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Merging Unix And Mac OS
martin writes: "Here's an interesting article on 32bitsonline writing up one of Apple's chief O/S engineers talk at Usenix2000 on how they produced Mac OS X. Interesting to see how the design elements of Mac OS have been merged into BSD to produce a hybrid of the the two OSs."
Seem like it could be automated. A simple PERL script would probably do it. Filter out the fluff words, then try to match long words and phrases common to both stories. Anything above a certain threshold would bring it to a human's attention for further review.
But since it is here, I did think it was rather interesting that they use their layers to deal with many of the problems. It sounds like the carbon layer is the one that will deal with some of the issues between aqua / cocoa and darwin. I am not sure about this. I know that in Linux the filenames that have spaces in them are quoted strings when used on the command line. I don't think that this should have been such a big issue for BSD or OS X. I am looking forward to seeing the finished product and it will be interesting if they have a version of OS X that runs on Intel as well. I have heard that darwin has been ported, but the question is will Apple port carbon, cocoa, and aqua to Intel as well. If OS X runs on Intel, I'd be interested in trying it out. I am not inteested in buying a new Mac box only to find out that I do't like OS X because of some reason.
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Interesting proposal. Personally, however, I love the Unix console. If the managed to have the option of using a Mac/Unix console, then that would give me a reason to buy a macintosh.
But it would basically merge 2 separate operating systems together. The Unix/Linux world and the Mac world would no longer be separate identities. I admit that they both seem completely opposite, but it is possible. [Using the Mac interface instead of X or something].
This might even unite many users on the internet. Those who love macs for their simplicity and ease of use and those of us who value Unix/Linux for its stability and robust nature.
They'd just have to do something about the hardware on the macintosh before I would have no problem buying either one.
"Imagination is the only weapon in the war against reality." -Jules de Gautier
But as of Mac OS 9, "Eject Disk" ejects the disk and removes it from the desktop.
Works in good old 8.x too.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Okay, my sister recently bought a top-o-the-line Powerbook G3, and I was really impressed (and jealous). I played with OSX for a while, and it is really cool, although it seemed a little slow. I think the new graphics system is a lot, even for a G3.
I also got to see Virtual PC. From my last experience with it (several years ago) it was a dinosaur and hardly worth using. But now it is fast as heck, and I think you can even install other OS's (Linux, BSD's, etc) under it as well.
Question: with OSX, will Virtual PC still be around? I would think that the challenges of getting a Windows system running when the entire underlying MacOS has changed would be formidible. Will OSX use something like WINE instead?
LL
"If you are falling, dive." -Joseph Campbell
Remember, this is Apple. The average Mac user won't even realize that it's running on UNIX underneath - it'll just be a Mac with a very pretty GUI that never crashes.
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On the UNIX side, how are the problems of UNIX system administration handled? Are all the text configuration files gone, or did Apple just put GUI wallpaper over them?
For that matter, is it really BSD underneath? They don't mention Mach at all. Was the NeXT stuff dumped completely?
Given how much work Apple has done with Classic integration into DP4, particularly the fact that Classic apps show up in the dock along with the native apps, I expect VirtualPC for OSX to run very smoothly. And I'd really like to see Windows apps show up along with Mac apps in the dock. But we'll just have to wait and see.
And btw, Office98 runs just fine in Classic.
Veteran, Bermuda Triangle Expeditionary Force, 1992-1951
Must be a slow news day, this has been circulating for weeks...
It does have Mach and 4.4 BSD at the bottom. You can download all of the source to this, known as Darwin, from the Apple web site. It's the same source being used in OS-X. Since OS-X is still 'alpha' I'm not sure how current it is, but they are making efforts to keep it up to date with what is currently shipping.
The important thing to remember is that despite having a Mach/BSD core, Apple stresses that it is a BadIdea(*TM) to write anything that relies on Mach or BSD interfaces. Apple has created an operating system independent abstraction layer on top of Mach/BSD known as "CoreFoundation". CoreFoundation provides basic operating system services such as process control, file system access, networking access, etc... and also provides primitives used for foundation level API's such as string handling and file package stuff.
