thoughts on UNIX and older systems

From: Miles O'Neal <meo_at_netads.com>
Date: Sat Jan 16 11:42:42 1999

All this noise about the younger OSes (Linux, FreeBSD)
got me thinking. I vaccilate between amused and annoyed
over the bickering between the Linux and FreeBSD contingents.
That kind of thing is part of the reason Windoze owns as
much of the matket as it does. I realize nobody could
predict the way it would take off, but when MS first started
to own the desktop, the *users* of UNIX should have started
cooperating. But instead, they went along with the vendor
factions, and Windoze won.

Yeah, I know, it was somewhat inevitable. But I don't think
it would have been quite as bad as it is. So learn from
history. Feel free to argue in private, but in public, I'd
push the overall UNIX-like OS, with just a recommendation.

Of course, it's a good feeling to even have the option.
Because 10 - 12 years ago, what were your UNIX options, if
you weren't the government or a university?

1) You could buy expensive hardware that ran a UNIX variant.
2) You bought a workstation from Sun or Apollo - still not cheap.
3) If you were lucky, you got one of the few Cromemcos or
   Perkin-Elmer desktops, that ran UNIX. But they weren't
   much less expensive than the Sun, Apollo, etc workstations.
   (Fortune's desktops were in the workstation price range.)
4) If you were really lucky, you found a good deal on a used
   PDP from someone with a UNIX license who forgot to wipe the
   disks or tapes - but then you were illegal.
5) You bought Minix. Minix was cheap, and you got source, but
   it was really meant to be a teaching tool. It was well done,
   but extremely limited. (Nevertheless, Tanenbaum's _Operating
   Systems Design and Implementation_ is still an excellent book.)
6) If you were *really* lucky, you got a good deal on a working
   workstation.

Just out of curiosity, does anyone have a Perkin-Elmer desktop
running Linux? IIRC, it was pretty much a straight port of
whatever was current from bell Labs at the time - or maybe an
older version.

-Miles
Received on Sat Jan 16 1999 - 11:42:42 GMT