discussing flavors of POSIX [was M$ && Sending files back?]

[gaf at blu.org (Jerry Feldman)]

Bill,
Neither does BSD. BSD does not contain any code from the AT&T kernel. 
Additionally, there are many Unix systems (based on OSF1 for instance) that 
also do not contain AT&T code, but they are branded Unix. 
Certainly, System V was pure Unix, and the Berkeley Unix releases were 
originally based on Unix version 6 (which predated System V). 
I don't have the time to go into the dates, but back in the early 90s, when 
AT&T sued BSDI, all AT&T code was removed from the BSD kernels. Both Clem 
Cole, in his talk last year presented a roadmap outlining it. 

While Linux was created from scratch, I personally include it when I talk 
about Unix, and it does comply with some POSIX standards, and interops with 
most Unixes. There was a time when FreeBSD was clearly a better OS that 
Linux. Whether that is true or not today, I don't know. Linux has come a 
long way, and in some vendors, it is beginning to replace their commercial 
versions of Unix. I suspect that if a vendor wanted to spend enough money, 
they could get away with branding Linux and Unix. (Note the The Open Group 
owns the Unix brand, and their standards determine whether or not a vendor 
can use the Unix brand, but Finnbarr is the expert on this, not me). 

I know that even some proprietary systems that were never ever thought of 
as Unix are now being made compliant with POSIX and even Unix 98. 
On 18 Jun 2002 at 13:06, Bill Bogstad wrote:

> Would that be comparing Linux and UNIX with BSD?  Given the frequency
> of comments over the years about how "Linux isn't UNIX because it
> shares no code with UNIX, but BSD does" that should make for an
> interesting discussion.  Seriously, though, a discussion of the
> strength/weaknesses of various freely available POSIX-like systems would
> be a good thing...

--
Jerry Feldman <gaf at blu.org>
Associate Director
Boston Linux and Unix user group
http://www.blu.org PGP key id:C5061EA9
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