Built on top of CoreFoundation are all of the NeXT frameworks such as Cocoa (formerly AppKit), Foundation, EOF, etc... as well as Quartz. Also built on top of CoreFoundation is Carbon (the legacy MacOS "toolboxes"). Apps built to the Carbon API's will run on either MacOS 9 or X! There is also "Classic" which is an emulator for old apps that use the old Mac Toolbox API's. Any existing ISV's are strongly encouraged to port their apps to Carbon. Classic is for old orphaned apps that people still need to run (but can't port to Carbon since they aren't Open Source).
So while Apple is building OS-X on top of Mach/BSD, they are not tied to it. They can port everything to a different OS with relatively little pain. Apps will just recompile unless they do sneaky stuff like access Mach or BSD api's directcly. Even drivers will be semi-portable since Apple has a very advanced driver achitecture known as "IO Kit"...
Mac OS-X is way cool, Linux folks would be wise to learn more about it and borrow the better features. I would especially look at the Framework system which are the coolest shared libraries around.
Burris
p.s. no offence to anyone, i'm a fat unix guy with a beard. aren't we all?
sig:
See the "..for smart people" banners Wired runs here? Look elsewhere guys.
Why keep MacOS X backwards compatible? It's killing efficiency
Is this from personal experience or are you just pulling this out of your hat? Note: Unless you have personal experience with OS X and know that this is an effiency issue, then you shouldn't proclaim it as such.
You're forgetting something: X sucks. It would be very difficult to make an operating system that works as smoothly and easily as a Mac if it were tied down to compatibility with clunky old X Windows. And the three-button mouse thing would kill them.
If you want something that uses X and uses standard GNU software, why don't you just run Linux?
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I'm interested to know whether there is acutally a market for a UNIX/MacOS combination. I agree that it sounds like a neat idea in general, and would definitely raise my opinion of the Macintosh, but will the average (even the above average,) Mac user welcome such a thing?
It is not being touted as UNIX. It is being touted as something that gives you a more stable, more modern Macintosh. Trying to explain exactly how it is more stable and more modern is the difficult part, and understandably so. Most Mac owners are content with what they have.
Check out this article posted today at MacCentral. This is the second of two article covering "Road to Mac OS X: Unix and Mac OS X Part II." The first article is here and contains some more details regarding how this merger is going to take place.
There is also a LOT more information at MacSecurity.org which goes into much more detail regarding all the ill-informed posts here on permissions and questions regarding security.
The optional installs will make the box as secure, or open, as you would imagine. But like an true server, the knowledge of the admin/user is the crucial part in the safety of the system.
All in all, these two articles and one site will give you the answers to most of the questions regarding how this project is coming together.
I think we may be in for a surprise when OS X comes out. Good or bad is yet to be determined.
It's only when we've lost everything, that we are free to do anything...
Ars Technica has a good review of OS X Developer Preview 4, and another Q&A article that explains in detail questions about the BSD-ism/Mach-ness of the new OS.
I am an admitted compleat Unixhead, but I've long felt that case-sensitivity is more of a problem than an asset on Unix filesystems; people simply don't tend to think of case as a distinguishing feature, and it bites them more often than it serves a useful purpose. Those few cases where case is the sole distinction between two filenames generally just represent someone's bad judgement. Note that this isn't the same as case preservation, which is important (and as mentioned in the article, has always occurred on HFS and HFS+ filesystems).
-- Life is short. Forgive quickly. Kiss slowly. ~ Robert Doisneau
Let's see. Most MacOS users are smarter than you'll ever be judging by the stupidity of your comment. And as for MacOS itself, when another operating system comes near to the power of MacOS for destktop publishing and art, then please let me know. Meanwhile, I think the MacOS users will be sitting there enjoying an inredible imaging engine (Display PDF) with color matching, flexibility and special effects that other OSs can't touch.
