Talk:Xenix

message: I remember a presentation in 1999 of the editor of the Linux Journal playing up a number of Microsoft ads from the early to mid 1980s where Bill Gates states that he is convinced that UNIX was the best Operating System around. Not entirely unbelieveable: DOS not only survived, but thrived despite both MS's & IBM's best attempts otherwise. And I suspect MS would like to forget their involvement in this 30-year-old technology; best reason for the changes I made to the relevant articles. -- llywrch 03:02 Mar 14, 2003 (UTC)
:Truth be told, this is not a simple tale and I doubt there is much shame at MS over their long UNIX history (only perhaps a bit of marketing spin to keep consumers focused on Windows). There have long been rumours Gates recommended Xenix to IBM for the PC but was flatly turned down since MS was but a licensee of AT&T, IBM's biggest potential competitor at the time (the AT&T breakup was looming and with it, AT&T's entry into the computer market). Gates then offered CP/M, but the IBM guys didn't negotiate well with DR and came back to Gates still looking for an OS so at last he scrounged and came up with Quick 'n Dirty, which was about his last easy option. MS/PC-DOS, even cleaned up, was utterly primitive compared to Xenix, but its fast, unprotected calls and wide open structure worked well for games too and licensing costs were nill. When he realized how much money could be made on an open hardware platform with a light OS (program launcher, really) that MS owned outright and which met a cheap, marketable standard (which included "hackability" for lucrative games), he went with the market (never mind the pressures of MS having gone public after the IBM deal) and the public ultimately bought the cheapest OS available- MS-DOS. There are also rumours one of the many reasons Paul Allen left MS was his unhappiness with the shift in focus away from UNIX-like products (MS had been a small but respected language vendor edging into UNIX for the low end mini-computer market before its meeting with destiny and IBM). Meanwhile by 1987 Microsoft's Xenix was still the most widely installed form of UNIX in the world: MS-DOS, OS/2 and NT were all fundamentally influenced by it. Early Windows was built on Xenix boxes. In effect, internally MS was a UNIX shop until 1993. Gates was still preaching the virtues of UNIX as late as 1996 and even claiming that NT was (in a "weak" sense, his word) a form of UNIX. Microsoft's gradual withdrawl from the UNIX market likely made it many more billions than it would have made otherwise but also left a wide open opportunity for Linux and later the BSDs to attract the markets MS left untended. Meanwhile MS bought/licensed/stole imitated the best, cheaply implemented the spoils and along with some cunning business practices shoved them into the market pipeline which by 1995 or so it utterly dominated. Gwen Gale 19:01, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Microsoft and UNIX 

message: To me at least this article doesn't make clear the the SCO here is "old SCO" —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.45.4.118 (talk • contribs) 10:09, April 16, 2006 (UTC)
<daniel@nelxe.dk>: I think that Microsoft actually used to own Santa Cruz Operation....so they didn't really abandon the UNIX efforts...SCO released SCO Unix..
---
Microsoft wound up getting partial ownership of (old) SCO for what I'd understood to be non-payment of bills. I don't think it was ever more than 1/3rd.
Microsoft owned 20% of The Santa Cruz Operation as of 1988. They invested in SCO and this allowed them to, by 1989, effectively exit the UNIX business while still generating revenue through their investment in SCO and royalties.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ldimershein (talk • contribs) 04:08, 11 June 2018 (UTC)
replies: text:  Yeah, I've been working on the Altos page and articles about the 586/8600 (e.g. ) do talk of something that sounds like virtual memory (using 4K pages), with swapping to disk supported as well, but without demand paging. They almost certainly had an external MMU (as the whole Altos 8086 arch wasn't PC compatible, e.g. it used an 8089 for I/O). But details about the MMU are very scarce; I'm guessing it was all discrete. Someone not using his real name (talk) 15:49, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text:  I was able to find out that another 8086 Xenix-dedicated machine, called Nabu 1600 had an external MMU (board) , so most likely Altos had something similar. Unfortunately, while I can find block diagrams for the Altos 8000 on the net (in its manuals), there aren't any for the 8600 (on the net.) Someone not using his real name (talk) 15:59, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

