Submission for comp-unix-microport

[UNIX-UNIX Cp]

Path: tolerant!voder!pyramid!oliveb!amdahl!pacbell!belltec!dar
From: dar at belltec.UUCP (Dimitri Rotow)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.microport
Subject: Re: Microport, Xenix, Interactive:  Which one?
Summary: get a second opinion from microsoft and at&T
Message-ID: <326 at belltec.UUCP>
Date: 2 Jan 89 23:15:05 GMT
References: <285 at longway.TIC.COM> <Jan.1.14.26.26.1989.4289 at ron.rutgers.edu>
Distribution: usa
Organization: Bell Technologies, Fremont, CA
Lines: 42

In article <Jan.1.14.26.26.1989.4289 at ron.rutgers.edu>, ron at ron.rutgers.edu (Ron Natalie) writes:
> It's a moot point.  All the 386 system V ports are essentially the
> same one done by Interactive Systems.  They are fairly decent
> Sys 5 R 3 ports and you can even get TCP for them.
> 
> -Ron


Ron -

I agree with you that it is a moot point in that there is convergence towards
a standard, but you may want to check with AT&T, Intel, and Microsoft about
who's did the work.   The original UNIX System V/386 Release 3.0 came out
from Intel Corporation as the general contractor.  Interactive did a lot of 
work for Intel, especially on the base AT device drivers, and based its own
"386/ix" product on the stock Intel/AT&T product.  However, the Intel OPO
guys up in Oregon and the Intel MCG guys in Santa Clara like to think that
the few thousand man hours they spent with AT&T creating the final 3.0
product had a bit to do with the effort.

According to AT&T, the device driver content in Release 3.2, the "merged"
Xenix/UNIX release is "less than 10% residual intellectual property based
on Interactive's contributions in 3.0."  In particular, the console/keyboard
driver is pretty much the Microsoft Xenix driver (note the presence of
multiscreen in console, etc).

According to AT&T and Intel, *they* are the ones doing essentially *all*
of the work in Release 3.2.  They have incorporated stuff from numerous
third parties (Microsoft, etc), but it is a very large mistake to think 
that anyone but AT&T is steering the boat from here on in.   Of all the 
commercial releases, the Intel/AT&T release that we publish is obviously
the closest to AT&T's standard (because it *is* AT&T's standard), but
Interactive is easily the next closest.  Because of the high quality
and timeliness of ISC's work it is easy to misidentify their close
relationship to the AT&T port in 3.0 with the same identity in 3.2, but 
that is not the case.

Note also that AT&T's own commercial binary UNIX for their 6386 WGS line
is different than the official standard AT&T/Intel product licensed 
through Greensboro.

- dimitri rotow