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
As a hardcore Mac user (and programmer) and Linux user, I am very much looking forward to Mac OS X. My biggest complaint is that I've been waiting for over 5 years for a modern OS for the Mac, and I still have to wait a little longer.
I think most knowledgable Mac users will appreciate the stability and performance of BSD, while the less sophisticated users will be wowed by the Chewy GUI Goodness (tm) that is Aqua. Apple knows what it's doing. Now if they'd just do something about Cocoa for Windows...
Actually this might interest you.
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Could I use a free compiler a la gcc on OSX?
... but Aqua is itself basically one big theme file; if you remove it (or even switch resolutions on the fly ;) you get a DP2-ish Platinum appearance. I deduce that theme implementation will not be a particularly challenging task. Check with the Kaleidoscope fellows.
An Apple-extended gcc is what builds OS X. Project Builder is the looks-too-damn-much-like-VC++ IDE front end to it.
Is one likely to ship with OSX?
There will almost certainly be no standard BSD kit shipping on the Consumer distribution CDs. It will almost as certainly be a free download in the same fashion as MPW is now, since it is the development environment, as mentioned above.
Can the gui (shell?) be altered to make an OSX desktop look like, for example, KDE? Is there support for themes, and does the word themes even apply?
Officially no
I'd love to be able to run OSX on my P3 machine
Give it up. Apple makes money on hardware. It is remotely possible you will see specific preconfigured x86 systems, but there will be no shrinkwrap OS X for Intel. Ever. Anyone who thinks different (hee hee) either is utterly ignorant of Apple's business model, or is on crack.
Now, the open-source Darwin runs on Intel. But Quartz, Cocoa, etc. won't. Even Yellow Box for Windows is being EOLd in September, which I think is a mistake, but whatever.
Is there a particularly good Mac site I can get this information from
You could always try the mothership.
"We have all been here before..."
Dammit, you got me whistling a CSN song!
Anyway, this story has already been posted, as "The Challenges of Integrating Unix and Mac OS".
Suggestion to the Slashcode developers: add something like this in the next release!
$rh = $db->query("SELECT s FROM stories WHERE s.category = $newArticle{category}");
while ($rh->fetch()) {
$c = isect(@{$newArticle{keywords}}, @{$_{keywords}});
warnMsg("This article looks like $_{name} (at $_{url}), with $c matched keywords.\n") if $c >= $SOME_ARBITRARY_CONSTANT;
}
(Ghod, I still remember some of this stupid database programming... I've been trying to forget the horrible memories for half a year now. Urgh.)
To the editors: your English is as bad as your Perl. Please go back to grade school.
The idea is that the Mac community at large won't notice a difference (which of course isn't possible, but anyway...). The plan is for everything to "just work."
:))
Now, as for how this will bear out is something completely different. From what I've used of DP3 and DP4 (which is little as I have to remove my Voodoo3 to use it), it is a bit of a culture shock, not only because it's BSD, but also because of how different everything feels. The columned windows to Single Window Mode, the lack of popup folders in the Finder to even the lack of the Apple Menu (which is both a good and bad thing, but my opinion is that it leans toward bad for consistency's sake)... they'll all make a semi-veteran Mac user feel odd. The Veterans (read: those who have been forced to use more than just MacOS) can put up with it and the real newbies won't have known OS9 (let alone any before), so it doesn't matter. I still think it feels weird, just like it's weird when I use Windows or Unix, even if I can use them effectively.
The hostile ones like the ease and are probably scared that Apple won't be able to get that ease back, especially since they've heard of how hard Unix is and how different OSX is from OS9. Different is bad, right?
The skeptical ones anticipate the good things (SMP, preemtive multitasking, etc) even if they don't know what those terms mean, but also don't think Apple can pull it off...
And then people like me who know computers, and know the strengths and weaknesses of Unix and MacOS... they can't f---ing wait to get ahold of this (or maybe that's just me
The Happy Blues Man
The Happy Blues Man
I accept on blind faith that Cincinatti exists.
