Unix/Linux

[Anthony Giorgianni]

Hello All

Don't know if this is a dumb question but....

If a freeware title says it's good for Linux, does that mean it works on
Unix and visa versa? I notice, for example, that The Gimp has Windows, Mac
and Unix versions. But I thought the Gimp originally was a Linux title? Are
the words Unix/Linux used interchangeably?


--
Regards,
Anthony Giorgianni

The return address for this post is fictitious. Please reply by posting back
to the newsgroup.

 

[dszady]

Hello All

Don't know if this is a dumb question but....

If a freeware title says it's good for Linux, does that mean it works on
Unix and visa versa? I notice, for example, that The Gimp has Windows, Mac
and Unix versions. But I thought the Gimp originally was a Linux title?
Are the words Unix/Linux used interchangeably?

Not a dumb question at all. And a hard one to answer.
You might have to research this a little more to get a more of a feel for
it.
I think The Gimp was a GNU project and intended for both Linux and Windows.
I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong. I remember installing The
Gimp on Widows was harder than it is on Linux.

I used this search phrase: unix linux difference same?
http://www.talkroot.com/archive/topic/924-1.html

 

[Jörg Volkmann]

Hello All

Don't know if this is a dumb question but....

If a freeware title says it's good for Linux, does that mean it works on
Unix and visa versa? I notice, for example, that The Gimp has Windows, Mac
and Unix versions. But I thought the Gimp originally was a Linux title? Are
the words Unix/Linux used interchangeably?

No Unix and Linux are diffrent OS. Unix was designed about 1970-75 and
Linux from Linus Torvalds abot 1992 ??

This are different OS, whatever SCO and the Torqueville Foundation
says, are announce. The study from the Torqueville foundation abot
Linux as to be a copy of Unix, was so stupid, that evena man with
little IQ could see, that they were absolutly wrong. It was a faste og
time, money and intelligence (but i think the author luck this very
much).

Jörg Volkmann

--
Regards,
Anthony Giorgianni

The return address for this post is fictitious. Please reply by posting back
to the newsgroup.

JV

 

[MAMEngineer]

If a freeware title says it's good for Linux, does that mean it works
on Unix and visa versa? I notice, for example, that The Gimp has
Windows, Mac and Unix versions. But I thought the Gimp originally was
a Linux title? Are the words Unix/Linux used interchangeably?

Linux is a derivitive of UNIX, and as such, many UNIX programs will run with
little or no additional recompiling. The GiMP is one of these... you might
also see it referred to as *nix or UNIces...

 

[Gordon Darling]

No Unix and Linux are diffrent OS. Unix was designed about 1970-75 and
Linux from Linus Torvalds abot 1992 ??

This are different OS, whatever SCO and the Torqueville Foundation says,
are announce. The study from the Torqueville foundation abot Linux as to
be a copy of Unix, was so stupid, that evena man with little IQ could
see, that they were absolutly wrong. It was a faste og time, money and
intelligence (but i think the author luck this very much).

Jörg Volkmann

Accurate as far as it goes. The differences between different flavours of
Unix (and Mac OS X) is far less than between Unix and Windows. The main
Gnu/Linux compiler (gcc) is available on almost every Unix platform under
the sun (the planet not the company). If you have the program's source
code you can recompile the source for a Linux program under Net/Free/Open
BSD, Mac OS X (which is BSD based) and almost any other Unix (HP-UX, AIX,
Solaris, etc) by taking into account the subtle differences between the
Operating Systems.

The other alternative is emulation. Many windows programs will run under
Linux using "Wine" or vice versa using CygWin.

Regards
Gordon

 

[Mark R. Blain]

If a freeware title says it's good for Linux, does that mean it works on
Unix and visa versa? I notice, for example, that The Gimp has Windows, Mac
and Unix versions. But I thought the Gimp originally was a Linux title? Are
the words Unix/Linux used interchangeably?

From the About.com Linux glossary: "Unix is a family of operating
systems which include over a hundred flavors, including HP-UX, IRIX,
Linux, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris and Tru64."

Most Unix programs are designed to be compiled and run on many flavors
of Unix, although you may have to download the source code and compile
it yourself. Linux is such a common flavor of Unix that the terms are
often used interchangeably.

The GIMP is available as "precompiled binary packages" (ready to
install and use) at www.gimp.org for several "distributions" of Linux
such as Debian and Fedora. Others (Redhat, Mandrake etc.) are
available from the Linux distribution makers and third-party sites.

For help finding Unix or Linux programs, see rpmfind.net or
<http://dmoz.org/Computers/Software/Operating_Systems/Linux/Software_Directories/>

 

[=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=BBQ=AB?=]

Linux is a derivitive of UNIX,

Derivative is not the right word. The goal of the GNU Project was
to develop a UNIX-compatible system without deriving it from UNIX.

and as such, many UNIX programs will run with little or no
additional recompiling. The GiMP is one of these.

The GIMP is a GNU program, so it can be compiled and run on any
UNIX-compatible OS.

 

[Richard Steven Hack]

If a freeware title says it's good for Linux, does that mean it works on
Unix and visa versa? I notice, for example, that The Gimp has Windows, Mac
and Unix versions. But I thought the Gimp originally was a Linux title? Are
the words Unix/Linux used interchangeably?

It actually depends on the program and what IT depends on.

If the program is written to run with a desktop environment such as
KDE or GNOME, it will require those libraries to run at all - and
those libraries will not be available on a commercial UNIX machine
such as HP/UX. Then again, Solaris is now using GNOME as its default
desktop, so the GNOME libraries might enable it to run on Solaris.

