** Reply to note from Hallam-Baker <hallam@ai.mit.edu> 09/02/96 5:15pm -0400 --or another Hallum-Baker ignorant rant v. unix, bsd, etc. = Eric Murray wrote: = > = > Scottauge@aol.com writes: = = > > Read, Understand, and Delight... Microsoft maybe in trouble at last. = > = > I doubt it. People don't use Microsoft products because = > of their quality or functionality. = = Errmm.. hate to disappoint but SCO UNIX started life as Xenix which = was written by Microsoft in the dark ages. = = the **original** SCO product and versions up to 3.something **were** xenix --not written by MS, but simple unix V7 which was capable of 64K program and 64K data and would run on a 286. MS had a substantial investment in SCO when the old man was screwing things up (before the old man was forced out for sexual harassment --his brother had long since raped Convergent and was gated). MS had made the V7 deal with Western Electric with Billy thinking he had an exclusive on **the** way to go --better than sliced bread; V7 was not commercially available --only to universities because of a WE consent decree with the government. Billy was in seventh heaven --sure he had the deal of a lifetime! not so: Bell Labs shortly announced the breakup and decided to commercially ship System III --it was available in source code only, but the price was only about $25K in the first go around, and you could produce binaries for sublicensing for $250 or some such --it was not a great price, but it was doable. System III was not restricted to 64K plus 64K. One of my major conract customers at the time was WE --System V R2 was already available internally, including a decent VAX port (unlike the really piss-poor V32 Berkeley rewrote into BSD 4.2 --offering it back to Bell Labs for free, which was spurned from the Ivory Tower at Murrey Hill...) With the WE and AT&T breakup, and the multiple licensing activity, Gates hit the roof --threw several well known major temper tantrums, including at least one at WE/Labs that I am directly aware of. Gates vowed to bury UNIX in all flavours and has had that intention ever since --non-stop. Billy-boy does not carry a grudge lightly --he not only gets very mad and comes off the wall (or handle), but he has every intention of getting even. I've always figured Billy suffers from Tourette's for his mannerisms, his uncontrollable rage, &c. --just has not learned to manage it, and figured his Daddy could solve it all --and now there is an item of $10billion give or take a few --buys a lot of hate. part of Billy's vindictive plan against AT&T involved hiring Dave Cutler from DEC --Cutler was the self-styled leader of the VMS team, also with a bad case of temper-tantrums I saw dave literally shatter an impossible to break WE 500 series telephone simply by "hanging" it up.... (...time to clear the decks!) and that was for NT --great job! Cutler took the deal thinking he had a free hand --at Billy's place? --naive. and Dave had to put up with the Windows legacy... the crap that goes on inside NT is not all Cutler's direct fault. and that is Billy Boy and the SCO club... and death lurking in the alley for unix --but I doubt he will be able to kill it --there is just too large a crowd of professionals who refuse to use MS --not just because the product is crap, but because of Billy. = > > This is for single user home based UNIX systems. = > = > Single-user UNIX isn't all that useful. = matter of opinion --works fine, just like the big guys, on a workstation. so it limits you to one login -??? runs full multi-tasking re-entrant just like multi-user. somewhere along the line, you were standing behind the door and forgot to listen when single user limitations were defined. = Listen to the guys who built it. UNIX = is a program development environment. = that's so ludicrous, it's funny. you figure everyone just sat around playing with themselves? I wouldn't tell that to Thompson, Ritchie, Kerrigan and friends... unix was a **tool**. = In the early years it was = interesting because there was source available, that ceased to be = the case years ago. = and AT&T source has always been available at some price. BSD source from 4.2 through the current (and last) 4.4 is freely available, give Walnut Creek $29,00 and you have it all and pay the shipping from Free Software Foundation (GNU) and you have all that too (most of which is on the freeBsd and Linux CDROMs anyway. = Multi-user ain't much better. Listen to the guys who built it. apparently you never figured out there was anything after SCO's initial releases --they were junk as was their first several passes at System III and V -they tried to live with their Xenix Heritage --including trying to make System III run on a 286 --an abysmal product. today SCO is shipping SysV R4+ --the last Labs and Unix International version which also