I can't believe the number of people that have themselves convinced that OS X is going to be running on x86's.
One of the favorite sports of the computer nerd is trying to figure out what Apple is going to do next. There is nothing good on TV, let's try to figure out what is going on deep in the bowels of 1 Infinite Loop. This has been going on as long as I can remember.
You know Jobs loves this. He knows we enjoy it too. Apple gets good press when they release something elegant like that beautiful charcoal iMac, but then they get good press when we hear nothing. When they are quiet, we think they are up to something outrageous.
Security is so tight at Apple, they could be making a port and we not know it. We won't know until they are ready to tell us. You notice how well they kept the iMac, ibook and the G4 underwraps.
They know how to yank our chain, and we eat it up. That's fine with me, the industry would be boring if not for Apple and the new kid on the block, Linux.
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Because people might want to use it, that's why.
DOS succeeded because, largely, it stayed compatible with it's predecessors (except when Microsoft wanted to break a competitors app)
OS/2 ran DOS and Windows apps just fine, to allow people to transition from Windows to it.
Windows succeeded because it allowed people to run multiple DOS apps while they were waiting for Windows apps to arrive
Windows 95 succeeded because it allowed people to run 3.1 apps while they waited for 32-bit apps to appear.
Ditto NT 4.0
Windows 2000 still runs Win 95 and Win NT apps as it waits for it's own apps to arrive.
Linux is based on Unix, which makes it basically backwards compatible in spirit with 20 years of Unix-ness.
About the only operating systems I can think of that have been introduced in a LONG time are the Palm OS (which doesn't count, since it's a completely different platform altogether) and BeOS (Witness how the BeOS is spreading like wildfire).
Among other things, the reason that Intel's platform has stayed popular for so long is because it's stayed compatible with users' devices and software.
Same for the Mac... Apple performed nearly seemless transitions in the moves from 68040 to PowerPC (less floating point dependant apps) and from NuBus to PCI...
Moral: If you want to keep your users, you need to stay compatible.
Apple employees have discussed this issue several times on the Darwin-Development mailing list. Here's the latest, which was in regards to the GPL licensing of dpkg and why Apple couldn't use it for their installer.
Peter Bierman wrote:
Later in the thread, Wilfredo Sanchez also followed up:
- Mali
Mac Central is updated daily, and hosts Andy Inahtko's columns.
Low End Mac Posts links to everything interesting about macs (including the occational link to /.) and has detailed specs for the entire mac line, 1984 - today.
MacWeek sucks, but they cover the trade shows fairly well.
Mac News Network seems to me like it is mostly a forum for product releases and press statements, but a lot of people consider it a favorite. (They were the first one I saw publish the ETA for the Diablo II port, so there's one notch on their belt, anyway.)
And of course, there is the new kid on the block, MacSlash, who took the slash code, and added ugly aqua-themed graphics to it.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Disclaimer: it's been a while since I sat down behind a box running OS X Server, so I may be remembering some stuff wrong . . .
I've dealt with OS X Server a bit, and some of the standard text config files are still hanging out, but not very many. Almost everything you need to configure (well, that I needed to configure) was configurable through relatively intuitive GUI tools. From what I've heard, there are ways to accomplish administration from the command line, but I never played around enough to figure out how to do so. Documentation is scarce.
What I found most disconcerting about OS X Server was the way they "Mac-ified" the filesystem . . . by default, hard drives are mounted on the root with terribly descriptive names like "Server_HD3" instead of putting them somewhere really useful (i.e., make the second drive /usr/local/share or /usr/local or something . . .). Stuff like Apache ended up in /Local/Library/WebServer, CommuniGate Pro was in /Local/Communigate . . . apps were not installed in /usr/bin or /usr/local/bin, in some cases. It was just weird.
If there's anybody out there with NeXT experience, is this the way things were done? I know that OS X (from what I understand) draws heavily on NeXT (i.e., retaining the NetInfo stuff).
To keep tossing stereotypes around, that would be straight hair to the waste, and crinkly ankle length skirts.
