After 18 months of joint development, 3Com Inc and Microsoft Corp have finally begun shipping LAN Manager (CI No 1,033) as part of the 3+Open line, saying it is the first networking product to support both existing MS-DOS and Macintosh applications, as well as new OS/2 based distributed processing systems. Based on OS/2, the LAN […]
After 18 months of joint development, 3Com Inc and Microsoft Corp have finally begun shipping LAN Manager (CI No 1,033) as part of the 3+Open line, saying it is the first networking product to support both existing MS-DOS and Macintosh applications, as well as new OS/2 based distributed processing systems. Based on OS/2, the LAN Manager supports existing MS-DOS users, to whom it claims to offer an improved service over the old MS-DOS-based 3+ system by providing a better user interface. However, despite wide spread reluctance to migrate to OS/2, both companies feel that end users will express little concern over the fact that the machine is OS/2-based, and are optimistic that LAN Manager’s release will encourage a trend towards wider acceptance of OS/2 at the server end; 3Com and distributors alike say that OS/2 is stabilising after its initial traumas and will eventually become an industry standard – they are also keen to stress that the LAN Manager doesn’t mark an attempt to replace MS-DOS; rather than being an OS/2 network, it is being promoted as a network with OS/2. 3Com has also announced early support in the industry for the 3+Open line – DEC will license LAN Manager technology for use on VAXes, while X Open is to publish LAN Manager protocols as part of its X/Open Portability Guide.
