LinuxPlanet: .comment: Something for Everybody

“…The name suggests that eCommerceStation is designed to run
Web sites or something like that, but it’s actually a really good
LAN operating system. It comes with Lotus SmartSuite (1.5 in the
beta; 1.6 in the release version due in the next month or so),
StarOffice 5.1 for OS/2, Netscape 4.61 for OS/2 (the release
version will have Warpzilla, a Mozilla port apparently done by IBM;
the version I downloaded yesterday works very well), and a world of
network administration stuff, as well as VoiceType, the speech
recognition system. Technically exciting are the addition of IBM’s
Journaling File System and a Logical Volume Manager. It’s an
interesting update, and if you have an OS/2 license it is a lot
cheaper than the sum of its parts at $139 from Indelible Blue.”

“But what really appealed to me is a program called “Wise
Machine,” published by an outfit called TouchVoice Corp. This
program is not so attractive for what it does (it’s beta-ness is
evident) but what it suggests. It is, based on what I could figure
out about it in that it is utterly undocumented best I can tell, a
kind of supreme package manager. Unlike the Wise and UnWise stuff
found in Windows, which appears on an application-by-application
basis, this thing is installed once and handles tasks for all the
apps on the machine. Use it to install your applications and it
will keep track of what it has done. This makes keeping an accurate
inventory easy. It also eases removal of applications. And moving
an application from one place to another is a drag-and-drop
operation with this application. (This is what I’ve gathered from
playing with it a little; again, the documentation isn’t
there.)”

“What struck me is that this is exactly the kind of thing that
Linux very much needs.”

Complete
Story