How Unix made it to the top • Hacker News Board

Re: How Unix made it to the top

#31

Post by xorcist » Sun, Dec 18, 2016, 9:34 AM UTC

pmontra wrote: post #30

coldtea wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, the meaningful way for UNIX (and Linux) to succeed as a popular product, according to the aspirations of its proponents, was on the desktop. It wasn't just about the server side back then (late 90s, early 00s) it was all about taking over Windows. If somebody uses some hardware product (e.g. set top box) and doesn't know its Linux, then it's no big win for the Linux community. And it's not just necessarily that…

The only successful desktop UNIX derivative is MacOS. That ship has sailed. However the most relevant computing devices for consumers are phones and tablets nowadays, not desktops. UNIX derivatives run almost all of them. Big success, I'd say. UNIX derivatives are running most servers too and are making inroads into the Windows desktop. The outlook is good unless a new popular market suddenly open with no meaningful…

Chromebooks are very successful, outselling MacOS desktops in 2016. They run a pretty standard Linux environment.

I don't think anyone thought Linux to take over the office desktop by mass porting office applications but by moving them to the web. That shift is still happening.

Re: How Unix made it to the top

#32

Post by coldtea » Sun, Dec 18, 2016, 9:45 AM UTC

xorcist wrote: post #31

pmontra wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only successful desktop UNIX derivative is MacOS. That ship has sailed. However the most relevant computing devices for consumers are phones and tablets nowadays, not desktops. UNIX derivatives run almost all of them. Big success, I'd say. UNIX derivatives are running most servers too and are making inroads into the Windows desktop. The outlook is good unless a new popular market suddenly open with no meaningful…

Chromebooks are very successful, outselling MacOS desktops in 2016. They run a pretty standard Linux environment. I don't think anyone thought Linux to take over the office desktop by mass porting office applications but by moving them to the web. That shift is still happening.

>Chromebooks are very successful, outselling MacOS desktops in 2016.

That's still products from multiple vendors (Dell, HP, and Lenovo, Asus?, etc) narrowingly beating sales from a single vendor.

And that (a) in a year when the single vendor had stalled updating their product line, and (b) with the Chromebooks being much cheaper, and more mass market, offerings.

So this speaks more to the slow sales of Chromebooks during the previous years than some major breakthrough.

Re: How Unix made it to the top

#33

Post by deaddodo » Sun, Dec 18, 2016, 9:49 AM UTC

cperciva wrote: post #11

hyperhopper wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well that was the intended wordplay. Although it is a shame that for end users Unix is still nowhere near the top of any popularity metric.

How do you define "popularity"? UNIX is found in many devices end users don't think of as being "computers" at all. The best software is the software users don't even realize is there, because it just works .

> UNIX is found in many devices end users don't think of as being "computers" at all.

No, Linux is.

http://kernelbook.sourceforge.net/pdf/ch-intro.pdf

Some devices run BSD derivatives, but I'd still hesitate to call those Unix vs derived from Unix.

Re: How Unix made it to the top

#34

Post by deaddodo » Sun, Dec 18, 2016, 9:50 AM UTC

nine_k wrote: post #4

hyperhopper wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well that was the intended wordplay. Although it is a shame that for end users Unix is still nowhere near the top of any popularity metric.

Unix kernel is hugely popular: think of the millions of Android devices. Unix userland, not so much, outside the software engineering community.

Android doesn't run a Unix kernel. Hell, Linux isn't even all that compatible with Unix outside of POSIX.

http://kernelbook.sourceforge.net/pdf/ch-intro.pdf

Re: How Unix made it to the top

#35

Post by deaddodo » Sun, Dec 18, 2016, 9:52 AM UTC

lisivka wrote: post #20

hasenj wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't iPhones and iPads also have a UNIX kernel?

It's complicated. Original UNIX by AT&T was newer open-sourced. BSD (Berkley Software Distribution) was opensource distribution of user programs for UNIX (like TCP/IP stack, vi editor, etc.), used by original UNIX, with proportions 20% of AT&T code and 80% of BSD code. So technically, BSD is(0.8) not(0.2) UNIX. FreeBSD is branched from BSD code, so it is(0.8) not(0.2) UNIX too. Apple MacOS X is based on FreeBSD code…

He asked about the Kernel. The Kernel is XNU / Mach, modified to act like a monolithic/hybrid kernel. The BSD code in Mac OS X is all user space, much of which probably isn't in iOS at all.

Re: How Unix made it to the top

#36

Post by squarefoot » Sun, Dec 18, 2016, 10:00 AM UTC

nine_k wrote: post #4

hyperhopper wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well that was the intended wordplay. Although it is a shame that for end users Unix is still nowhere near the top of any popularity metric.

Unix kernel is hugely popular: think of the millions of Android devices. Unix userland, not so much, outside the software engineering community.

"Unix kernel is hugely popular: think of the millions of Android devices."

You probably meant Linux, not Unix. Unix is an entire class of operating systems, not a kernel. Nitpicking aside, the huge problem here is that popularity means nothing if the user is not aware of what he/she is using, so I would rephrase that as "the Linux kernel is hugely widespread ...". There is still a big problem though: Android is mostly closed, at least all vital device drivers are, so that you have no chances to build a working non Android environment on newer devices or patch old ones, move an installation from a device to a different one etc. Having a Linux kernel does not help in this context since all benefits the FOSS community infused into the system were stripped away. I would dare to say that telling people that Android contains a Linux kernel is even dangerous to the Linux image.

Re: How Unix made it to the top

#37

Post by chris_wot » Sun, Dec 18, 2016, 10:14 AM UTC

old-gregg wrote: post #13

> It didn't seem like a very good idea for us to be keeping records from > the inner sanctum of the corporation on a computer where most everybody > had super-user privileges. A call to the PR guy convinced him of the > wisdom of keeping such things on their own premises. And so the CEO's > office bought a Unix system. ... and this is exactly how it works today with SaaS subscriptions, except root-privileged people d…

Why do you think Qlik has been so successful?

Re: How Unix made it to the top

#38

Post by chris_wot » Sun, Dec 18, 2016, 10:20 AM UTC

TrumpVoter12345 wrote: post #17

dhosek wrote: post #8

I learned TeX back in 1984 because I wanted a word processor which would put footnotes at the bottom of the page.

I learned TeX because it was fucking gorgeous.

Who is this Gorgeous? And what does it have to do with TeX?

Re: How Unix made it to the top

#39

Post by kgwgk » Sun, Dec 18, 2016, 10:22 AM UTC

user5994461 wrote: post #7

elchief wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ya no one uses mac or BSD

Indeed, noone uses BSD. Is mac considered as a Unix? I think it'd be considered as its own thing by now.

UNIX® Certified Products http://www.opengroup.org/openbrand/register/

Re: How Unix made it to the top

#40

Post by kgwgk » Sun, Dec 18, 2016, 10:24 AM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #27

hasenj wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't iPhones and iPads also have a UNIX kernel?

They do, and a certified one at that. Android phone's doesn't, as Linux is not technically a UNIX (doesn't derive from the original UNIX codebase in any way.

I don't think iOS is a certified UNIX, is it?