AIX, System V comparision

[Mark H. Colburn]

[Moderators Note:-  OK, I think we've beaten this subject to death.  Let's
 just agree to disagree.  -Der]


In article <1100 at altos86.UUCP> jeff at swusrgrp.UUCP (Jeff Tye sys adm) writes:
>
>>    (2) Do you have any comments on AIX vs. System V?
>
>IBM is wasting their time. System V is so far advanced and accepted that
>IBM has no chance of catching up. Unless AIX has some very advanced and
>useful features, it's a waste of everybody's time.

This is not necessarily true.  Although System V is definitly "advanced",
the emergence of the POSIX standards should give time for IBM, and the OSF
in general, to catch up.  

I think you will see a new trend in the industry soon--"I want more value 
to my operating system: make it standard".  Already the users have been 
asking for this, and various national and international standards are now 
emerging to make this possible.

What does this mean for AIX and System V?  System V will have to take a
step back and make the system "standard".  Once they do that then thay can
move forward again, building new things into their system.  However, there
is a new organization, Unix International, which is responsible for
sheparding the development of System V.  UI may well slow the advance of
System V to assure that various standards are met, or at least moving in
single direction, rather than growing like an ameoba.

This slow down will allow AIX and other vendors to catch up in the game.
Although AT&T has a lot of clout, there is still plenty of room for growth
in the marketplace.  AIX can use the time which AT&T is using to regroup to
build a POSIX conforming system of their own.  Obviously, it will still be
new, and probably somewhat buggy, but there should be a number of immediate
users (namely all of the members of OSF) who can shake out the system.

It will be interesting to see what happens, but I don't think it will be
quite as cut and dried as stated above.

-- 
Mark H. Colburn                          mark at jhereg.mn.org
Minnetech Consulting, Inc.