Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!aplcen!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!usc!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!pt.cs.cmu.edu!andrew.cmu.edu!+ From: Rick.Rashid@CS.CMU.EDU Newsgroups: comp.os.mach Subject: Re: Two MACH questions Message-ID: Date: 12 Jan 90 14:46:25 GMT References: <35878@cornell.UUCP> Sender: rfr@NATASHA.MACH.CS.CMU.EDU Distribution: comp Organization: Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA Lines: 22 In-Reply-To: <35878@cornell.UUCP> CMU does plan to make the Mach kernel (without Unix compatibility support) available without external licenses. This kernel has been running at CMU for over a year and is now up on Vax, Sun 3 and PMAX platforms. CMU has two projects ongoing to provide binary Unix compatibility for the pure Mach kernel. The first to be completed is based on a single Mach task with many internal cthreads and a complementary transparent shared library. It is fully compatible with the 4.3bsd binaries which ran on earlier versions of Mach and runs on Vax, Sun 3 and PMAX platforms on the pure Mach kernel. A second effort to build a restructured OS environment which would also support BSD Unix is also underway. That system splits all key OS functions into separate servers whose functions are largely generic (i.e. independent of Unix functionality) and would be usable for a variety of OS environments. Current plans have us distributing the pure kernel with the single server Unix environment to outside research groups in late spring. Access to the Unix server would still require Berkeley licensing but access to the kernel itself, Mach libraries, etc. would not. -Rick