Today in Tech History – July 27

  

1949 – The first jet-powered airliner, the de Havilland Comet, made its first flight. Previously jet engines had only been used to power small fighter aircraft.

1981 – Microsoft Buys Full Rights to 86-DOS

             About two weeks before IBM begins shipping the first IBM PC, Microsoft buys the full right to the operating system 86-DOS, formerly known as QDOS(Quick and Dirty Operating System), from Seattle Computer Products for $50,000. Microsoft had previously paid $25,000 to SCP for a non-exclusive license in December 1980 in order to begin porting the operating system to the IBM PC, which used the Intel 8088 processor. Microsoft renamed 86-DOS to MS-DOS and licensed it to IBM as PC-DOS.SCP would later sue Microsoft claiming fraud because Microsoft did not reveal IBM as a licensee. The case was settled in SCP’s favor for 1 million dollars, a fraction for the annual revenue Microsoft was receiving from MS-DOS and PC-DOS.

1993 – Windows NT 3.1 released

             Microsoft released another Operating System to focus the business. NT 3.1 was the first release in the NT stood for “N-Ten,” the codename of the Intel i860 XR processor for which NT was initially developed. The NT kernel was different than the Windows 3.x version. It implemented the Win32 API, or 32 bit programming. Windows NT also was for the business. It didn’t push multimedia like it’s home counterpart.

1997 – Computer Could Have Prevented Murder of Fashion Designer

             In an article in the Los Angeles Times, former san Jose Police Chief Joseph McNamara argued that computers could have by Andrews Cunanan. “If the Miami Beach Police Department had computer technology as sophisticated as that used in one of the town’s trendy restaurants,” McNamara wrote, “fashion designer Gianni Versace would probably still be alive.” He noted, however that few police departments have the necessary technology. Police had received information on Cunanan earlier in the week from a pawnbroker, but at the time of Versace’s death, it remained in paper format waiting to be enter into the computer system.

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