Was Windows 1.0's lack of overlapping windows a legal or a technical matter?
Summary
The Stack Exchange discussion argues that Windows 1.0's lack of overlapping windows was primarily a design decision tied to tiling window management, not a legal constraint or a hard technical limitation. The top answer cites BetaWiki and Cedar-era research to support the view that overlapping was possible in some contexts (e.g., popups and menus) but not the default behavior, and it references contemporary sources (InfoWorld, PC Magazine) to illustrate the historical context.