WINE Ascendant

I had an interesting realization on Sunday, and it took me a bit to wrap my head around it.

Imagine this conversation taking place in 1993:

• Linux Hippies: Hey, Microsoft, we’d like to run Windows software on our OS.  Can you help us out?
• Microsoft: Uh, whatever, you freaks.  Our OS is the result of millions of man-hours of development.  You can’t just …re-create it.
• Linux Hippies: Oh, ok.  I  guess we’ll just have to re-implement the whole API, clean-room, from scratch.  You know, so it’s legal and all.
• Microsoft: Hah! Good luck, suckers.
  
• Everyone Else: Hah! Look at those crazy Linux guys, trying to re-create the Windows API!  That’s nuts, they’ll never get anywhere with that.

That was sixteen years ago.  Sixteen years is a long time.  Yet … the project continued.

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