contains all BSD calls which were added by SUN under contract --it's a good solid product. however, despite years of kernal hacking for WE, I still prefer straight BSD flavours. Commercially, SUN leads that pack, followed by DEC with Ultrix which is BSD by another name... HP is sort of System V R4+ Even IBM is Unix --they just call it AIX and it is BSD based --also very solid and thoroughly supported --you can not even get IBM heavy iron without AIX --MVS &c. run as processes. Ken Olsen, founder of DEC, called unix "snake oil." DEC's VMS is good, but was originally a DCL platform. security is excellent by comparison to early unix, but it is not open (or was not, to be correct) --and source is virtually out of the question. FYI, both unix and VMS are derived from Multix... Today DEC ships Ultrix on everything, and VMS basically only on the mainframes. Ken Olsen was forced out when the sales staff blew Ford Motor Co out of the water on an immense deal, along with an even larger Fed contract --essentially the salesmen refused to sell unix (required in both bid specs) on the hardware.... DEC started sliding, and Ken was "retired." = Today Linux probably represents the future of the UNIX family, it = allows people who want to hack at the OS level access to the sources = of a fully functioning OS. This allows people to add in new kernel = features, schedulers and other exotica without having to write a = whole new O/S. = the only reasons NT will end up in big business is a) politics, b) freebies, and c) intimidation. MIS staffs will not choose it, MSNBC just canned NT 4.0 as worthless junk. Linux has a large base, but it is a warmed over version of Bell System V --rewritten supposedly from scratch by a husband/wife team (I might have believed it had it been the husband/wife team of Peter Conklin who was also on the DEC VMS gig from the gate --I gave him his first job out of Harvard in 1962 --arrogant, but 100%. = Just don't confuse it with "home computing", this is geek computing = and you better have a lot of interest in computing to use it. = that's pure bullshit, again. actually, FreeBSD is easier to handle than Linux and more professionally supported --including ongoing active development, It qualifies as home computing in my book --you take the CD, copy two disks out to kick it off, and say GO. comes up in X windows... geek code? get off your MicroSlop mentality limitation. = Home = computing is the market for users who need a system that's simpler = than a VCR or they can't use it. = that's total nonsense, your British class system is showing its ignorant face again -you are insulting what little intelligence the American middle class does have... unless you really wish to limit the users to TV set-top boxes which can "surf" a few canned sites from assholes-on-line, etc. the children of the household will never settle for that! = At one time that meant Apple, today = it means Microsoft, it will never mean Linux - not unless someone = can make Linux much much simpler than it is at present and provide = decent WISIWIG tools such as editors etc. designed for use by aunt = Ethel. = give me a break! your igonance is showing --it's plain and simple an MS advertising jugernaut! both linux and freebsd have X built in --FreeBSD actually goes directly to X at bootup --and there are plenty of tools,editors, etc in X --and freeBSD runs Linux binaries. and there are a number of high grade packages which are fully supported. Secondly, SUN binaries for X86 are no more expensive than MS is heading for with NT which they will use to "replace" W95 (W95 was just another MicroSlop holding pattern). just a simple fact: MicroSlop advertising buries anything and everything. and, if that does not work: Intimidation is just another form of Communication and Billy's real good at, witness the DOJ and FTC round 2 unfolding now. apparently your schooling is limited to MS courses.... MS is a pure virus on its own, if not the software, than certainly the company. why does MS have 85% of the desktop? --the power of money and lies --and a loud noisy parade with a bandwagon, free beer, and all that good stuff that goes with predatory market practices. fair competition? why should MS be fair when its stated goal is to take a fraction of **every** transaction on any network. Billy has no tolerance for the existence of anything other than Billy's creations and control --total control. It does not matter if W95 crashes more often than 3.1 --upgrade it for more money! Money is the name of the game at MS, not decent product for a reasonable price. Always has been, always will.... --attila -- Now, with a black jack mule you wish to harness, you walk up, look him in the eye, and hit him with a 2X4 over the left eye. If he blinks, hit him over the right eye! He'll cooperate --so will politicians.