Well, you've obviously researched it more than I care to. I guess this is what I am thinking of: "The NT POSIX subsystem was included with the first versions of Windows NT because of 1980s US federal government requirements listed in Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) 151-2.[1] Briefly, these documents required that certain types of government purchases be POSIX-compliant, so that if Windows NT had not included this subsystem, computing systems based on it would not have been eligible for some government contracts. Windows NT versions 3.5, 3.51 and 4.0 were certified as compliant with FIPS 151-2." -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_POSIX_subsystem (and more or less as you say)
Some history here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_wars Charles -----Original Message----- From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Timothy Sipples Sent: Tuesday, April 14, 2020 10:59 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: Any shop use UNIX in a production job? Charles Mills wrote: >A trivia question: Which of these is UNIX? Windows Server or Linux? I replied: >Neither. Charles Mills then replied: >Which *used to be* UNIX? Still neither. I can find no evidence that Microsoft ever obtained a UNIX(TM) certification for any Windows operating system or even obtained a license for UNIX source code from AT&T or another authorized party specifically to ship any subsystem or product on/for Windows.(*) However, Microsoft evidently would not have been upset if you thought otherwise. :-) Here's the thumbnail history as I understand it. Back in 1996 a company called Softway Systems (later renamed Interix) shipped a product called OpenNT for Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. OpenNT apparently was written "cleanroom," meaning that it didn't license or use UNIX source code from AT&T or another authorized party. OpenNT was a POSIX subsystem, and at some point -- possibly starting pre-Microsoft -- it was POSIX certified. Meanwhile, Microsoft separately developed the "Microsoft POSIX subsystem" and included it in early releases of Windows NT. Microsoft did this to get FIPS 151-2 certification so that the U.S. federal government could consider Windows NT for more of its acquisitions. Later, Microsoft acquired Interix, updated the technology, positioned it as a replacement for their own POSIX subsystem, and renamed the technology in this sequence: "Microsoft Windows Services for UNIX" (sometimes "Unix" in references) then "Windows Subsystem for UNIX-based Applications." However, these products/subsystems were never certified as UNIX(TM) either. The preposition "for" in their names is quite meaningful and doing a lot of heavy lifting. Initially Microsoft's versions were separately chargeable, and then at the very end they were no additional charge downloads. In a completely separate effort, David Korn created UWIN, which is an X/Open library and set of utilities for Win32. UWIN isn't UNIX(TM) either. Ironically, AT&T, UNIX's inventor, now distributes UWIN's source code -- but that doesn't make it UNIX(TM) either: https://github.com/att/uwin OK, so that was/is Microsoft Windows. In fact Microsoft has distributed a bona fide UNIX operating system in the past: XENIX (also sometimes written Xenix). XENIX was definitely a genuine UNIX(TM) operating system. Microsoft licensed AT&T's UNIX source code (Version 7 then later System V), and XENIX also includes bits of BSD. The Santa Cruz Operation (SCO) eventually acquired exclusive rights to XENIX, and that branch of the very, very complicated UNIX family tree essentially died out, losing out to SCO UNIX. But during much of the 1980s Microsoft XENIX from its various OEMs (including IBM) was the most popular UNIX(TM) distribution. (*) The UNIX trademark owner made/makes the final call. - - - - - - - - - - Timothy Sipples I.T. Architect Executive Digital Asset & Other Industry Solutions IBM Z & LinuxONE - - - - - - - - - - E-Mail: [email protected] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
