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Overall summary on Apple Rhapsody:
A User Overview

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After 4 reports of my initial tests with the various components of the first developer release for Apple Rhapsody, I would like to summarize how things come together overall. I hope to unify the 4 reports to present the bottom line. My aim is to strike a balance between ordinary users and programmers, so the discussion is simplistic. Please pass this along as appropriate.

Much of this (including figures) is taken from slides from an 8700 Center Seminar I gave on December 17, 1997, and includes new results over the last few weeks. In that seminar, the slides showed mostly Wintel screen shots, and I used a Power Mac for live demo purposes.

• Rhapsody Blue Box (HTML)
• Rhapsody Blue Box (MS Word)
  

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• Yellow Box for Windows (HTML)
• Yellow Box for Windows (MS Word)

• What it is, and what it is not
• General Structure

II. WHAT IS UNIQUE ABOUT RHAPSODY?

• The Blue Box--Mac OS compatibility
• Yellow Box--The Development Platform
• Application Deployment--Mac OS/Windows/UNIX
• Java

III. WHAT IS THE ADVANTAGE OF RHAPSODY?

• Developers
• Users

IV. THE OVERALL PICTURE

• The Rhapsody Package
• Power Mac versus PC Compatibles
• Rhapsody versus other cross-platform alternatives
• Conclusions

I. WHAT IS RHAPSODY?

WHAT RHAPSODY IS NOT:

• It is NOT an immediate replacement for Mac OS 8 and 9.
• It is NOT Copland or Gershwin--early code names for Mac OS 8 and 9.
• It is NOT a new code name for Mac OS 9. The Mac OS 9 code name is Allegro.
• It is NOT a new code name for BeOS, from Be Software, Inc. BeOS is not involved.
• It is NOT just another OS peculiar to Apple hardware.

WHAT RHAPSODY IS:

• It IS a computing/development/deployment architecture which includes an OS, rather than just another OS.
• It IS the eventual successor to Mac OS. Provides clear upgrade path, while retaining strong back compatability.
• It IS designed for heterogeneous networks.
• It IS designed with enterprise computing in mind.
• It IS based on OpenStep from NeXT (commercial grade code). OpenStep is well tested and well regarded.
• It IS NO more proprietary than Windows (3.1, 3.11, 95, 98, NT 4, NT 5, CE) code.

OVERALL STRUCTURE :

The general schematic of Rhapsody is given in the following 2 figures. There are several critical points to note:

• The complete Rhapsody package has 5 principal parts: Mac OS (Blue Box), Yellow Box, Core OS, Advanced Mac look-and-feel, and hardware. Design-wise the components are largely independent of each other. Thus component mix-and-match is possible, and the Yellow Box/Java component can be hosted on different operating systems.
• Rhapsody will operate on PowerPC or Intel style hardware.
• Core OS is Berkeley Unix 4.4 (BSD 4.4) with the Mach microkernel. All UNIX advantages are present: pre-emptive multitasking, memory protection, multiuser access, password protection, etc.
• The advanced Mac look and feel is the same, whether on PowerPC or Intel.
• Blue Box (Mac OS compatability environment) is only available when using PowerPC hardware. Apple continues to improve the current Mac OS, and will increase the ability of Mac OS to utilize the core OS of Rhapsody. Please see the report on the Blue Box beta for more details.
• The Yellow Box is a set of cross-platform object-oriented development application programmer interfaces (API). It is derived from OpenStep (from NeXT) and includes existing OpenStep technologies, many of the Apple technologies which distinguish the Mac, and other industry standards and technologies (e.g. Java).

II. WHAT IS UNIQUE ABOUT RHAPSODY?

So far this sounds like another flavor of UNIX with development tools which is incompatible with most everything else. This is true if one associates a particular operating system with particular hardware. But this is not true in the case of Rhapsody. The primary reasons for this are the Blue Box and the Yellow Box. The Yellow Box is the strategic component since its original design is nearly totally hardware and operating system independent.

THE BLUE BOX--THE MAC OS COMPATIBILITY ENVIRONMENT

The Blue Box is a complete process image (can be modified like any Mac OS System folder) of the Mac OS, starting with Mac OS 8. It operates with the rest of the Rhapsody system, and provides a seamless upgrade path for current Mac OS users. Blue Box is part of Rhapsody for PowerPC, since Mac OS has dependencies on PowerPC/680X0. This is like DOS, Windows 3.1/95/98, and (to a lesser extent) Windows NT being dependent on Intel 80X86.

When running Blue Box, it is basically impossible to tell the difference between running Blue box and standalone Mac OS--and that is the point! From a user standpoint, you are working on a Macintosh. Thus current Mac OS users can leverage the vast majority of their existing equipment and software to do critical work today. Mac OS users are not automatically forced to upgrade existing hardware and software.

