Mac vs linux

Unix-Linux Convergence - Product Information

People in the computer industry like a good competitive fight. Nearly everyone takes a side, then roots for the chosen favorite to blow away the competition. Say anything negative about the favored vendor, and, well, the partisans will give you heck.

A few years ago -- though it seems like a lifetime -- the popular competition was Mac OS vs. Windows. Then there was NetWare vs. Windows NT, and about the same time period the Unix religious wars were raging. The Unix wars were so consuming that Microsoft sidestepped the fray and was able to launch Windows NT right under the noses of Unix vendors. The Unix industry couldn't respond in a unified manner. This isn't surprising, the Unix industry has never acted in a unified manor.

The dynamics never stop shifting. Today, the emergence of Linux is providing another challenger. So far, Linux has not emerged as a serious threat on the client side, at least not in terms of producing shipments that threaten Microsoft's dominance of new client operating environment sales.

On the server side, Linux is causing concern in the Microsoft camp. Not so much because it has stolen sales from Windows NT or Windows 2000, but rather because Linux is leaking into the compute infrastructure like water on a leaky roof. This quiet infiltration follows in the footsteps of Windows NT, which also began its life as a technology that seeped in through corporate seals.

While there is little evidence to suggest that Linux will drive Microsoft out of the operating systems business, it is causing a shift in market dynamics. One of the first visible casualties was Santa Cruz Operation (SCO). In August the company sold most of two of its three business units to Linux start up Caldera Systems Inc. The deal transferred SCO's entire professional services business and most of its server software business.

For the past year, SCO's product sales have been on shaky ground. Although not a hugely successful growth company, SCO did have the largest server operating environment new license shipment tally of any Unix, vendor, a point that often comes as a surprise to some in the industry. During the first half of 2000, the company's sales plummeted to less than half the sales made during the same period last year. The company publicly blamed Year 2000-related issues, but the reality is Linux encroached on the entry-server market where SCO had its best success and Windows NT encroached in SCO's VAR channel.

Caldera plans to create something called the Open Internet Platform, which will combine Unix and Linux into a common platform for applications. But the trend of increasing synergy between Linux and Unix is not limited to SCO and Caldera. Hewlett-Packard is moving aggressively to support Linux applications by adding Linux API and ABI capabilities to HP-UX 11i. While interoperability on 64-bit Intel architecture platforms will be better than on PA-RISC, the fact that HP is going this route gives HP a strong Linux/Unix story. Likewise, IBM has plans, albeit somewhat longer term, to produce API-level compatibility between AIX and Linux.

It appears the major Unix vendors -- Sun being the notable exception -- are, looking at Linux to grow into the role of becoming their entry-level form of "Unix." By offering application compatibility, applications on these entry platforms can then scale up to the bigger brothers that are true Unix-branded systems.

Oddly, it is the Unix community, which for so many years fought religious wars against itself, that now is banking on the success of Linux to drive fresh application blood into the Unix market and increase the competitive stature of Unix compared a with Microsoft products.

The combination of Linux and Unix on client systems, to entry servers all the way on up to enterprise-class, large SMP systems presents an interesting competitive story to Windows. Will this be enough of a story for users to consider Unix instead of Windows 2000? And will the Linux desktop take off once application packages emerge that offer 100 percent compatibility with Microsoft document formats?

The answers to these questions remain to be seen, but if applications prove to be portable between Linux and Unix, it bodes well for the future of the Unix market and ensures that Microsoft won't be able to dominate the server market the way it dominates the client market.

Al Gillen is research manager for system software at IDC (www.idc.com) and former editor in chief of ENT.