text:  Seattle Computer for example offered a MMU board to go with their 8086 CPU board , which they even say were used (in combination) in their own Xenix computer. Someone not using his real name (talk) 16:04, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

text:  Here are the schematics of the Nabu. The last 4 page or so are the MMU (made of discrete ICs). Someone not using his real name (talk) 16:51, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

text: When you say I have never heard of Microsoft selling XENIX, I think it depends on what you mean by selling. I believe that in most (all?) cases, Microsoft didn't sell Xenix directly to end-users, they would sell it via hardware manufacturers (such as IBM). So most Xenix end-users didn't directly purchase Xenix from Microsoft, they bought it from the vendor of their hardware (OEM). (This wasn't unique to Xenix, but was common to many Microsoft products; MS-DOS was only sold to OEMs for the first (almost) ten years of its existence, and couldn't be bought retail until 1991; most home computer users who used Microsoft Basic never bought it from Microsoft, it came with their computer; etc.) SJK (talk) 09:54, 10 July 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  SCO & 8086 MMUs 

message: The 1983 date for the port is probably a "it worked then" kind of date. By 29 May 1984 they only had a beta to give out for PC Magazine to review. Since IBM did not distribute Xenix for the XT (they distributed PC/IX instead), SCO would have had to sell Xenix for the XT as shrink-wrapped (or at least mail order direct). So it must have had some clear shipping date sometime in 1984, but I'm unable to find it. It's also possible that the PC Magazine review was delayed a fair bit because it appeared in a themed number, with QNX and Idris also reviewed in it. (The June 12 issue of PC Mag then reviewed PC/IX, uNETix, Venix and Coherent.) Someone not using his real name (talk) 03:16, 22 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: When you say I have never heard of Microsoft selling XENIX, I think it depends on what you mean by selling. I believe that in most (all?) cases, Microsoft didn't sell Xenix directly to end-users, they would sell it via hardware manufacturers (such as IBM). So most Xenix end-users didn't directly purchase Xenix from Microsoft, they bought it from the vendor of their hardware (OEM). (This wasn't unique to Xenix, but was common to many Microsoft products; MS-DOS was only sold to OEMs for the first (almost) ten years of its existence, and couldn't be bought retail until 1991; most home computer users who used Microsoft Basic never bought it from Microsoft, it came with their computer; etc.) SJK (talk) 09:54, 10 July 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  SCO Xenix for PC ship date? 

message: I've added a little information on the later descendants of Xenix (SCO UNIX and OpenServer) and a redirect from OpenServer, but the information is pretty sparse.  Anyone who knows more about this should add to the article.  (I know, I know, SCO is "evil" these days - I run Linux myself - but that doesn't mean Wikipedia shouldn't list information about them.) Beinsane 00:02, 3 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Xenix descendants 

message: I removed this section, which previously said, in full: "Microsoft Pascal Compiler for the 286 XENIX Operating System (didn't support 386 extentions". I considered cleaning it to: "Microsoft Pascal Compiler for the 286 Xenix Operating System (did not support 386 extensions)" but then considered the section was too sparse to stand alone. If anyone can flesh out the section with other software available then feel free to add it back in. Pelago 22:25, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Available Microsoft XENIX Software 

message: "There were 33 institutions on Ferentz's 1975 list of users; there were 138 in September 1976, 37 of them outside the U.S. And, in 1977, Interactive Systems (Santa Monica, CA) became the first company to support Unix commercially. It was soon followed by Human Computing Resources in Toronto."
http://www.byte.com/art/9410/sec8/art3.htm —The preceding unsigned comment was added by NevilleDNZ (talk • contribs) 13:27, 30 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, ISC did PC/IX (and other things) for IBM (totally independent of Xenix from all accounts), but it's not clear what HCR did. Also Venix was available for the XT before either PC/IX or Xenix were. Someone not using his real name (talk) 04:03, 22 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: ISC did IS/1 before that: a value-added V6 Unix for the PDP-11. QVVERTYVS (hm?) 16:13, 22 February 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Byte article from May 1994 

