[Coco] OS9 vs Flex

[Aaron Wolfe]

On Sat, Dec 31, 2011 at 3:20 PM, john dumas <JohnDumas at austin.rr.com> wrote:
> On 12/31/2011 11:02 AM, Frank Swygert wrote:
>>
>> Hmmm... I seem to recall Frank Hogg's articels saying that Flex was at
>> least multi-user, if not multi-tasking. Seems like one would have to go with
>> the other, but it's possible that each user could only run one task at a
>> time instead of many... I don't recall enough!! Need to find one of Hogg's
>> Rainbow articles/ads...
>
> Been looking at the source code for SWTP 6809 Flex this past year. I can see
> no way that more than
> one user could be using it at once. As others have said. it looks like a
> CP/M for '00 & '09.
>
> No concept of user login at all. One terminal. Single tasking - no
> scheduler, Flex or the
> program (singular) it launches owns the entire machine............etc
>
> Cheers,
> johnd
>

In Frank Hogg Laboratories ads in 68 mj, they refer to "Flex, UniFlex
and OS9" as three different operating systems, and offer different
versions of their software for each.   I think when people say simply
"Flex" they mostly mean the original single tasking CP/M or MSDOS like
system, basically a bunch of routines at known/fixed memory locations
that a single program uses, the shell is unloaded when a program is
loaded, etc.   Probably more useful than OS9 on a 64k system in some
applications simply due to lower memory footprint, but not nearly so
refined and powerful an OS.

UniFlex is a multiuser/multitasking environment that is somewhat
Flex-like, but seems to need its own versions of software.  There are
some good articles written by Frank Hogg and others about exactly what
UniFlex is, but I can't seem to find them.   There was a good deal of
comparison from readers and various authors of the two systems as
well. Somewhere in those mags are the gory details.   Hard to judge
popularity precisely, but it seemed a lot more time was spent in the
magazine talking about regular Flex than UniFlex.