Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mcsun!hp4nl!star.cs.vu.nl!ast
From: ast@cs.vu.nl (Andy Tanenbaum)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: Re: OSF/1 kernel
Message-ID: <8587@star.cs.vu.nl>
Date: 22 Dec 90 15:13:40 GMT
References: <28990@usc>
Sender: news@cs.vu.nl
Organization: Fac. Wiskunde & Informatica, VU, Amsterdam
Lines: 25

In article <28990@usc> kjh@pollux.usc.edu (Kenneth J. Hendrickson) writes:
>It also listed the cost to get a copy of this [i.e. OSF/1]
>software.  I seem to remember $5000 for a single user license w/o any
>source code!
>
>I'm not sure, but I thought that maybe OSF == GNU.  Please correct me if
>I'm wrong.  If this is true, I don't have any hope for a free full
>V.4/BSD Unix ever coming out.  (I sincerly hope I'm wrong.)

Consider yourself corrected.

   Axiom 1.  GNU = FSF
   Axiom 2.  OSF != FSF
   Theorem 1. OSF != GNU
   Proof 1.  Trivial.

Is the price for a single binary license $5000?  I find this impossible
to swallow.  I might believe $500 and I would certainly believe $50.
Anybody know the Truth?

Last I heard, FSF was contemplating writing a UNIX server on top of Mach
3.0.  Since all Mach 3.0 provides is communication services, all they have
to do is rewrite most of BSD from scratch.

Andy Tanenbaum (ast@cs.vu.nl)