message: I worked in a Tandy Computer Centre around 1985. I took to Xenix in a big way and ended up collecting a few of The Tandy's. I also ended up with a lot of manuals. (All gone now..) The TRS-80 Model 16a - 16b were 8" floppy. The first Xenix I could find (I ended up working in Tandy Australia's Head Office - Doing Computer Support) Was Version 7. Not System III. Version 7 shipped with TRS-80 Model 16a's. 16b's were sold with the Version 7 and needed to be upgraded to System III when it became available. I would say that all Tandy Model 6000's (the last in the range) were sold with System III. Althought the earlier System 7 would operate. There were subtle hardware differences between the 2 models. Therefore System III seemed the better choice. Also the system 7 implementation plain and simple had more issues. The System III version had more bells and whistles. Of course developement systems were available to both flavours of Xenix. The source of both versions contained SCO and Microsoft ownership messages. So SCO and Microsoft were involved in Xenix pre System III. I also had an early Tandy Xenix manual that described the proceedure for bootstrapping Xenix on a PDP11 from a tape backup unit. It was supplied as a guide with one of the early tandy units I picked up. That unit was running 8" winchester 8MB hard disks from memory. But the manual wasn't relevant to use to boot with. It was more as a early system admin guide. I think some of this needs to be mentioned. The earlier versions of Xenix were supplied on 8" floppy. No one mentioned Cromemco? When we were selling the TRS-80 Model 16a (for AU $10k basic system) the Cromemco was our nearest competitor in cost terms?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.173.51.90 (talk) 05:58, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Early Xenix Versions not mentioned in article 

message: Intel made computers? Intel is a chipmaker, I don't think they ever made a complete computer therefore why would they OEM Xenix???  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.185.28.136 (talk) 02:58, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Intel Made Computers, so there! 96.231.227.127 (talk) 00:58, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Intel? 

message: Does anyone care about non-technical information about Xenix, such as that from a SCO price list?  I'm trying to throw away some old literature from the Xenix days, and don't want to discard anything that historians might consider to be useful some day.  The pricelist includes, for example, the list of hardware manufacturers and models for which Xenix distributions were available in November 1, 1987, the products available for each, and the prices, which differed for the various platforms.  Also, I have a technical training schedule and pricelist, a SCO background paperon "Multiuser vs. Networking", a "Xenix 2.2 Technical Backgrounder" dated January 1987, and "The SVID as Today's Best Non-Proprietary Specification for an Interface to an Operating System" background paper dated September 23, 1987. R68000 (talk) 23:11, 21 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, yes, YES. If it contains version numbers, as we know and understand that Xenix changed version numbers often, and more often cryptically. Thanks 207.53.252.58 (talk) 03:31, 30 November 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Commercial Information 

message: *See file:///usr/src/linux/Documentation/filesystems/sysv-fs.txt (if you're on a Linux system)
*Very little at http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Filesystems-HOWTO-9.html#ss9.26 , except that it is classified as a derivative of System V FS (in agreement with the previous "ref").
*On SCO EFS/AFS/EAFS : http://osdir.com/ml/linux.file-systems/2004-05/msg00027.html
--Jerome Potts (talk) 11:47, 24 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  the Xenix file system 

message: link to http://www.unicom.com/pw/faq/sco-xenix.faq is dead  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.105.243.211 (talk) 08:15, 24 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  link errors 

message: An image used in this article, File:Xenix Screensnap.PNG, has been nominated for speedy deletion for the following reason: Wikipedia files with no non-free use rationale as of 19 May 2012 
;What should I do?
Don't panic; you should have time to contest the deletion (although please review deletion guidelines before doing so). The best way to contest this form of deletion is by posting on the image talk page.
* If the image is non-free then you may need to provide a fair use rationale
* If the image isn't freely licensed and there is no fair use rationale, then it cannot be uploaded or used.
* If the image has already been deleted you may want to try Deletion Review
To take part in any discussion, or to review a more detailed deletion rationale please visit the relevant image page (File:Xenix Screensnap.PNG)
This is Bot placed notification, another user has nominated/tagged the image --CommonsNotificationBot (talk) 10:14, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: File:Xenix Screensnap.PNG Nominated for speedy Deletion

