[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by Joe Bob

Didn't Gates, steal his Op Sys from Apple?

Gates' first OS was ms-DOS.

IBM PC DOS (and the separately sold MS-DOS) and its predecessor, 86-DOS, resembled Digital Research's CP/M—the dominant disk operating system for 8-bit Intel 8080 and Zilog Z80 based microcomputers. DOS instead ran on Intel 8086 16-bit processors. Starting with MS-DOS 1.28 and PC DOS 2.0 the operating system incorporated various features inspired from Xenix, Microsoft's variant of Unix.

When IBM introduced the IBM PC, built with the Intel 8088 microprocessor, they needed an operating system. Seeking an 8088-compatible build of CP/M, IBM initially approached Microsoft CEO Bill Gates (possibly believing that Microsoft owned CP/M due to the Microsoft Z-80 SoftCard, which allowed CP/M to run on an Apple II[2]). IBM was sent to Digital Research, and a meeting was set up. However, the initial negotiations for the use of CP/M broke down; Digital Research wished to sell CP/M on a royalty basis, while IBM sought a single license, and to change the name to "PC DOS". Digital Research founder Gary Kildall refused, and IBM withdrew.[2][3]

IBM again approached Bill Gates. Gates in turn approached Seattle Computer Products. There, programmer Tim Paterson had developed a variant of CP/M-80, intended as an internal product for testing SCP's new 16-bit Intel 8086 CPU card for the S-100 bus. The system was initially named QDOS (Quick and Dirty Operating System), before being made commercially available as 86-DOS. Microsoft purchased 86-DOS, allegedly for $50,000. This became Microsoft Disk Operating System, MS-DOS, introduced in 1981.[4]