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GeoWorks: The Other Windows (2019)

Before Windows became a fact of life for most computer users, a scrappy upstart named GeoWorks tried taking Microsoft on. It failed, but it gave us AOL.

But perhaps its longest legacy was in the hands of a firm named Breadbox, which had essentially treated GeoWorks as a volunteer upkeep project, with the eventual goal of turning the GEOS into an educational software platform that worked in tandem with Android. Managed by a firm named blueway.Softworks, the application took a complicated route to open source, TechRepublic reporter James Sanders noted in March, including agreements with the former rights-holders. Speaking to the publication, blueway.Softworks founder Falk Rehwagen, who once worked with Breadbox, noted that the complex mixture of licensed and non-licensed software baked into PC/GEOS makes its open-sourcing harder than it sounds.

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