message: According to the 1983 OEM directory, there was no such limitation. There are only two Z8000-based systems hardware providers there (w/Xenix, that is). Central Data Corporation (with a Z8000 product, first customer ship: January 1981) and Paradyne Corporation (with a Z8001 product, so I'm guessing this was the fabled first port, although given that their first customer ship was March 1981, this issue might be wrong as well.) As a side note, I think the external MMU issue applied to them as well. Someone not using his real name (talk) 17:08, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: The CDC Z8000 stuff has some archival docs here (possibly incomplete). But there's nothing about Xenix in there so maybe they never shipped a product themselves (even though MS shipped Xenix to them.) Someone not using his real name (talk) 18:36, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

text: Well, if the marketing department and the XENIX Product manager are to be believed, then Microsoft/SCO was planning on porting XENIX to both the Zilog Z8001 and the Z8002. ( Oh, like I have ever seen/heard of these ever... and I was there. ) Looks like the Z8001 was the chip, and the Z8000 was the processor. 209.129.161.251 (talk) 01:13, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

text: Both the Wikipedia article on the Z8000, and the BYTE magazine article by Bob Greenberg, Jun 1991, mention that XENIX was made for the Z8000, and The article refrences on the Z8000 mentions it too. http://www.softpanorama.org/People/Torvalds/Finland_period/xenix_microsoft_shortlived_love_affair_with_unix.shtml 209.129.161.251 (talk) 01:13, 12 March 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Only Z800'''1'''? 

message: Indeed, the AT&T 6300 Plus shipped Unix System V for $99. The lowest I have SysV from anyone else around this time frame was $595. I'll see if I can find some secondary source to comment on this huge price discrepancy between AT&T's own distro and what OEM vendors could get (from AT&T). Someone not using his real name (talk) 18:00, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: It was indeed $99 for the OS for the AT&T 6300. You just had to have an AT&T 6300 UNIX PC. 209.129.161.251 (talk) 01:06, 12 March 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  "believing that it could not compete" 

message: In that '83 OEM directory, MS put themselves as Xenix customer/OEM for... Apple Lisa (with a note that the hardware was supplied by Apple.) Someone not using his real name (talk) 18:45, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Funny thing 

message: It looks like the floppy is of the IBM PC AT Xenix 1.0 mentioned here, which is actually based on System III, so probably based on MS Xenix 2.x or even 3.0. IBM had this issue that they didn't want to release products for their machines with version numbers based on somebody else's product versioning scheme. Someone not using his real name (talk) 11:41, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  IBM floppy photo 

message: We have a contradiction in the article. On the one hand, we have primary sources for the existence of 3.0 and secondary for 5.0; on the other, we state that the very last version was 2.3.4.
Now my interpretation, based on the screenshot, is that the confusion stems from the following:
* Xenix was at some point upgraded to System III (aka Unix 3.0, as it's called in the System III source code), then System V (aka Unix 5.0).
* After System V, AT&T froze the numbering so the next major release of AT&T Unix was System V Release 2. The screenshot reflects this numbering by identifying the running OS as "SCO Xenix System V", more specifically "SysV release 2.3.2".
I'm going to make changes to the article based on this interpretation, which does not contradict any of the cited sources. If a source can be found that contradicts my edits, feel free to add it and edit accordingly. QVVERTYVS (hm?) 10:31, 28 February 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Versioning contradiction 

