aps@decvax.UUCP (Armando P. Stettner) (11/12/84)
From its beginning, UNIX was in a constant state of change. I do not feel that any single version or release typifies UNIX. I feel that UNIX represents a philosophy of implementation and architecture more so than its common services. However, I feel that there is a set of characteristics which is required in order consider a thing a member of the UNIX lineage: open, read, write, seek, close, fork, exec, getuid, setuid, a real hierarchical file system, a shell, etc. What other capabilities a "UNIX System" is given is not important to the question of whether or not the system is UNIX. What maybe more important is how a capability is implemented and how it is presented to a user [process?]. Adding VMS type RMS capabilities (file access methods) to UNIX is not necessarily a bad idea. Doing so will not change whether or not it is UNIX. However, if the implementation means that all files have an RMS file type and files can not be reproduced *exactly* by simply copying their bytes because the system knows more about their structure to begin with or if the implementation means that the output of one program can not be piped into the input of another, it probably isn't UNIX anymore. While I'm on it, 4.2BSD isn't UNIX; neither is 4.1BSD, System V or System III or Version 7 (although I think it is the "real standard"). Even the /usr/group "standard" is not UNIX. These are all UNIX. They are all part of the evolution of UNIX. As I have said before, I believe that UNIX is evolution. To nail down the idea UNIX to some specific implementation is not good. UNIX is a direction or set of directions. For me, it is a way of being. (How's that for existentialism.) If I can get real-time capabilities or the ability to share resources across several machines running UNIX, more power to me, a user. Armando P. Stettner UNIX User.
wapd@houxj.UUCP (Bill Dietrich) (11/14/84)
I can't resist stating what I understand to be the legally correct definition of "Unix". Although I am an employee of ATT Bell Laboratories, this is not an official statement and I may be wrong about various details. I think the official legal definition is that ATT's implementation of Unix System V and the implementations done by Motorola, National, Zilog and Intel under agreement with ATT are the only items that can be called "the Unix operating system". Things like BSD 4.X which (I believe) are built from ATT code originally and (I believe) require fees to be paid to ATT (probably an agreement between Berkeley and ATT) are properly called "Unix-based operating systems". Things like PC/IX and others which provide similar or identical functionality but are not based on ATT code at all are properly called "Unix look-alikes". Also, I believe that ATTBL has trademarked "Unix" (or registered it somehow) as an adjective only, so that it is improper to say "Unix has pipes". Correct form would be "the Unix operating system has pipes". Just thought I would try to state the "official" position, to muddy the waters further. Bill Dietrich houxj!wapd
henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer) (11/16/84)
> I think the official legal definition is that ATT's > implementation of Unix System V and the implementations > done by Motorola, National, Zilog and Intel under > agreement with ATT are the only items that can be > called "the Unix operating system". Basically correct, except that you're forgetting a few earlier releases of Unix from Bell, notably V6 and V7. And if you want to be fussy, the official form of the word is "UNIX", not "Unix". Bletch. -- Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology {allegra,ihnp4,linus,decvax}!utzoo!henry
Ron Natalie <ron@BRL-TGR> (11/16/84)
Wrong, PC/IX is System III hacked into an even less usable form by Inactive Systems Corp of Santa Monica. -Ron
mwherman@watcgl.UUCP (Michael W. Herman) (11/16/84)
To inject a bit of humor here: I just read a thesis that instead of containing the obligatory "Unix is a trademark of Bell Laboratories" footnote, had a footnote that read "Unix is a footnote of Bell Laboratories". I thought that was pretty good.
jaap@haring.UUCP (11/25/84)
> UNIX (-footnote -:)) is a footnote of Bell Labs.
So you never knew this is a standard feature of the -ms .UX macro
package?