BSD proprietary offerings
BSD proprietary
The proprietary UNIX sphere is much larger than most people think, but most will identify with the big names such as Solaris and AIX. Many would be hard pressed to actually name another proprietary UNIX offering beyond these two. Most proprietary Unix variants are focused on a fixed platform; Solaris is primarily produced for Sun’s own SPARC based hardware (although an Intel version is available), while AIX is specific to IBM’s PowerPC platform.
Actually comparing proprietary UNIX variants is very difficult because many have used and exploited different components from both BSD and System V Release 4 (SVR4). Others have changed their spots half way through production (SunOS and Solaris, for example). The proprietary UNIX variants also frequently provide either an SVR4 or BSD compatibility layer to help migration from one to the other, or to help users of other variants to migrate to the new platform.
Ultimately making comparisons boils down to examining the heritage and support of the operating systems and the platforms supported. There are two mainstream, proprietary UNIX variants, which run on the PowerPC CPU, Mac OS X and AIX. As you know, Mac OS X is essentially Darwin, which is in turn based on the FreeBSD and only works on the apple PowerPC platform.
AIX is the UNIX operating system produced by IBM and which runs only on IBM’s own PowerPC based hardware. AIX is based on SVR4 and has some obvious advantages compared to both BSD and Mac OS X. The first is the availability of different software. As a proprietary UNIX, it also has the best options available for proprietary support; IBM themselves provide many of their applications in an AIX version. Interestingly though, even IBM provide more of their software in Linux versions than AIX.
The other big advantage is the level of support offered by IBM for their AIX customers. You can get full, 24-hour support with an AIX expert if you are willing to pay for it. Support for most BSD offerings is provided on an informal email basis, which isn’t suitable for customers using BSD in a proprietary environment. Choosing to use BSD, in a proprietary environment, will therefore depend on the experience of the people managing the system. See also about comparison of BSD over Linux.
