Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cbmvax!daveh
From: daveh@cbmvax.UUCP (Dave Haynie)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Apple System 7.0
Message-ID: <6834@cbmvax.UUCP>
Date: 11 May 89 17:38:56 GMT
References: <24279@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA
Lines: 46

in article <24279@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>, lauac@mead.qal.berkeley.edu (Alexander Lau) says:

> Does an Amiga have inter-process communications, 

Of course, every real multitasking operating system has some kind of IPC.  The
whole Amiga system, from the low levels on up, is designed around things like
messages.  For instance, how do you get a block of data off a disk?  You prepare
a message, and send that message to the task that governs access to that disk.
You wait, consuming 0 cpu time, until the job has been performed, at which point
your task is signaled to wake up, and the message is returned with the data you
requested.  Of course, it's not necessary for your task to go to sleep while
waiting for data from some I/O device, if you've got other work to do in the
meantime.

>built-in e-mail features, 

No more built-in than UNIX.  I know several folks who are using UUCP mail quite
happily, TODAY.

> virtual memory up to 4 gigabytes, 

While no one's actually written a virtual driver for the Amiga yet, we do have
systems with MMUs out, and the OS supports 4 meg addressing, TODAY.

>an optional UNIX-like operating system 

It's called AMIX.  AT&T's UNIX System V, Release 3.1 is another name for it.  That's
not UNIX-like, that's UNIX.  So is AU/X, I hear.

> and a large educational pricing campaign?

Apple probably has the best educational marketing, if not marketing in general,
of any company.  Even IBM found they had to actually build high-performance
hardware instead of just resting on their name.

> Just wondering,

Glad to be of some help.

> --- Alex
> UUCP: {att,backbones}!ucbvax!qal.berkeley.edu!lauac
> INTERNET: lauac%qal.berkeley.edu@ucbvax.berkeley.edu
-- 
Dave Haynie  "The 32 Bit Guy"     Commodore-Amiga  "The Crew That Never Rests"
   {uunet|pyramid|rutgers}!cbmvax!daveh      PLINK: D-DAVE H     BIX: hazy
              Amiga -- It's not just a job, it's an obsession