Which UNIX?

[Ronald S H Khoo]

mju at mudos.ann-arbor.mi.us (Marc Unangst) writes:

> Xenix is an
> awful almost-Unix clone from Microsoft.

Wrong.  Xenix is a port of *REAL UNIX*(TM) by Microsoft.
To quote the build program from C News:

	v7	Version 7 (4.1BSD is pretty close, ditto Xenix)

Now, if Henry Spencer thinks that Xenix is pretty close to v7 functionalilty,
that's good enough for me!

And v7 is, after all, the One True Unix.

So: Xenix is a port of Unix (v7 and Sys III kernels have variously been
used as the porting base for different versions of Xenix, I think) and
it behaves enough like v7 for most applications.  This means it's an
"almost-Unix clone" ?  Sorry.  No.  Wrong answer.

Now, it is true that some of the Xenix utilities are <expletive deleted>
like the Microsoft C Compiler (barf!) -- calling it a C compiler may be a
little ambitious, but you can change that, can't you?  e.g. I use the GNU C
compiler myself.

To bring a little relevance to this newsgroup, it might be useful
to remind Mr Unangst that a modern Xenix (since he did mention SCO's name)
in SCO Xenix 386 of the current variety will acutally execute System V/386
COFF binaries as well as Xenix 86, 286 *and* 386 ones of assorted kinds.
Indeed, with the latest maintenance supplement, cpio(1) *IS* the exact
same COFF binary that SCO ship with their System V/386.

Xenix, SCO and Microsoft may well have problems, but "Xenix not being
Unix" isn't one of them.  Please stop, desist and refrain from spreading
misinformation.  Thank you and good morning.
-- 
   ronald at robobar.co.uk | +44 81 991 1142 (O) | +44 71 229 7741 (H) | YELL!
   "Nothing sucks like a VAX"   --   confirmed after recent radiator burst!
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