Since the Blue box is a direct image of the current Mac OS, as Apple improves Mac OS, the Blue box will simultaneously improve as well. Right now we are looking at Mac OS 8.1 (minor update) around January, and a major update (code-named Allegro) at the end of summer 1998--tentatively called Mac OS 9.

Mac OS About Box; after Blue Box beta install, and double-click various applications.

YELLOW BOX--THE DEVELOPMENT PLATFORM

The components of the Yellow Box are shown in the following 2 figures. The first shows the capabilities of the Yellow Box, while the second shows some (but not all) of the various technologies which make up the Yellow Box.

• Yellow Box is a superset of the OpenStep frameworks, and includes many of the Apple technologies which distinguish the Mac--color management, true plug-and-play, QuickTime Media Layer, AppleScript, and AppleEvents to name a few.
• Yellow Box frameworks support a variety of widely used cross-platform technologies such as CORBA, Java, COM, databases, the World Wide Web, etc.
• Yellow Box includes the Display PostScript imaging model, which is the same PostScript used in printers, imagsetters, and typesetters.

The POWER of the Yellow Box is that the design does NOT explicitly require a specific hardware design, operating system, or user interface. As OpenStep, it already runs today on Intel (Mach, Windows NT), SPARC (Solaris) and PA-RISC (HP-UX). As Rhapsody, it runs on PowerPC (Mach, Mac OS), Intel (Mach, Windows 95/NT), and SPARC (Solaris) and PA-RISC (HP-UX)--with help from Sun and HP. OpenStep on Windows shipped commercially in 1994.

As an example, the following figure shows the program called Interface Builder running on Windows 95/NT using the Yellow Box for Windows 95/NT component of the Rhapsody Developer Release for PC Compatibles. Interface Builder is a programming tool used to build Rhapsody applications, and was originally written for the Rhapsody environment (running on Mach). The figure shows some very simple program building in progress. Note that in the figure Interface Builder looks-and-feels like a Windows program, but the construction of menus (lower right) is Mac-like! So I am developing within Windows 95/NT, but creating programs that run on Windows 95/NT, Rhapsody, Mac OS, and Mach! I am not tied to writing explicitly for Windows 95/NT!

Interface Builder running on Windows 95/NT

YELLOW BOX APPLICATION DEPLOYMENT--MAC OS, WINDOWS, UNIX:

The Yellow Box is a key differentiator of Rhapsody compared to other environments. The independence from hardware, operating systems, and user interfaces allows the Yellow Box to be deployed on various platforms. Two targeted platforms are shown in the next 2 figures.

Yellow box deployment prefers a 32-bit or greater memory model. For Wintel, one must use at least Windows 95. Windows 3.1, 3.11 do not qualify, and the vast majority of Windows programs are still 16-bit. Windows 95 is not a 32-bit operating system, but does understand the same 32-bit memory model as Windows NT. Mac OS has been 32-bit for almost 10 years now. UNIX has been 32-bit for some time, and now moving to 64-bit.

Applications utilizing the Yellow Box are available to all desktop users. Applications retain full functionality, and adopt the look-and-feel of the host operating system.
Users do not have to get retrained on new operating systems in order to use the software. Contrary to popular perception; Windows is NOT a Mac, and vice-versa.
Users can still use their existing software for critical functions they need to do. Users are not being forced to do wholesale upgrades of software and hardware.
The Yellow Box includes the Display PostScript imaging model, which is the same PostScript used in printers, imagsetters, and typesetters.

Rhapsody Draw program running on Windows 95/NT

JAVA:

The previous figures imply that the Yellow Box and Java are linked. Java has been touted as a solution for write-once, deploy anywhere software. The Yellow Box has been made completely accessible to Java-based programs. This gives Java programmers access to the maturity and power of the Yellow Box, along with automatic cross-platform deployment capability. One of Java�s current limitations is that it is still rather inmature as a development and deployment platform. By opening up the Yellow Box to Java, Java developers get full access to all the advanced development and deployment capabilities of the Yellow Box.

III. WHAT IS THE ADVANTAGE OF RHAPSODY?

DEVELOPER BENEFITS

• Possible for the vast majority of code (if not all) to be common across all significant desktop platforms today. This is in contrast to many current tools which are particular to a given platform, thus necessitating multiple code sets. Now developers can focus on the program, and know that they automatically have cross-platform deployment. Just recompile for whatever platform you are targeting.
• Because developers work from one (or nearly one) set of code, applications have better code and file compatibility across platforms.
• Application runs native and runs as expected for each targeted platform.
• Great deal of functionality already built into the Yellow Box for fonts, imaging, etc. This is all free to developers, so you do not have to constantly write the same code repeatedly.
• Developers can focus on creating robust and truly useful software. Less reliance on specific operating system vendors, and emphasize on what customers really need.
• Since software and hardware are separated, developers can create applications that tie into data located on just about any type of hardware (mainframes, minis, etc). This is critical for heterogeneous enterprise computing.

