> MS-DOS was inspired by Unix,

Q-DOS, 86-DOS, and MS-DOS 1.x were inspired by various operating systems
on DEC computers, such as TOPS-10, OS-8, and RT-11.  MS-DOS 1.x had essentially
no similarity to Unix whatsoever.

When they needed hierarchical directory support for hard drives, they did a
disgusting job of sort of kludging it so that it has some trivial superficial
similarities to Unix.  However, this similarity was never more than skin deep.

> as IIRC M$-Windows was from X-Windows, but the inspiration rapidly
> evaporated early on.

MS Windows has no similiarity to the X window system to speak of.  There is no
sign that the developers had ever even seen X.  X may not be perfect, but
MS didn't even copy its good features.

If anything, Windows started as a poor attempt to clone the Macintosh, with
some of Apple's less brilliant features omitted.

To paraphrase something that's occasionally been said about AMD vs. Intel [*],
the most original thing Microsoft has done is to copy Apple.

Eric

[*] AMD actually seems to be doing some excellent original work these days,
such as the soon-to-be-released K7 processor.