Plan Be (1997)

Plan Be (1997)

Author: Derek February 12, 2024 Duration: 28:39

Original text by Henry Bortman and Jeff Pittelkau, MacUser, January 1997.

How does BeOS measure up to System 7.5, and could it have become the next-generation Mac OS? The authors examine why Copland would not have been the crashproof operating system we had all hoped for.

Official BeOS demo video from … I’ll have to guess 1998, the year the x86 port of BeOS shipped. An extremely rudimentary port of Cinema 4D is shown. Maxon appears to have dropped all plans to complete their BeOS port of Cinema 4D after Be decided to focus on the Internet appliance market in late 1999.

BeOS demo video intro music: Virtual (void) Remix from the Cotton Squares, a.k.a. Be Engineering. BeOS, it’s The OS. More on the Cotton Squares. Standing In The Death Car!

AFAIK a pure software multitrack digital audio recording and editing suite never shipped for the BeOS. Otari’s RADAR doesn’t count since that was a hardware/software bundle, and an expensive one at that. Second version. If you can find a DAW for BeOS that was available in 2000 right before everything imploded, I’d like to hear from you. :-) I have a sample track from one but I don’t think it was ever published. GrooveMachine doesn’t count since it’s geared towards short samples and phrases. BeBits lists Qua as a hard disk recorder, but the author’s website states its audio functionality is also centered on short samples.

Printing support was not a priority for BeOS. Hey, this was supposed to be an OS for the multimedia future, not dead tree prepress! I tried the third-party BInkjet printer support package with a DeskJet 680C and it worked well.

Nitin Ganatra of iOS Contacts and Mail.app fame worked in Apple Developer Technical Support through the 1990s. He talked about working with developers and the perils of letting Apple marketing loose on Copland in the Debug podcast, episode 39.


The Cotton Squares/BeOS Demo Video: Where Are They Now?

Baron Arnold: Danger (early 2000s, now: ???)

Frank Boosman: AWS

Jeff Bush: ???

Jean-Louis Gassée: The Monday Note, Grateful Geek

Ficus Kirkpatrick: Google, Meta

Scott Paterson: making the world a better place

Doug Wright: ???


Derek hosts Mac Folklore Radio, a podcast that serves as a warm, nostalgic conversation about the machines that defined personal computing for a generation. This isn't a dry technical history, but rather a collection of stories, memories, and shared experiences centered on the Macintosh ecosystem from its early beige-box days through the colorful iMac era and beyond. Each episode feels like digging through a box of old software manuals and rediscovering the community, the quirks, and the sheer sense of possibility those computers inspired. You'll hear tales of first setups, beloved and baffling peripherals, the games that consumed hours, and the software that felt like magic. It's crafted specifically for those who lived through it-the users, tinkerers, and enthusiasts who remember the hum of a CRT and the distinct scent of a warm motherboard. Tune in for a dose of genuine, fond reminiscence that functions as comfort food for the Apple-centric soul, preserving the personal side of tech history one story at a time. This podcast is a love letter to the culture built around these machines, celebrating the folklore that official manuals never recorded.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Mac Folklore Radio
Podcast Episodes
John Calhoun on Casady and Greene (2024) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 10:35
Original text by John Calhoun. MacScene’s interview with John re: The History of Glider. Part 1, Part 2. Mr. Advisador for the Newton has been revived! Told you it was creepy. Original Newton version. The Computer Chroni…
Charles Piller: Is Apple Serious About Macintosh Clones? (1995) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 40:03
Actions speak louder than words: a look at Apple’s extremely quiet Mac OS licensing program. Original text by Charles Piller. Macworld Boston 1994, Tim Bajarin: Apple has to either start licensing, or lower their prices.…
Jim Black on John Carmack and Steve Jobs (2018) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 11:21
Original text by Jim Black. Previous John Carmack episode: The Steve Jobs Rollercoaster. Peter Graffagnino’s appearance at NeXTEVNT 2015. Peter is interviewed by fellow Pixar veteran Michael Johnson. Some of the original…
The Iconoclast - Send In The Clones (1995) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 15:17
Apple’s licensing approach (ca. 1994-1997) is a bad idea. Original text by Steven Levy, Macworld January 1995. Andy Bechtolscheim quote about SPARC licensing and Macintosh clones: “Sun had a unified business… it wasn’t r…
Wise Guy - 1984 Redux (1994) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 11:10
How Macintosh could have taken over the world. Original text by Guy Kawasaki, Macworld February 1994. Various 1993ish Apple commercials courtesy of RetroByte.
Steven Levy - One Mississippi, Two Mississippi, ... (1996) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 7:03
Why does System 7.5 take so long to start up? Original text by Steven Levy, Macworld April 1996. Avoid conflating Moore’s Law with Dennard scaling. 65scribe has an easily-digested summary of Dennard scaling in his extens…
The Desktop Critic - How to Become a Millionare Overnight (1996) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 13:09
Eight best-selling Mac products that don’t exist–yet. Original text by David Pogue, Macworld April 1996. More on the history of DiskDoubler. John V. Holder’s TakeABreak has recently been uncovered from the depths of arch…
Jonathan Schwartz - Good Artists Copy, Great Artists Steal (2010) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 11:59
What to say when Steve Jobs threatens to sue you. Original text by Jonathan Schwartz. More about Lighthouse Design’s Concurrence courtesy of the Apple Wikia instance. Sun famously sued Microsoft over their incompatible J…
James Thomson - Mac OS X Dock History (2025) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 14:57
Original text by James Thomson. DragThing, one of many Dock-like tools for classic Mac OS. PCalc for classic and modern Mac OS/iOS. Some PCalc history. The One True Place for the Dock may be at the bottom of the screen,…
Darin Adler: 20 Years of Computer Software (1996) [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 42:37
Original text by Darin Adler. An overview of the Motorola MEK6800D2 single board computer/development kit. Roger Heinen “engineers are a dime a dozen” story from episode 40 of the Algorithms + Data Structures = Programs…