:)
So what's Apple's problem with having a GPL'ed package management system? I know many companies have an aversion to the GPL, but how does having a free and open package management system hurt them? The GPL wouldn't infect the packages. This isn't a flame - I really don't see where what the catch is from Apple's point of view.
And if they don't like the GPL, can't they just implement package management themselves, copying their favorite parts from deb, rpm, Sun's pkg, *BSD's ports, etc. Sure, setting up their own packaging system would be a lot of work, but I think it would be pretty small compared to some of the other stuff they're putting into OSX.
Preventive War is like committing suicide for fear of death. - Otto Von Bismarck
The reason some Mac users are so hostile could be that adding Unix elements sounds like adding complexity. Of course, when they sit down and use the system, they'll find that its just as easy to use and their fears are unfounded (unless Apple screw up royally). The mac users I know (All 2 or so of them) don't really want to know about operating systems, any more than they want to know about the atomic structure of silicon. They just want a Mac as a device to do things.
First off, you don't seem to understand the fundamentals of the reasoning behind OS X. They need to be backwards compatible for three reasons:
1) They have developers already, and a sturdy base of current applications, games, etc. that need to continue to run to ease the transition.
2) The conversion of these apps must be easy.
3) The new OS needs to be rewritten to be more robust and modern.
To do this, they introduced carbon. It is VERY easy for all the Apple developers to port to carbon. Something like only 15% of the APIs that were allowed for OS 7->9 are thrown out, while allowing compatibility through carbon for the other 85%. This gives a much shorter lead time in porting.
Apple also knows that their look and feel is much different than X offers, and it would be MUCH harder and more time consuming for developers to port to an X window manager environment.
Apple allows a good level of backwards compatibility, ease of updating software for the new OS, and still produces a "modern OS." This is a business decision, not an idealistic X UI rewrite.
It's only when we've lost everything, that we are free to do anything...
Connectix have already officially said that Virtual PC 3.x won't ever run on Mac OS X ... that's what Virtual PC 4.0 is for. Virtual PC uses every undocumented and sneaky, tricky thing it can to improve performance, so it needs to be updated for Mac OS X.
...
Another interesting item is that around the time of Virtual PC 2.0, Connectix said they hoped that by 4.0 they would "un-box" the emulator, sort of like what happened to the "Blue Box" in Mac OS X, so that Windows apps would appear for all intents and purposes to be Mac apps. Who knows whether they still plan to do this
Virtual PC really is amazing. Incredibly fast and a lot of fun to use. Very satisfying in a geek way. I wrote a computer book recently where we had Windows screenshots in odd-numbered chapters and Mac screenshots in even-numbered chapters, and I did all the screenshots on the same Mac, thanks to Virtual PC.
If you're not a Mac user, but you have a chance to play with a Mac with Virtual PC for a day sometime, take it. Lots of fun. You can run DOS, Windows 3.1/95/98, Windows NT/2000, Linux, OS/2, and switch between them anytime. Each lives on its own virtual hard drive, which are just disk images. With Windows or Linux, you just drag files from within the Virtual PC window (from the Windows desktop, for example) and drop them on the Mac desktop.
The Classic environment in Mac OS X creates a virtual machine inside of Mac OS X which boots a largely unmodified version of Mac OS 9. Applications which are built for Mac OS 9 and have not been "Carbonized" run in this environment. The Classic environment replaces the hardware abstraction layer in Mac OS 9 with a series of shims that pass requests to parts of Mac OS X. For example, a memory request in Mac OS 9 gets fulfilled by a memory request in the Darwin kernel. Mac OS 9 can thereby use resources managed by Mac OS X.
What's the speed of running an app in the Classic environment? Does the environment work roughly the same way that the Blue Box did in Rhapsody?
It's interesting that Apple chose to keep the historical UFS instead of basing it on a newer FS or advancing their HFS. While HFS+ was designed to bridge between HFS and UFS, it still doesn't make sense to use a pure-unix filesystem when you don't have a pure-unix OS. Instead, IMHO, they should have used something like the BeOS filesystem, so they could keep resource forks, etc.