message: Trusted Xenix, under the name Secure Xenix, was first developed at IBM Federal Systems Division, beginning in 1985. There were (as I recall) two releases, in 1987 and 1988. We also released a text-windowed version, based on Viewnix. The B2 evaluation process began while it was an IBM product, but everything was given over to TIS starting in 1989. This was just the 286-based version; while we considered Xenix 386, at that point, IBM's focus had shifted to AIX. (Note: I'm familiar with the history as I was part of that group, starting in late 1986.) Mahousu (talk) 01:18, 10 August 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Secure/Trusted Xenix 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: A "successor" should have more in common than just being later on the timeline.  A reliable source is needed to support the editor's opinion TEDickey (talk) 22:09, 5 November 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: OS/2 is partly (~80%, give or take) compatible with Xenix, though not fully. It's more of a spiritual successor, though MicroSoft did obviously intend OS/2 to be it's replacement. As put on OS/2's page, "Because of this heritage, OS/2 shares similarities with Unix, Xenix, and Windows NT in many ways" and on Xenix's own page, "It agreed with IBM to develop OS/2,[4] and the Xenix team (together with the best MS-DOS developers) was assigned to that project". Both systems have a similar design concept. --2600:8801:2180:2E17:68B7:B7C:7E09:7EE8 (talk) 01:53, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: That's interesting. You should provide a reliable source of information sometime, as a reality check. TEDickey (talk) 00:27, 7 November 2017 (UTC)

text:  "Similar design concept" does not a "predecessor" nor "successor" make. Nor does a high degree of "compatibility", whatever that may mean. Nor does chronological sequence, though that is generally essential, it is not sufficient. Jeh (talk) 10:24, 8 November 2017 (UTC)
replies: text:  That is a fair point, they're not directly related. Frankly OS/2 has more in common with NT than it does with Xenix, but it is helpful to point out the OS/2 did succeed Xenix at least goal wise. --2600:8801:2180:2E17:5834:A62A:6A1F:A4A3 (talk) 04:36, 9 November 2017 (UTC)

text: I have no idea what's going on here, but do you always accuse people of being vandals? --2600:8801:2180:2E17:E407:4A4D:4B36:6F53 (talk) 05:00, 8 November 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Fine. Let's play and see how you two discuss. I took back my allegation. —Best regards, Codename Lisa (talk) 05:30, 8 November 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  succeeded by unrelated system 

message: A see-also to a system lacking any influence other than a 30-year-separated involvement by one of the developers is irrelevant.  TEDickey (talk) 21:57, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. The link is to a Linux distribution by Microsoft. That has very little to do with Xenix. Also, if one is going to mention that, why not mention the NT POSIX subsystem, SUA/SFU, Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL), SQL Server for Linux, Linux running in Azure, etc. This is all very tangential. SJK (talk) 20:01, 19 April 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  irrelevant edits 

message: It appears that period publication used all-caps for the name. If this was the standard name during its time then it seems that the article should replace Xenix with XENIX for greater accuracy. See an example: https://i.postimg.cc/VLbyqzt9/xenix.png  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.77.193.114 (talk) 05:36, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: Also, if that seems frivolous, imagine if people on Wikipedia were to start writing Dos instead of DOS. I doubt that would last long, for good reason.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.77.193.114 (talk) 05:44, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: It looks like Wikipedia is a real mess when it comes to this. UNIX sometimes, Unix others. Venix sometimes, rather than VENIX. Someone in authority needs to sort this out by capitalizing names that need to be capitalized. Again, imagine if people were to randomly write Dos instead of DOS. It would be silly, like the situation currently is with UNIX and UNIX-like systems here.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.77.193.114 (talk) 06:10, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Capitalization of Xenix to XENIX 

message: What is this on the Article page? [12]:9[note 2] right after: The first Intel XENIX systems shipped in July 1982. Jimj wpg (talk) 7:48 pm, Today (UTC−5)
:Most of the stuff in double-curly-braces refers to a Template; you can read about this one by searching Wikipedia for "Template:Rp" TEDickey (talk) 01:12, 7 September 2019 (UTC)
thread_title: What does :9 [note 2] mean? 

message: Removed the claim for Trusted Xenix: "second highest level achieved by  any O/S" - presumably true if only A1 (no A2 or B3) was achieved, but misleading: several OS achieved A1 and at least one other achieved B2 and B3 (B3 is higher than B2), so the implied "second most secure O/S" is false.  It's like saying, if someone won a silver medal at the Olympics "They won the second best medal in Olympic history".   All the best: Rich Farmbrough 13:27, 22 May 2024 (UTC)
thread_title: Second highest