Unix optimized for SPARC? (really just more OSF babble)

[Barry Shein]

Fascinating data point!

IBM negotiated an "in perpetuity" SysVR2 license with ATT.

OSF will use IBM's AIX as a base for their Unix.

Put those together and everything becomes *much* more clear, thanks!

As to newcomers needing licenses I would guess that they can choose
between buying whatever is current from AT&T and then applying for an
OSF license or simply become some sort of OSF redistributor, perhaps
that's the loophole, sublicensing under OSF's license, so anyone
joining up with OSF can basically negotiate T&C's with OSF and AT&T is
a minor factor.

I know that AT&T sold (pricey) licenses which allowed various
sublicensing, tho I thought that was basically binary-only
sublicensing, then again, make your changes within the auspices of OSF
itself and have them sublicense the changes back to you, as long as
ownership of the changes remains within the foundation that should be
legitimate and it serves the "sharing" aspect to some extent
(somewhere everyone has to get his/her head into an appropriate noose,
that's typical in these joint technology ventures, having to
sublicense your own changes from the foundation sounds about right.)
It also explains a little more clearly why OSF needs the development
facilities they seem to be building.

If all that's close to correct things are starting to make a lot more
sense.

	-Barry Shein, Boston University