UNIX FAQ Version 2.1 92/12/04 -- Question 6.6

Brief notes on some well-known (commercial/PD) Unices.

From: "Pierre (P.) Lewis" <lew@bnr.ca> Date: Sun, 11 Oct 1992 15:29:00 +0000 Version: 2.0 (I am not at all satisfied with this section, unfortunately I have neither the time nor the documents to make it much better (wrt contents). Should only list Unices known by a reasonably wide audience. Small and non-US Unices welcome, e.g. Eurix. In need of reformatting) This section lists (in alphabetical order) some of the better known Unices along with a brief description of their nature. AIX: IBM's Unix, based on SVR2 (later up to SVR3.2?) with varying degrees of BSD extensions, for various hardwares. Proprietary system admin (SMIT). Both 850 and Latin-1 CPs. Quite different from most Unices and among themselves. Newsgroup: comp.unix.aix. - 1.x (for 386 PS/2) - 2.x (for PC RTs) - 3.x (for RS/6000), paging kernel, logical volume manager, i18n; 3.2 adds TLI/STREAMS - there is also a version for S/370 mainframes (as task under VM) Was to have been base for OSF/1 until Mach was chosen instead. AOS (IBM): 4.3BSD port to IBM PC RT (for educational institutes). Don't confuse with DG's proprietary OS of same name. Arix: SV A/UX (Apple): SV with Berkeley enhancements, NFS, Mac GUI. System 6 (later System 7) runs as guest of A/UX (opposite of MachTen). Newsgroup: comp.unix.aux. - 2.0: SVR2 with 4.2BSD, system 6 Mac applications. - 3.0 (1992): SVR2.2 with 4.3BSD, system 7 applications. BOS for Bull's DPX/2 (680x0) - V1 (1990): SVR3 with BSD extensions (FFS, select, sockets), symmetric MP, X11R3 - V2 (1991): adds job control, disk mirroring, C2 security, DCE extensions 386BSD: Jolitz's port of Net2 software. Posix, 32-bit, still in alpha. BSD/386 (80386): from BSDI, with source (augmented Net2 software) Newsgroup: comp.unix.bsd. Chorus/MiXV: Unix SVR3.2 (SVR4) over Chorus nucleus, ABI/BCS. Coherent (80286): Unix clone compatible with V7, some SVR2 (IPC). V4.0 is 32-bit. Newsgroup: comp.os.coherent Consensys: SVR4 CTIX: SV-based, from Convergent D-NIX: SV DomainIX (Apollo): dual Unix over Apollo Domain operating system DomainOS (Apollo): BSD 4.2? with System V? (strict differentiation?) - 10.x DVIX (NT's DVS): SVR2 DYNIX (Sequent): 4.2BSD-based DYNIX/PTX: SVR3-based Esix (80386): pure SVR4, X11, OpenLook (NeWS), Xview Eurix (80?86): SVR3.2 (german?) FTX: Stratus fault-tolerant OS (68K or i860-i960 hardware) GNU Hurd (?): vaporware from the Free Software Foundation (FSF): Unix emulator over Mach 3.0 kernel. Many GNU tools are very popular (emacs) and used in the PD Unices. HP-UX (HP): old from S III (SVRx), now SVR2 (4.2BSD?) with SV utilities (they have trouble making up their minds). - 6.5: SVR2 - 7.0: SVR3.2, symlinks - 7.5 - 8.0: BSD based? for HP-9000 CISC (300/400) and RISC (800/700) Interactive SVR3.2 (80x86): pure SVR3. Interactive has been bought by Sun; will their system survive Solaris? Idris: first Unix clone by Whitesmith. - 4D Irix (SGI): SVR3.2, much BSD. Newsgroup: comp.sys.sgi. Linux (80386): PD Unix, SVish. Available with sources. Newsgroup: comp.os.linux MachTen, Tenon Intersystems: runs as a guest of System 6, no memory protection, 4.3BSD environment with TCP, NFS. MacMach (Mac II): 4.3BSD over Mach 3.0 microkernel, X11, Motif, GNU software, sources, experimental System 7 as Mach task. Mach386: from Mt Xinu. Based on Mach 2.5, with 4.3BSD-Tahoe enhancements. Also 2.6 MSD (Mach Source Distribution). Microport (80x86): pure SVR4, X11, OpenLook GUI Minix (80x86, Atari, Amiga, Mac): Unix clone compatible with V7. Sold with sources. Being POSIXified (sp?). Newsgroup: comp.os.minix. MipsOS: SVish (RISC/OS, now dropped, was BSDish) more/BSD (VAX, HP 9000/300): Mt Xinu's Unix, based on 4.3BSD-Tahoe. Newsgroup: comp.os.xinu? Net/2 tape (from Berkeley, 1991): BSD Unix, essentially compatible with 4.3BSD, includes only sources free of AT&T code, no low-level code. See 386BSD and BSD/386 above. NextStep (Next): BSD over Mach kernel, own GUI. 386 version coming? - 1.0 NEWS-OS (Sony) - 3.2 OSF/1 (DEC): DEC's port of OSF/1 PC-IX (IBM 8086): SV SCO Xenix (80x86): SCO Unix (80x86): SVR3.2 Solaris (Sparc, 80386): - 1.0: essentially same as SunOS 4.1.1, with OpenWindows 2.0 and DeskSet utilities. - 1.0.1: SunOS 4.1.2 with multiprocessing (kernel not multithreaded); not for 386 - 2.0: will be based on SVR4 (and have symmetric MP), will include support for 386; with OpenWindows 3.0 (X11R4), DeskSet, ONC, NIS. Compilers unbundled! SunOS (680x0, Sparc, i386): based on 4.3BSD, includes much from System V. Main Sun achievements: NFS (1984), SunView (1985), NeWS (1986, postscript imaging, now in OpenWindows), OpenLook GUI standard, OpenWindows (NeWS, X11, SunView!). Newsgroup: comp.sys.sun.*. - 3.x: SV IPC package, FIFOs - 4.0.3: lightweight processes, new virtual mem, shared libs - 4.1: STREAMS & TLI, 8-bit clean?, async I/O, ms-dos file system (continues as Solaris -- see above). UHC (80x86): pure SVR4, X11, Motif Ultrix (DEC): based on 4.2BSD with much of 4.3. Newsgroup: comp.unix.ultrix. - 3.1, 4.0 UNICOS (Cray): Newsgroup: comp.unix.cray - 5.x, 6,x, 7.0 UTEK (Tektronix) - 4.0 Xenix (80x86): 1st Unix on Intel hardware, based on SVR2 (previously on S III and even V7). Newsgroup: comp.unix.xenix. 3B1 (680x0): SV-based, done by Convergent for AT&T. Newsgroup: comp.sys.3b1.