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scross
join:2002-09-13
USA

scross to XT0RT

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Re: Could Linux take off thanks to Windows 8?

OK, "Unix-like" then. It's been a while, but if I remember my Unix history correctly there are some important differences between "Unix" and "UNIX", and some sordidness related to Unix and BSD (which caused AT&T to lose control of Unix). And then there's Posix and this-ix and that-ix and some-other-ix. And who can forget Xenix, which is a version of Unix which Microsoft itself sold and supported back in the day?

But at their core, these are all more Unix than not Unix, and they are probably all more stable and more reliable than any version of Windows will ever truly be. If for no other reason than they don't have all of the bells and whistles and general eye-candy that Windows has, which really shouldn't be integrated into the core of an operating system anyway.

howardfine
join:2002-08-09
Saint Louis, MO

1 edit

howardfine

Member

said by scross:

...and some sordidness related to Unix and BSD (which caused AT&T to lose control of Unix).

In fact, BSD has its roots in the original Unix and contained original Unix code which was eventually written out to avoid lawsuits. It truly is "Unix-based".
quote:
But at their core, these are all more Unix than not Unix, and they are probably all more stable and more reliable than any version of Windows will ever truly be. If for no other reason than they don't have all of the bells and whistles and general eye-candy that Windows has, which really shouldn't be integrated into the core of an operating system anyway.

This is one of the most aware comments I have ever read on this board.

FF4m3
@bhn.net

FF4m3 to scross

Anon

to scross
said by scross:

...some sordidness related to Unix and BSD (which caused AT&T to lose control of Unix).

Here's a brief overview of the "sordidness" to which you refer -

From Unix.org:

In 1984, another factor brought added attention to UNIX systems. A group of vendors concerned about the continuing encroachment into their markets and control of system interfaces by the larger companies, developed the concept of "open systems."

Open systems were those that would meet agreed specifications or standards. This resulted in the formation of X/Open Company Ltd whose remit was, and today in the guise of The Open Group remains, to define a comprehensive open systems environment. Open systems, they declared, would save on costs, attract a wider portfolio of applications and competition on equal terms. X/Open chose the UNIX system as the platform for the basis of open systems.

Although UNIX was still owned by AT&T, the company did little commercially with it until the mid-1980's. Then the spotlight of X/Open showed clearly that a single, standard version of the UNIX system would be in the wider interests of the industry and its customers. The question now was, "which version?".

In a move intended to unify the market in 1987, AT&T announced a pact with Sun Microsystems, the leading proponent of the Berkeley derived strain of UNIX. However, the rest of the industry viewed the development with considerable concern. Believing that their own markets were under threat they clubbed together to develop their own "new" open systems operating system. Their new organization was called the Open Software Foundation (OSF). In response to this, the AT&T/Sun faction formed UNIX International.

The ensuing "UNIX wars" divided the system vendors between these two camps clustered around the two dominant UNIX system technologies: AT&T's System V and the OSF system called OSF/1. In the meantime, X/Open Company held the center ground. It continued the process of standardizing the APIs necessary for an open operating system specification.

In addition, it looked at areas of the system beyond the operating system level where a standard approach would add value for supplier and customer alike, developing or adopting specifications for languages, database connectivity, networking and mainframe interworking. The results of this work were published in successive X/Open Portability Guides.

XPG 4 was released in October 1992. During this time, X/Open had put in place a brand program based on vendor guarantees and supported by testing. Since the publication of XPG4, X/Open has continued to broaden the scope of open systems specifications in line with market requirements. As the benefits of the X/Open brand became known and understood, many large organizations began using X/Open as the basis for system design and procurement. By 1993, over $7 billion had been spent on X/Open branded systems. By the start of 1997 that figure has risen to over $23 billion. To date, procurements referencing the Single UNIX Specification amount to over $5.2 billion.

