[The_Reader_David]

I see this as a move to counter the little-observed change in the competitive environment produced by Apple basing Mac OS X on a Unix core. MS realizes that this changes the applications development environment: there are now two software worlds Windows and Unix/OS X/Linux. MS is facing competition from Linux in the Intel-chip hardware universe, but this chould be brushed off as insignificant, were it not for the fact that the same applications development done for Unix will now will minimal effort also be applications development for Macs, Solaris work-stations, and Unix main-frames. Stepping into the hardware business is a move to provide themselves with the vertical-integration advantage which has kept Apple in business (and holding 5-7% of the PC market, and that mostly at the high-end) despite assaults by MS, and the perpetual dire predictions of Apple's demise. Admittedly it is an oblique move to counter the threat. A direct one is quite impossible, though: no Mac user would load a Motorola-processor version of Windows as their primary operating system, nor would Unix-using computer geeks switch (I speak as both).

[dr_who]

Apple's merely made their OS more robust. Hopefully they'll get a little more market share than the loyal anti-wintel desktop holdouts. Microsoft has just continued the process of merging the "industrial strength" (snigger, snigger) versions of Windows (NT/2000) with their older consumer version. Sun and other Unix vendors are the ones who are feeling real competition from Linux (and others). But the dream of Unix afficianados since the 80's has been to put Unix on the desktop, and the holy grail since the 70's has been to have a free, complete, open source Unix. Two for two ain't bad.