OS/2 e-Zine! - Confessions Of A British Warp User

Confessions Of A British Warp User

- by Tim Walker

You think YOU'VE got it bad??!?!

I can just about hear the questions already. What's so different about using OS/2 Warp in the UK, you ask, that I get given 1500 words to explain it? Well, I hope by the end of this article your curiosity on that front will be thoroughly satisfied, and that what I have to relate will help you OS/2 enthusiasts in the US feel that maybe, just maybe, you don't have it too bad.

To begin with, an introduction. I've been using OS/2 Warp (Red Box, 3.5" disk) since December 1994, when I took advantage of a special student offer (I was studying for a diploma in publishing at the time). Like most of you, I suspect, I was a convert from Windows 3.1, attracted by the promise of long filenames and a single operating system capable of running all my DOS, Windows and (later) OS/2 apps in a stable multitasking environment. Things have never been quite that simple, of course, but then in the world of computing, things rarely are. . .

In the intervening months, I've upgraded from 4 to 8Mb RAM (the first thing I did after Warp was installed, not surprisingly), bought a CD-ROM drive (wish I'd had one earlier, so I could install from CD) and found myself work in electronic publishing. And all the while I've stuck with OS/2 Warp, despite the occasional bout of asking myself why in the face of assorted hassles and. . . well, you'll soon hear what else.

So, what makes being a British Warp user (and, most days, enthusiast), shall we say, less than absolutely peachy? Well, where would you like to begin? Software? OK, there's a great mail order retailer in Bristol, who stocks practically every commercial OS/2 application in existence. And. . . and. . . er, you guessed it. OS/2 software is as hard to find in Britain as a VRML browser for an Amstrad word processor. You're lucky even to find Red Box Warp in most software stocklists, usually on the bottom shelf beneath all the Windows stuff. No wonder the myth persists that OS/2 Warp has no native software.

Magazines? Pray, what magazines? There's not one dedicated OS/2 monthly to be found in even the larger UK newsagents, and if any fellow Brits reading this know where to get OS/2 Magazine via import, I'd love to hear about it. Granted, some of the serious computer monthlies give Warp some coverage (two actually devote regular columns to it--you know who you are, and many thanks), but most view OS/2 as a curiosity, fine for a few corporations but an also-ran in the race for the home desktop. To see the obsequious fashion in which most British PC magazines have been falling over themselves to welcome Windows 95 and ignore a genuine 32-bit OS, makes a grim spectacle indeed.

If that's not bad enough, there's the knowledge that if you encounter a problem with OS/2, there's little point writing to the magazines' help pages, because nine times out of ten you can bet your last penny there'll be no-one there who knows a thing about it. "OS/2 Warp. . . oh, yes. Didn't we spend two hours testing it for a review last year? Oh, let's tell him to get Windows 95 instead. Anyone for a Doom DeathMatch?"

This is the thin end of the wedge. I must admit Kevin Linfield's recent OS/2 e-Zine! article on "RTFM" (issue #3) got my hackles up a touch, because, with all due respect to the author, he's writing from a country where an OS/2 user at least stands a chance of meeting another, and support is far more widespread. In the UK, at least as I see it, if you run into system difficulties, you're on your own, mate. "Read The (Fine) Manual". Manual? Oh, you must mean that 70-page booklet that came in the box. Yes, very handy. (Tell me, Kevin, where's the 400-page one you mention?) "Get help from friends." I wish. I am the only OS/2 user I know personally. Full stop. Few other computing friends even know about the system, beyond some vague idea I use this weird OS. "Use the IBM support. . ." perhaps a reference to the support which ran out nine months ago, costs 45 pounds a year and always told me to reinstall (if I was fortunate enough to get through in the first place). "Join a user group." Well, if a British reader knows of an OS/2 group and/or BBS in the London area, I'm interested.

So, let's recap: Almost no native software on shelves. Little magazine coverage. Negative image. Few sources of help when problems arise. So what's kept me going all this time?

Deep breath: the Internet. Without the Web and other resources to call on, I'd probably be struggling with Windows 95 by now. I would never have heard of Stardock, or the brilliant Object Desktop. I wouldn't have a single shareware app, game or anything. In short, I have the Net and the OS/2 community on it (including, e-Zine!) to thank for keeping my head above water. (At this point, I should thank Faheem Ahmed, creator of the sadly-missed "Get Warped" site, for helping me through the tough early months, and his advice on various Warp-related matters. You're a lifesaver!)

I still have problems with Warp, and could fill up an entire article with questions I have about it. Why do I keep getting a "Forms Mismatch" problem every time I print from the menu bar of an application? Should my OS2.INI file be 750K? How do I "tune my system"? Why do system sounds often play 5-10 seconds late? Why on earth does a command prompt window appear when I open a .DOC or .TXT object? And they're just the ones I can think of offhand. Believe me, I'd like nothing better than to ask a friend how I fix these problems, only. . . you get the idea.

So, you still want to know why I haven't gone the Win 95 route by now. Quite simply, OS/2 is potentially a system capable of blowing Bill Gates' latest effort clean out of the arena. Note I said potentially. Let's be honest: Win 95's multimedia support, especially video, does rather outshine Warp's (at least, video's pretty awful on my 8Mb 486DX2-50, and you don't get the sound-lag problem with Win 95), and some kind of autoplay function might be appreciated in the next OS/2 release. I mean, if Win 95 can autostart CDs, based as it is on antiquated DOS technology, why can't OS/2?

And, I must admit, I tend to side with the underdog in a debate. It's a bit of an English characteristic, I suspect. Besides, I don't see why Microsoft should be allowed to single-handedly direct the entire course of personal computing (one reason I'm so fed up with the UK magazines feebly rolling over and letting the Redmond Roadshow make all the running). In terms of fundamental technology, OS/2 is the superior system, and furthermore it stands a good chance of being ported to the PowerPC platform (Win 95 being a simple stopgap until--Gates hopes--we all have PC's up to running NT).

So, that's an idea of what it's like for me, going against the flow and using OS/2 Warp in the UK, despite the world and his whippet trying to persuade me the battle's already lost. Please do feed back on what I've said, whether you want to help, condole, tell me it's the same for you, disagree or simply tell me to stop whining and get on with life! At least that way, I won't feel quite so alone. :-)

Tim Walker is based near London, and works in electronic media (on-line and CD-ROM) for a major publisher of journals. He uses OS/2 at home, and hopes to have his own home page up before long.

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