USER BENEFITS

• choice to use hardware systems which best does their job--whether as a new purchase, or utilizing existing equipment.
• developers can quickly get versions of programs to run on user�s platform of choice.
• file compatability should be much easier to attain since programs are compose principally of one set of code.
• leverage their existing and legacy systems, and be able to upgrade software and hardware when it makes sense to do so.
• applications run as users expect to see them. Thus programs Rhapsody OS have the advanced Mac look, on Mac OS look like Mac programs, same for the Windows..... Training costs are kept under control.
• programs retain functionality regardless of the platform. An example is Display PostScript. The Rhapsody program has the look and feel of Mac OS or Windows, but still retains full PostScript functions. Non-Yellow box applications work as always.
• continue to leverage any existing software on their preferred hardware that is critical for performing their jobs today.
• when the host OS is BSD 4.4/Mach, users can bypass the Yellow Box and just use the system as a UNIX workstation. There are definitely things the UNIX shell does very well. However, using the shell is strictly the users CHOICE.
• when the host OS is BSD 4.4/Mach, users can bypass the Yellow Box and just use the system as a UNIX workstation. There are definitely things the UNIX shell does very well. However, using the shell is strictly the users CHOICE.

SOFTWARE AVAILABILITY

There is definitely quite a bit of software that will run on Rhapsody today:

• Current Mac OS software via the Blue Box.
• Because the core OS is BSD UNIX 4.4, any software that runs on BSD 4.4 runs on Rhapsody--you just may need to use the UNIX shell.
• OpenStep applications run on Rhapsody. There are quite a few programs which are full content creation programs analogous to Office, Ilustrator, PageMaker, cc:Mail, etc.
• Initial developer reaction to Rhapsody DR1 positive
  • OpenStep developers
  • Adobe has committed to trying it.
  • Id Software (Quake, DOOM) is seriously considering it as platform of choice. Quake is already ported to Rhapsody. Id Software is big in the PC game market.
  • UNIX developers have access to all standard UNIX tools.
• Because of the cross-platform deployment capability of Rhapsody, software which may be developed with the PC market in mind is automatically available for people in the Mac and UNIX worlds. Better yet, they do not run crippled--like Microsoft Office 95 for Mac.

IV. THE OVERALL PICTURE

THE RHAPSODY PACKAGE

• get up to 3 complete and mature OS in 1 package: Mac OS, OpenStep, and UNIX.
• close to 100% compatibility for existing Mac programs.
• full Java platform. Full Yellow box frameworks access to Java.
• superior object-oriented environment for rapid application development. Great tools for enterprise and distributed computing, and web development.
• cross-platform development and deployment strategy.
• full BSD 4.4 UNIX distribution. Includes BSD command line shells, utilities, POSIX libraries, programming tools, and other UNIX amenities.
• all major UNIX utilities, servers, and applications been ported to BSD UNIX and will run without change in Rhapsody.

POWER MAC VERSUS PC COMPATIBLES

Why continue to buy PowerPC hardware?

• Blue box for running Mac OS software.
• Better unity of hardware and software--true plug and play
• Lower maintenance costs, higher return-on-investment
• Better performance--especially with the now shipping G3 systems.
• More stable and reliable with system software upgrades. Windows NT 4 is 16 million lines of code, and NT 5 is 28 million lines of code-- who knows how many service packs are needed. These are Microsoft advertised numbers. Rhapsody is about 6 million lines of code, with about 40 thousand for the core OS.
• User needs and/or preferences
• Access to full Rhapsody package on PowerPC. Run multiple operating environments from one box.
• Due to plethora of PC hardware possibilities:
  • doubtful Rhapsody for Intel will have the same plug-and-play benefits as Power PC
  • reduced hardware and software integration as Rhapsody for PowerPC.

RHAPSODY VERSUS OTHER CROSS-PLATFORM ALTERNATIVES

• Developers who use Yellow Box and no platform-specific features can write programs once and deploy everywhere on 100% of the modern PC market!
• Commercial cross-platform development products, but expensive and not as advanced and rich as OpenStep.
• OpenStep superior to the current major alternatives for cross-platform development, although 100% pure Java is closest reasonable contender.
• Java is an immature technology. AWT and IFC frameworks not nearly as good as OpenStep. Java applets/applications are interpreted.
• Web CGI gateways and server plug-ins OK for simple tasks, but very limited. Human interfaces abysmal, even with help of Java applets.

CONCLUSIONS

I hope this has helped in understanding the potential that Apple Rhapsody provides, both as an architecture and as an operating environment. Judging from the media, there is still a lot of confusion over what Rhapsody is.

I will be available to keep people updated on any major new developments and releases, and whatever results I come up with as I am beta-testing the software.

Sincerely,

Larry Peng
Org 8713
510-294-2402