The only way to find out is to download the program, look at the
libraries it needs and then see if those libraries either exist or can
be obtained for the desired OS, and whether the program can be
re-compiled on the specified OS.

Usually the best thing is to look for a native port, i.e., a version
of the program that somebody has already created for the specified OS,
either in source or binary form.

In general, while the words UNIX and Linux are frequently used
interchangeably, and while many programs will run on either, the two
are not the same and many programs will only run on one or the other.
Linux is actually an operating system kernel which has numerous
utilities layered on it that were created by the Free Software
Foundation (GNU). This makes it look and act like UNIX enough to make
the differences not terribly important, but there are differences.

This is especially true of binaries - compiled programs. The format
of executable programs differs between Linux and UNIX and even among
UNIX variants.

 

[Chris Lee]

Not a dumb question at all. And a hard one to answer.
You might have to research this a little more to get a more of a
feel for
it.
I think The Gimp was a GNU project and intended for both Linux and
Windows.
I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong. I remember installing
The
Gimp on Widows was harder than it is on Linux.

Basically when someone says a software program is for Unix/Linux
they mean it's a cross-platform/operating system program.

It'll build/you can download binaries for other OS's other than Linux.

 

[Chris Lee]

From the About.com Linux glossary: "Unix is a family of operating
systems which include over a hundred flavors, including HP-UX, IRIX,
Linux, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris and Tru64."

Err wrong. Linux IS NOT a UNIX. Never was and never will be.

Most Unix programs are designed to be compiled and run on many
flavors
of Unix, although you may have to download the source code and
compile
it yourself. Linux is such a common flavor of Unix that the terms
are often used interchangeably.

Nope. If a Unix program complies under GCC then in most cases it'll
run under Linux.

GCC is the key here.

 

[Susan Bugher]

Derivative is not the right word. The goal of the GNU Project was
to develop a UNIX-compatible system without deriving it from UNIX.

re Unix derivatives and relatives. . . I found a flow chart about 3/4
of the way down this page:

http://www.icselectionguide.com/U.html

which makes it everything much clearer. . .

I wonder if I can remember where all the arrows go. . .

Susan

 

[MAMEngineer]

Derivative is not the right word. The goal of the GNU Project was
to develop a UNIX-compatible system without deriving it from UNIX.

From http://www.icselectionguide.com/l.html#L

LINUX
Group Members: Linus Torvalds and a Cast of Thousands
Linux is a freely-distributable implementation of UNIX for 80386, 80486 and
Pentium machines. It supports a wide range of software, including X Windows,
Emacs, TCP/IP networking (including SLIP/PPP/ISDN), and the works. Ports to
non-x86 machines such as the Alpha and SPARC also exist. This is one rocking
project.

 

[Anthony Giorgianni]

Boy, maybe that wasn't as dumb a question as I thought. I'm actually
preparing a freeware story (I know, PC World just did one) for a major
magazine. We're listing some apps, and I'm trying to list what ops they are
for. Based on what everyone said, I better just list what the web sites for
the apps say, using Unix where indicated and Linux we're indicated. It guess
The Gimp can get both?!

Thanks everyone.


--
Regards,
Anthony Giorgianni

The return address for this post is fictitious. Please reply by posting back
to the newsgroup.

 

[=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=BBQ=AB?=]

From http://www.icselectionguide.com/l.html#L

I don't dispute that there's plenty of misinformation about it on the
web.

 

[=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=BBQ=AB?=]

re Unix derivatives and relatives. . . I found a flow chart about
3/4 of the way down this page:

http://www.icselectionguide.com/U.html

which makes it everything much clearer. . .

I wonder if I can remember where all the arrows go. . .

Try memorizing these arrows.

<http://www.levenez.com/unix/history.html>

 

[john p.]

Gnu/Linux compiler (gcc) is available on almost every Unix platform under
the sun (the planet not the company).

Umm, actually, Gordon, the sun is a star, not a planet.

 

[JanC]

The main Gnu/Linux compiler (gcc) is available on almost every Unix
platform under the sun (the planet not the company).

I use GCC as my main (native) Windows compiler too...

<http://mingw.org/>

 

[JanC]

Derivative is not the right word. The goal of the GNU Project was
to develop a UNIX-compatible system without deriving it from UNIX.

It's a derivative in the meaning of "it uses the same ideas & APIs (like
POSIX) used in unix systems" (which even Microsoft partially supports these
days, with a free add-on for Win2k/XP/2k3--and standard as part of
Longhorn, rumours go), not in the meaning of "it's based on unix source
code".

 

[JanC]

Err wrong. Linux IS NOT a UNIX. Never was and never will be.

I won't say "never will be".

There are several definitions of "unix", the current trademark holders
("The Open Group") define it as every system that implements a certain
behaviour ("The Single UNIX Specification") and Linux implements almost
everything of that. It's always possible someone will add the missing
functionality...

<http://www.unix-systems.org/>

 

[JanC]

Boy, maybe that wasn't as dumb a question as I thought. I'm actually
preparing a freeware story (I know, PC World just did one) for a major
magazine. We're listing some apps, and I'm trying to list what ops
they are for. Based on what everyone said, I better just list what the
web sites for the apps say, using Unix where indicated and Linux we're
indicated. It guess The Gimp can get both?!

It might be useful to check the website for pages titled "downloads",
"links", "build instructions", etc.
Sometimes 3rd parties make ports of programs that originate on Linux to
unix platforms, Windows and maybe other operating systems (or vice versa).

The GIMP shows Linux, several BSDs (incl. FreeBSD & MacOS X), Solaris &
Windows as supported, but other ports exist (e.g. for BeOS & SkyOS).