UNIX standard

[Moderator, John S. Quarterman]

From: uunet!wlbr.eaton.com!etn-rad!jru (John Unekis)

In article <150 at longway.TIC.COM>:
>From: jmb at patton.SGI.COM (Jim Barton)
>
>In article <147 at longway.TIC.COM>:
>> From: uunet!wlbr.eaton.com!etn-rad!jru (John Unekis)
>> 
>>    We recently had some SUN reps come to give a presentation about SPARC.
>>    They were strongly suggesting that due to their relationship with AT&T
>>    (that is AT&T will soon sell SPARC) it will soon be the case that if you
>>    are not a SPARC machine you will not *really* be UNIX compatible. They
>
>Finally, think about a sales organization that would send their salepeople
>out with such a story.  You are obviously concerned by it, and see the 
.....
  I realized after posting this article that it sounded critical of SUN,
  and might result in some flames in their direction. That was not at all
  my intention. SUN is an excellent company, and thay have always supported 
  us well. My question was actually more concerned with the future of UNIX
  as an open standard. Obviously keeping UNIX open is a double edged sword 
  for AT&T, they gain great credit as the source of the most widely accepted
  non-hardware dependent OS, but does it really benefit the sales of their
  machines? If AT&T were ever to pick a hardware standard as the basis for
  a product dependent UNIX, the SPARC would be an excellent choice. The 
  real question, I suppose, is can an open standard like UNIX really survive
  in today's feircely competitive marketplace?

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  Any opinions expressed above are mine only. {ihnp4 or voder}!wlbr!etn-rad!jru

Volume-Number: Volume 13, Number 38