Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!ucsd!helios.ee.lbl.gov!nosc!crash!pnet01!jca
From: jca@pnet01.cts.com (John C. Archambeau)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: PC UNIces
Message-ID: <976@crash.cts.com>
Date: 24 Dec 89 03:16:02 GMT
Sender: root@crash.cts.com
Organization: People-Net [pnet01], El Cajon CA
Lines: 55

rcd@ico.isc.com (Dick Dunn) writes:
>In article <841@crash.cts.com>, jca@pnet01.cts.com (John C. Archambeau) writes:
>[discussion of nonexistence of PC BSD deleted]
>
>> Why SCO and various other makers of PC-Unix license from AT&T instead of BSD
>> is a mystery to me, but that's the way it works in the PC domain.
>
>Well, let me try to remove the mystery.  You can like it or not; that's
>your choice, but here's why:  They want to sell their systems.  It's really
>that simple.
>
>Because they want to sell their systems (preferably lots of them; helps
>stay in business:-) they want to sell to businesses...or to resellers who
>will sell to end users, but in that case the reseller is the business.
>Now, try to put yourself in the wingtip oxfords and three-piece of a good
>conservative businessman:  Do you buy the system based on a Real Product
>from a Real Business like AT&T, one which will Surely Stand Behind Its
>Products...or do you buy one based on some stuff out of a university, built
>by some longhair kids who'll be gone as soon as they graduate?  (It's a
>joke, son...don't bother flaming.  Yes, I know that, e.g., McKusick has
>been at Berkeley far longer than the average senior technical person stays
>at one job in industry.)
>
>In other words, it's the perception that the system is a product that has
>sold AT&T.  I suppose that another plausible view is that using an AT&T
>system as a base offers more opportunity for a VAR to add value.

You're forgetting something, Sun MicroSystems broke the rules and licensed
from BSD.  SunOS is all BSD 4.3 based with SysV compatable libraries.  And the
funny thing is that Sun hogs a lot of the market.  I find it funny that Jobs
is trying to crossbreed a Sun-3 and a Mac to make his NeXT box.  I also find
it funnier than CBM and Atari are making their own rendition of a Sun 3/80. 
Of course, I am biased since I work for a Sun VAR, but then again.  I also am
Pro-SCO, just wish they did everything more BSD.  Also, remember, BSD put
TCP/IP into Unix, AT&T did not.  Networking is a big business and if you are
going to need TCP/IP, why not have a kernel that supports it intrinsically? 
That's the exact logic that I think Sun followed and they damn near own the
NFS market.

It is a good explanation, nice try, but somebody broke the rules and came out
as a major player in the Unix workstation market.

Of course, nobody's going to give a damn after BSD and SysV are merged and
crossbred into the next generation Unix.
 
     // JCA

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