13 Apr
2005
13 Apr
'05
3:52 p.m.
Thank you for following up on it!
... and thank him for his help in clarifying an interesting
item of history.
On Wed, 13 Apr 2005, John Foust wrote:
As he said, we have to ask Bill Gates.
His style is a little ambiguous, but it seems like we could interpret what
he said to mean, The official name is 'Gee Whiz', but if it WERE named
after somebody it would be him.
I would rely more on his memories of it than on Bill Gates' statements.
Remember that in the "Computer Bowl", NOBODY on Bill Gates' team could
remember where the write-protect notch is on 8" diskettes!
(So who DID fish out the tabs that fell off?)
As to the assertion that it was "Gordon", not "Greg", he clarifies
that
Gordon is his brother, so if there is anything to that assertion, then
there may be some family issues involved.
The GW-BASIC name stands for Gee-Whiz BASIC.
So,
which is it? I'm content with the ambiguous summary. It's
history, folks.
... and as good as history gets.
Dr. Whitten also added in a follow-up:
"I also know something about Intecolor 8001 and Compucolor II machines
because I was Director of Software for ISC from 1978-1979. I bought an
ISC 8001 in Jan 77 and worked for them as a consultant in 77 and 78."
Even that paragraph would be less ambiguous if he were to have talked
about "77" BEFORE "77 and 78", and BEFORE "1978-1979".
--
Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com