In early 1993, AT&T sold it UNIX System Laboratories to Novell which was looking for a heavyweight operating system to link to its NetWare product range. At the same time, the company recognized that vesting control of the definition (specification) and trademark with a vendor-neutral organization would further facilitate the value of UNIX as a foundation of open systems. So the constituent parts of the UNIX System (source code/technology and specification/trademark), previously owned by a single entity are now quite separate

scross
join:2002-09-13
USA

1 edit

scross

Member

Yes, indeed, the whole history of Unix is quite complicated. But the specific thing that I was referring to had to do with AT&T grabbing BSD code and porting it back into Unix, which as far as I know they had every right to do. But in the process they stripped out BSD's copyright notices and played fast and loose with some other BSD requirements, so what they ended up with was a Unix code base that was part AT&T's and part BSD's, but where you could no longer really tell what was what. And somewhere along the line there was a court ruling that because they had done this ("contaminated" their own Unix code base with BSD code), then AT&T could no longer claim the legal rights to it that they had enjoyed up until that point.

Or something like that. This is all from memory so I may have some of the details wrong, and I'm too lazy to actually go look all this up again.

FF4m3
@bhn.net

FF4m3

Anon

said by scross:

Or something like that. This is all from memory and I'm too lazy to actually go look all this up again.

Is this the story...?

USL v. BSDi:

USL v. BSDi was a lawsuit brought in the United States in 1992 by Unix System Laboratories against Berkeley Software Design, Inc and the Regents of the University of California over intellectual property related to UNIX. The case was settled out of court in 1993 after the judge expressed doubt in the validity of USL's intellectual property, with Novell (who by that time had bought USL) and BSDi agreeing not to litigate further over the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD), which would later develop into a range of BSD distributions, each tuned to its own specific audience's strengths and markets.

For many years, the details of the settlement had been kept secret between the parties, with the general public consensus being that USL and BSDi had mutually agreed not to litigate further over the software that would later be developed into the free BSDs — an agreement reached after the judge denied the injunction against BSDi, and after the UNIX IP had been purchased from AT&T by Novell.

In November 2004, a copy of the USL v. BSDi settlement agreement was posted to the Groklaw website, obtained from The Regents of the University of California's Office of the General Counsel under the State of California Public Records Law. This crucial link in UNIX legal history is now public.

FF4m3

FF4m3 to scross

Anon

to scross
said by scross:

Or something like that.

More here, interesting...

Explaining BSD
scross
join:2002-09-13
USA

1 edit

scross to FF4m3

Member

to FF4m3
said by FF4m3 :

said by scross:

Or something like that. This is all from memory and I'm too lazy to actually go look all this up again.

Is this the story...?

USL v. BSDi:

USL v. BSDi was a lawsuit brought in the United States in 1992 by Unix System Laboratories against Berkeley Software Design, Inc and the Regents of the University of California over intellectual property related to UNIX. The case was settled out of court in 1993 after the judge expressed doubt in the validity of USL's intellectual property, with Novell (who by that time had bought USL) and BSDi agreeing not to litigate further over the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD), which would later develop into a range of BSD distributions, each tuned to its own specific audience's strengths and markets.

For many years, the details of the settlement had been kept secret between the parties, with the general public consensus being that USL and BSDi had mutually agreed not to litigate further over the software that would later be developed into the free BSDs — an agreement reached after the judge denied the injunction against BSDi, and after the UNIX IP had been purchased from AT&T by Novell.

In November 2004, a copy of the USL v. BSDi settlement agreement was posted to the Groklaw website, obtained from The Regents of the University of California's Office of the General Counsel under the State of California Public Records Law. This crucial link in UNIX legal history is now public.

The "University's Counterclaim" section (and the separate lawsuit related to it) seems to cover what I remember. My memory is that it hinged specifically around BSD's copyright notices - or the lack thereof, because AT&T (or whoever) unceremoniously (and illegally) stripped these out of the BSD code that they took.

As I recall, a lot of this was rehashed during the SCO fiasco, with people saying "See, here is code that Linux took from Unix!", maybe followed by "No, that's actually code that Unix took from BSD!", maybe followed by "No, that's public domain code that everybody took!" - and so on and so forth. As I recall they were never able to prove anything like wholesale copying by the Linux folks, because almost everything that they held up as "proof" turned out to an non-starter.