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From: Terry Lambert <terry@lambert.org>
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc,comp.unix.solaris,comp.unix.aix
Subject: Re: ISP hardware/software choices (performance comparison)
Date: 15 Jan 1996 19:24:39 GMT
Organization: Utah Valley State College, Orem, Utah
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Casper.Dik@Holland.Sun.COM (Casper H.S. Dik - Network Security Engineer) wrote:
] >They were until Sun bought out their license for SVR4 sources
] >so that their code could diverge again.
]
] If SVR4 was the one and only other Unix, you would have a point.
] But that's simply not the case.
What other commercial UNIX is there? BSDI is commercial, but
it doesn't have X/Open certification to use the trademark.
] Besides, it's the API that counts, not what's under the hood.
I can see we have radically different world views. I would have
said the exact opposite. Any idiot can implement an API.
] >BTW: it would be legal for Sun to put the SVR4 code they bought
] >out up for anonymous FTP.
]
] Legal, I'm not even sure if that.
It's legal. They have full rights to the code they bought out;
it was one of the topics of discussion at Novell/USG when the
sale went.
] But shareholders could very well sue. (You bought something
] for hundreds of millions of dollars and you're now *giving*
] it away ??!?!?)
What Sun bought was a royalty buy-out, not technology. At least
that's how Sun should be looking at it.
At the price they paid, they have several years to go if they
amortize it as an "investment".
Really, they should consider it a fixed cost so they don't
penalize their marketing of Solaris by inflating the price
to cover the buy-out. Otherwise, they've really gained nothing
under the purchase, and *then* the shareholders should sue. The
real point is to drop the street price of Solaris, and that's
something that should happen *now* instead of after the royalty
buyout costs have been amortized.
Just some friendly observations.
] >Uh, the Usenix VFS papers were all based on SunOS.
]
] Which make them fall in Sun's camp, not BSD or SVR4.
Right. Makinging them *not* attributable to SVR4. I never
argued for a BSD camp origin, only *against* a SVR4 origin.
Terry Lambert
terry@cs.weber.edu
---
Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present
or previous employers.