Two questions about UNIX(r) certification.

[Jerry McAllister]

On Thu, Oct 18, 2007 at 03:18:02PM -0600, Chad Perrin wrote:

> On Thu, Oct 18, 2007 at 03:51:34PM -0400, Jerry McAllister wrote:
> > On Thu, Oct 18, 2007 at 01:56:05PM -0400, Rob wrote:
> > 
> > > Dan Mahoney, System Admin wrote:
> > > >I recently noticed that Apple's new OS, Leopard, is Unix certified.
> > > >I'd imagine that the big reason that FreeBSD hasn't done this yet is: It 
> > > >costs a lot of money.
> > > 
> > > There was a thread on this a month or 3 ago;  might want to check the 
> > > archives.  I think the consensus came down to something like:  The 
> > > certification is largely irrelevant, self-serving to a couple vendors that 
> > > sponsor it, and expensive, so  - why bother?
> > 
> > Sounds a little like way back when 'Crest" toothpaste used to adversised
> > that it was the only one accepted as an effective dentifrice by the
> > American Dental Association (I think that was the name they used) when
> > they were the only ones who had ever sought the credential and essentially
> > made up the category themselves.   After several years some other brand
> > finally did it too and then they all quit using it in their advertising.
> > 
> > So, probably this is only meaningful as long as Apple Spotted Cat OS is
> > the only one doing it.    If someone else does it, then it won't be
> > worth anything to anyone.
> 
> I'm at least aware of the following Single UNIX Specification compliant
> OSes:
> 
>   AIX
>   Darwin[1]
>   HP-UX
>   MacOS X
>   OpenServer
>   Solaris
>   Tru64 Unix
>   UnixWare
>   UX/4800
>   z/OS

Wow.  I am surprised that so many have gone to the trouble, given
how many of those are proprietary and how little applicability it has.

////jerry

> 
> [1]: I'm guessing about Darwin, as a subset of MacOS X that contains all
> the bits needed to make a complete Unix-like OS.  It may not be
> officially recognized as compliant.
> 
> Not all versions of all of those are compliant, of course, but they all
> have been or are currently (meaning, in some previous or current release
> version) certified SUS compliant.  There are quite a few "Enterprisey"
> corporate shops that put a lot of stock in SUS certification, so in terms
> of widespread adoption in business environments for server
> implementations, it's not something that "won't be worth anything to
> anyone".  Whether or not that means it's worth anything to FreeBSD is up
> for debate, I suppose.
> 
> I find myself wondering if the SUS is losing what technical value it may
> have once had.  The fact that MacOS X is certified kinda makes me even
> more suspicious of the value of the certification than I was already.
> 
> Of course, with the rate at which open source OSes like FreeBSD (and
> other BSD Unix systems, and of course Linux distributions) progress, one
> must wonder how SUS certification can even be practical in application in
> the open source world.  Certification takes time and money, and would
> need to be acquired anew for every release version (unless things change
> in regard to how certification is applied).  That seems a little outside
> the realm of reasonability.
> 
> -- 
> CCD CopyWrite Chad Perrin [ http://ccd.apotheon.org ]
> Isaac Asimov: "Part of the inhumanity of the computer is that, once it is
> completely programmed and working smoothly, it is completely honest."
> _______________________________________________
> freebsd-questions at freebsd.org mailing list
> http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions
> To unsubscribe, send any mail to "freebsd-questions-unsubscribe at freebsd.org"