In 1985 Steve Jobs resigned from Apple and founded NeXT Inc. in order to build the NeXT Computer. It was ahead of its time and had amazing features thanks to the NeXTSTEP operating system, most famously used at CERN by Sir Tim Berners-Lee to create the World Wide Web. NeXTSTEP later became OPENSTEP and when Apple acquired NeXT in 1997, they used it as the basis for Mac OS X and iOS. If you’ve done any Mac or iOS programming, you’ve seen the echoes of NeXTSTEP in the type names – NSObject, NSString, NSDictionary, and many others all come directly from NeXT (NS = NeXTSTEP).
These computers cost about as much as a new car when they first came out, so they were out of reach for most people. What was it like to use a top of the line system in the early 90s? Let’s build our own and find out!
Exactly as it says on the tin. A fun few hours.
I was a big fan of the Window Maker for my desktop:
https://www.windowmaker.org/
It was simple, functional, and not resource hungry like then recent Gnome 2.0 (-ish).
I don’t recall the exact reason why I stopped using WM. It could be lack of compatibility with recent apps, or needing to do too much manual configuration. It has been a long while.
Yet, I think it is still the easiest way to bring a “Next/MacOS” like simplicity on a Linux desktop. I with there was more support.
(Yes, being able to run an older OS in a VM is a different matter).
YES!!! I used Window Maker for YEARS! Ever since I realized how much I hate taskbars. >_<
Another reason that made it difficult to use over time was that development stopped almost completely. Version 0.92.0 was released in 2005. The next release after that was some minor bug fixes and a few changes in 2012. Window Maker was mostly stable and complete, but small issues still popped up. For me personally, icon scaling wasn't the best, and there were issues with dual monitor support.
Nowadays I use Openbox, but with a simple Window Maker "feel" to it. Right-click to open the applications menu, left-click to see running applications, and no taskbar.
Yes, same here!! 🙂
And if you want to see a complete NextSTEP environment using Linux and Window Maker, you’ll like to test this: http://wmlive.sourceforge.net/
If you want the feel of the original NeXTSTEP on top of Linux, you can try NEXTSPACE. It is still in development.
https://github.com/trunkmaster/nextspace
Didn’t know that one, thanks!
I have fantasies of what I would do if I became a billionaire.
One of them includes funding Étoilé OS and Darling development to bring them up to current MacOS levels of functionality and compatibility.
I want to be able to run Logic Pro on Linux lol
http://etoileos.com/etoile/
https://www.darlinghq.org/
These days I prefer Reaper over Logic Pro even in macOS, and Reaper has native Linux support.
https://www.reaper.fm
But yeah, it would be nice if those projects were feature complete and stable.
Old habits die hard. I’ve used it since it was Notator on the ST. 🙂
Okay – wouldn’t previous be a better emulator? This actually emulated the Next hardware, where=as, running OpenStep on a X86 emulator is a bit “half way there”… https://github.com/probonopd/previous