Re: Free system that could be "real Unix".

[Stephane CHAZELAS]

2007-10-16, 14:00(-07), mike3:
> On Oct 14, 8:06 pm, Christopher Browne <cbbro...@acm.org> wrote:
>> After takin a swig o' Arrakan spice grog, mike3 <mike4...@yahoo.com> belched 
>> out:
> <snip>
>> > Well the thing I was asking more about was making a system
>> > that would be "real Unix" in the sense that it would be *capable
>> > of passing* such evaluations -- so it would be "real Unix" in all
>> > but the legal sense (ie. what you can market it as) (unless of
>> > course all the money needed to get certification was paid.).
>>
>> I *think* that STREAMS would need to be added in order to pass the
>> official tests.  That might no longer be true, but I think it was, at
>> one time...
>>
>
> Well, I could not check the recent SUS (Single UNIX Specification),
> since to get a copy would cost $250 (!). I don't have that kind of
> free
> money on hand yet to blow on it.
[...]

???

SUSv3 can be freely browsed from
http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/toc.htm
and downloaded from
http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/download

And you can even download a debian package with the full HTML
doc for both susv2 and susv3 from any debian mirror.

But it's true the CDROM version would cost $250 for some reason
(?!).

>
>> >> The biggest *change,* as far as I was last aware, that would be needed
>> >> would be to introduce the STREAMS abstraction, which both BSD and
>> >> Linux folk have generally eshewed.
>>
>> > What was so bad about it, anyway, that they didn't like it?
>>
>> There was an implementation:
>>   <http://www.gcom.com/linux/lis/>

See also Fast-STREAMS (its replacement) from the openss7 project
and there also exist commercial versions both in user and kernel
space.

[...]
> Hmm. Could this mean then that perhaps it is _better_ that the
> Free systems are not "real Unix" in the sense of 100% compliance
> with the SUS? Then what is all this stuff about "Real Unix = power",
> anyway?

STREAMS is optional in SUS including for systems claiming XSI
(X/Open System Interface). See
http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/help/codes.html#XSR
http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/basedefs/xbd_chap02.html#tag_02_01_04

-- 
Stéphane