There's two things that Apple needs to do to get OS X into a state worthy of their name:
/. Applications generally expect the colon, so an intermediate layer converts the path on the fly. File names that include a / are also converted to colons. Colons are converted to /s. And so it goes... if they don't watch out, they're going to end up with a mess like DOS filename conversion in OS 8 (which really sucked; System 7 had better compatibility).
1) Quit the "design over functionality" bullshit and get back to basics. They have been listening (somewhat) to beta users with regard to things like the Dock, but they need to do more. Please, no more disasters like the Quicktime 4 player!
2) Figure out how to handle the various file systems that people are going to be using. HFS can't handle filenames over 32 characters, HFS+ can, but they both use colons as path separators, while the OS X standard filename uses the UNIX
Actually, the problem is related to the BSD roots. In all the *BSD's I've used, you have to be a member of the wheel group in order to su to root. So, you just need to make your user account a member of the wheel group and su will work without difficulty. Most likely, though, the average user won't run into this, because if I were Apple, I'd make it so the graphical config tools used a graphical su app that dealt with all of those things.
Supreme Lord High Commander of the Interstellar Task Force for the Eradication of Stupidity
*Darwin* already runs on x86. The mac interface is another story.
Apple is a hardware manufacturor. You'll see MacOS/X running on x86 the same day Apple demonstrates an x86 Mac--and even then, they're unlikely to offer it for non-Apple machines.
Perhaps that's why there aren't many women in the Unix technical arena, especially further up the chain. They can't get the beard...
Myself, I'll be stereotypically stuck near Number 2; Acid burns have left me unable to grow a beard, so I'm stuck with a rather pathetic goatee as my only option.
Perhaps I'll become a MCSE. I've always considered most Microsoftians bald-faced liars..
.sig: Now legally binding!
Yes. The BSD layer won't be installed by default, but when you install it, it should come with gcc - although they'll be clear to mark it as an extra utility, not as part of the operating system, to avoid breaking the GPL.
Can the gui (shell?) be altered to make an OSX desktop look like, for example, KDE? Is there support for themes, and does the word themes even apply?
Jobs doesn't like themes, much to the annoyance of the rest of us. But Aqua is basically a theme, and can be removed (returning you to Platinum), or presumably replaced.
I'd love to be able to run OSX on my P3 machine, but is S3 even going to think about putting out a driver for my Diamond video card? More succinctly, are hardware manufacturers going to be willing and/or able to ship drivers for PC hardware?
Definitely not going to happen, although Apple is probably keeping their options open for the future by maintaining x86 compatibility internally.
Is there a particularly good Mac site I can get this information from, so I can stop trolling
Mac OS Rumors
AppleInsider
MacInTouch
that's a start.
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>Why keep MacOS X backwards compatible? It's
>killing efficiency:
It's not quite backwards compatible; certainly not in the was that windows and system 7 were. The "compatibility stuff" isn't generally around or loaded; it's done by an artificial environment.
hawk
Shine on, you crazy diamond.
Burris
... I ended up being shock at the dismay and naysayers of the up-and-coming MacOSx.
Quotations like "what will the Mac people think" and "how can the Mac people possible learn how to run MacOSx".
Professionally I started on the Mac with a Quadra 800 AV when I was doing professional graphics and photography while in the military 5 years ago.
I have since then move through Windows and then into Linux for most of my computing needs.
I know that I do not speak for the rest of the gang here but an OS with the most user-friendly interface in the world with the stability, security and speed of BSD... that has to be the best OS in the world.
[flame type="protection"]
I can't wait to get my hands on a G3/4 just to tinker with MacOSx.
As a non-Mac user, I am looking forward to the final release. I wish I had a G3 so I can tryout the beta releases.
Please tell me why I shouldn't look forward to MacOSx as a non-Mac user.
ChozSun [e-mail]
ChozSun
ChozSun.com