HTML-based OS?

By SKillBot March 16, 2000 2:44 PM

(CP) This is one of the most confused articles I've seen in months, but it's interesting enough to mention.?AltaVista, the search engine company, has announced their completely web-based operating system which will "go head-to-head with the Mac OS and Windows." The point of it is to simplify web development.?With it, you can magically write a 5,000 line ecommerce program in 50 lines.?And how exactly does it work? This kind of focus on the Web cannot be accomplished with conventional operating systems since they are hardware-centric, not Web-centric. (sarcasm) I hate how my operating systems are so focused on my hardware! The OS software called Aestiva is available for many platforms, including Linux, Windows, MacOS7-9 and MacOSX for $799.?I would think it needs to be independant of an underlying OS before it can really compete with one, though.?

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That is way cool   reply

Posted by Jack (jack@dtheatre.com) on March 16, 2000 2:11 PM

I like that idea..

RE: That is NOT way cool   reply

Posted by Acheron (denny@dtheatre.com) on March 16, 2000 2:46 PM

I think the idea sucks!!!

What This Thing Really Is   reply

Posted by A random shemp (No Email) on March 17, 2000 8:19 AM

Actually, this isn't really an OS, more of a web-server add-on. It does have it's advantages, though. Like CGI, it is cross-platform (since all it requires is a CGI 1.1 compliant web server). But, like Active Server Pages or Cold Fusion, it uses proprietary BASIC-like tags to do coding. Unlike these, though, it uses a built-in database and you do your development through a web-browser, with no need for a client installed. Several larger sites ae using it already. It sounds like an interesting product... at least in theory. 
CritterNYC