
of propelling CP/M computers far beyond their current
limitations.

For example, High Tech Research (1135 Pine Street #107, Redding,
CA 96001, 800-446-3220) has announced their Ultraboard, a Z280
replacement of the Kaypro's Z80 chip.  The company claims that it
will run anything that can run on the Z80, but at 12 MHz (and
will sell for under $500).  In software, Sage reports that ZCPR
is evolving toward a Z Operating System (ZOS), capable of taking
advantage of such hardware.

Still, some aspects are undeniably discouraging.  Most panelists
agreed that few new commercial programs, with the exception of
WordStar 4, are being written for CP/M based computers.  Despite
their technological advances, the new eight bit microprocessors
may have arrived too late, and acceptance of them may depend more
upon marketplace forces than upon their computing excellence. 
The more fervent panelists stressed, however, that the hacker
intensity is still alive.  Figuring that this intensity was a
main factor in building the CP/M world, they suggest a similar
commitment might be sufficient to keep it afloat long enough to
begin taking advantage of the new chips.  After that, who knows--
stay tuned.
