#Mac operating systems timeline for mac#

#Mac operating systems timeline for mac#

Jobs also said Microsoft’s applications for Mac were “terrible” and called the company’s products “third rate.” He eventually spoke to The New York Times about the documentary and his decision to call Gates and apologize for his comments, but his statement felt disingenuous. And the Macintosh, of all the machines I’ve seen, is the only one that meets that standard.” And when Jobs asked Gates if he thought Mac would become another standard in personal computing, Gates praised the platform: “To create a new standard it takes something that’s not just a little bit different, it takes something that’s really new and really captures people’s attention. “We had more people working on the Mac than did,” Gates said of the early years, according to Walter Isaacson’s biography, Steve Jobs.Īt an Apple event in 1983, Gates told attendees Microsoft expected to earn half of its revenues selling Macintosh software the following year. The software pioneer created important programs for Apple’s PC in the early ’80s. Youthful innocence of the early ’80sĭuring the first Macintosh’s development and early years of production, Microsoft was a critical Apple ally.

The following events, from periods of harmony and acrimony alike, define the long, rocky relationship between the two modern-day technology giants. Today, Apple and Microsoft are much different companies, with new leaders who don’t lug along the baggage that comes as a result of nearly 40 years of fierce competition.

The hot and cold periods were often tied to the personalities of the companies’ founders and longtime leaders: Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. The on-again, off-again relationship between Apple and Microsoft began in earnest in the late 1970s, during the dawn of the PC era.