UNIX FAQ Version 2.1 92/12/04 -- Question 6.5

Identifying your Unix flavor.

From: "Pierre (P.) Lewis" <lew@bnr.ca> Date: Sun, 11 Oct 1992 15:29:00 +0000 Version: 2.0 This section lists a number of things you can look at in attempting to identify the base flavor of your Unix. Given the significant exchange of code and ideas between the various flavors and the many changes made by vendors, any statement such as "this Unix is an SVR2" is at best a statistical statement (except for some SVRn ports). Also many Unices offer most of both worlds (either mixed as in SunOS or strictly separated as in Apollo?). So this section is perhaps not very useful... The list of features in previous sections can also help. For example, if a system has a poll(2) but no select(2), it is highly probable that it is derived from SVR3. Also the name of the OS can provide a clue, as well as the logon message (e.g. SGI's "Irix SVR3.3.2") or the output of "uname -a" command. Available commands can also provide hints but this is probably less reliable than kernel features. For example, the type of terminal initialization (inittab or ttys) is a more reliable indicator than the print subsystem. Feature Typical in SVRx Typical in xBSD kernel name /unix /vmunix terminal init /etc/inittab /etc/ttys (only getty to 4.3) boot init /etc/rc.d directories /etc/rc.* files mounted FSs /etc/mnttab /etc/mtab usual shell sh, ksh csh, #! hack native FS S5 (blk: 512-2K) UFS (blk: 4K-8K) file names <= 14 bytes file names < 255 bytes groups need newgrp(1) automatic membership SVR4: multiple groups print subsystem lp, lpstat, cancel lpr, lpq, lprm (lpd daemon) ?? terminal control termio, terminfo, termios (sgtty before 4.3reno) SVR4: termios (POSIX) termcap job control >= SVR4 yes ps command ps -ef ps -aux string fcns memset, memcpy bzero, bcopy process mapping /proc (SVR4)