Sunday, November 30, 2008
Thursday, November 27, 2008
unix
The Creation of the UNIX* Operating System
After three decades of use, the UNIX* computer operating system from Bell Labs is still regarded as one of the most powerful, versatile, and flexible operating systems (OS) in the computer world. Its popularity is due to many factors, including its ability to run a wide variety of machines, from micros to supercomputers, and its portability -- all of which led to its adoption by many manufacturers.
Like another legendary creature whose name also ends in 'x,' UNIX rose from the ashes of a multi-organizational effort in the early 1960s to develop a dependable timesharing operating system.
The joint effort was not successful, but a few survivors from Bell Labs tried again, and what followed was a system that offers its users a work environment that has been described as "of unusual simplicity, power, and elegance...."
unix
UNIX is an operating system which was first developed in the 1960s, and has been under constant development ever since. By operating system, we mean the suite of programs which make the computer work. It is a stable, multi-user, multi-tasking system for servers, desktops and laptops.
UNIX systems also have a graphical user interface (GUI) similar to Microsoft Windows which provides an easy to use environment. However, knowledge of UNIX is required for operations which aren't covered by a graphical program, or for when there is no windows interface available, for example, in a telnet session.
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
UNIX is being attacked by Linux from the top and bottom ends of the market. The signs are that it is losing the battle on both fronts.
A couple of weeks back I wrote that Linux is becoming increasingly capable of doing the less-demanding tasks that UNIX has historically been asked to do, so there is less and less need for UNIX. That explains its falling share of the server market.
But what about the more demanding tasks? The kinds of tasks that are set by industrial facilities, research institutes, universities and meteorological forecasting centers. The kind of mind-bogglingly complicated tasks, in fact, that require the most powerful supercomputers in the world?
unix
The Open Group holds the definition of what a UNIX system is and its associated trademark in trust for the industry.
In 1994 Novell (who had acquired the UNIX systems business of AT&T/USL) decided to get out of that business. Rather than sell the business as a single entity, Novell transferred the rights to the UNIX trademark and the specification (that subsequently became the Single UNIX Specification) to The Open Group (at the time X/Open Company). Subsequently, it sold the source code and the product implementation (UNIXWARE) to SCO. The Open Group also owns the trademark UNIXWARE, transferred to them from SCO more recently.
Today, the definition of UNIX ® takes the form of the worldwide Single UNIX Specification integrating X/Open Company's XPG4, IEEE's POSIX Standards and ISO C. Through continual evolution, the Single UNIX Specification is the defacto and dejure standard definition for the UNIX system application programming interfaces. As the owner of the UNIX trademark, The Open Group has separated the UNIX trademark from any actual code stream itself, thus allowing multiple implementations. Since the introduction of the Single UNIX Specification, there has been a single, open, consensus specification that defines the requirements for a conformant UNIX system.
There is also a mark, or brand, that is used to identify those products that have been certified as conforming to the Single UNIX Specification, initially UNIX 93, followed subsequently by UNIX 95, UNIX 98 and now UNIX 03.
Monday, November 24, 2008
personal
The Personal area network (PAN) is a computer network used for communication with one or more computers in networks. Some examples of devices that are used in a PAN are printers, fax machines, telephones, PDAs and scanners. The reach of a PAN is typically about 20-30 feet (approximately 6-9 meters), but this is expected to increase with technology improvements.
cool
Windows Server 2008 is the first Windows operating system to ship with Windows PowerShell, Microsoft's new extensible command line shell and task-based scripting technology.[8] PowerShell is based on object-oriented programming and version 2.0 of the Microsoft .NET Framework and includes more than 120 system administration utilities, consistent syntax and naming conventions, and built-in capabilities to work with common management data such as the Windows Registry, certificate store, or Windows Management Instrumentation. PowerShell's scripting language was specifically designed for IT administration, and can be used in place of cmd.exe and Windows Script Host.