Haiku OS Beta 4, based on BeOS, was released on December 23, 2022 and promises to deliver many of the benefits of macOS and Windows systems. The biggest highlight of the system is that it adheres to many of the advantages of BeOS and takes only a few seconds to boot up/shut down on most devices.
Haiku OS is even more legendary because its predecessor, BeOS, was almost chosen by Steve Jobs to become the familiar macOS system.
Jean-Louis Gassee, head of Apple France, left the company to start a new company, Be Inc. Be continued to develop BeBox, a PowerPC-based computer, and BeOS, an ultra-fast modern media operating system with fast disk I/O, rendering and a kernel.
When Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1997, Apple needed a new operating system, and the competition was between NeXTStep and BeOS, developed by Jobs’ other company, NeXT.
Apple eventually chose NeXT, and over the next few years, NeXTStep was modified for Mac OS X and subsequently developed as iPhone OS 1.
But BeOS did not die out. A group of dedicated developers have been working quietly on Haiku for more than 15 years, toiling away in their spare time.
Haiku B4 is compatible with most modern and older hardware, including most Intel and Apple Silicon systems, Macs, PCs, and ARM-based computers. Given its provenance, it will run well on older Celeron laptops from the Windows 7 era.
In 1991, Jean-Louis Gassie leads a group of Apple employees, including AppleNewton developer Steve Sakoman, to build Be, a company that develops a new operating system designed from the ground up for multi-CPU and multi-threaded applications. At the same time, Apple had fallen behind in not being able to launch its new operating system, Copland, and was looking for a replacement. Gacy saw this as a golden opportunity.
In 1996, Garci offered $400 million to allow Apple Computer to use BeOS, but Apple estimated Be’s value at $80 million and offered $120 million, later rising to $200 million. The deal fell through and Apple moved on to buy NeXTSTEP and get Steve Jobs back.
