UNIX WILL BE ASSIMILATED. RESISTANCE IS FUTILE.
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This report is sponsored by NobleNet, provider of middleware programming tools for client/server and object-oriented software development, systems integration, migration and porting. NobleNet tools connect distributed logic, data sources, and objects across more than 40 platforms.
The report may be freely copied and redistributed without modification.
For more information on the topic of Unix NT integration and coexistence, visit http://www.unix-nt.com/
SUMMARY
Microsoft continues its strategy to dominate the Unix server market by helping to popularize a Unix variant, OpenNT, running on the NT kernel.
A company called Softway Systems, Inc. is building an X/Open and POSIX.2 compliant Unix on top of the NT kernel. For government and large corporate contracts, Microsoft and other large "WIntel" system manufacturers will bid OpenNT, in combination with the Win32 subsystem, to satisfy POSIX.2 and X/Open branding requirements. If this proves effective, Microsoft has every incentive to acquire and control OpenNT and its supporting technologies. Thereafter the "NT" brand will come to represent a dual Unix/Win32 environment made possible by OpenNT.
The idea: If NT sells for 50% to 25% of comparably performing Unix systems, and the customer can get both for a small incremental cost, then many customers will choose the dual environment. This supports the Microsoft strategy, outlined in the January 20, 1997 edition of the Wall Street Journal of targeting the Unix server market, specifically the segments served by SCO and Sun. One of the best ways to take business is to eliminate the choice between alternatives. Why decide between Unix and NT when you can have both for less than the price of Unix? That is a pretty compelling message, and it will play very well for ISVs who would prefer to deal with fewer platform variables.
Expect to see this outcome within the next 12 months. Softway plans to complete its work 18 to 24 months from its initial 2/96 announcement. The May 1997 FRS of the 2.0 version of OpenNT fits into this schedule. Already, Compaq and Hughes Data Systems have announced agreements to ship systems so configured.
The support of BSD sockets in the 2.0 release opens the door. With OpenNT network enabled, demand and expectation will grow for applications and supporting technologies on the platform. In support of this, NobleNet, Inc., a supplier of client/server middleware development and deployment tools, has ported ONC/RPC, RPCGEN and the award winning NobleNet RPC to the OpenNT environment. The toolkit delivers the native middleware tools that OpenNT programmers need to port and develop client/server software that operates in heterogeneous networks.
SOFTWAY SYSTEMS' STRATEGY
Softway plans for OpenNT to comply with X/Open Unix and IEEE POSIX.1 and POSIX.2 specifications, so that when packaged with Microsoft's Intel-based Win32 subsystem, NT will run both Windows and Unix applications. The following corroborating statements of product strategy come from Softway's website:
- - "While Microsoft has satisfied the requirement for POSIX.1 with Windows NT in the past, POSIX.2 conformance has not been available until now. Coupled with the POSIX.1 subsystem for Windows NT, OpenNT commands and utilities will provide complete conformance to POSIX.1 and POSIX.2, as described in FIPS 151-2 and FIPS 189 respectively, required for all operating systems procured by the U.S. federal government."
- -"Softway Systems will obtain and maintain National Institute of Standards & Technology (NIST) certifications for FIPS 151-2 (POSIX.1) and FIPS 189 (POSIX.2) for the OpenNT product line."
- -"Open systems buyers increasingly mandate products that carry the X/Open Unix brand in their procurements and require a guarantee of conformance to the Single Unix Specification. Additionally, many European governments and commercial customers require X/Open brands for all operating systems purchases."
- - "Windows NT vendors will be able to bid for such contracts when the OpenNT product carries the X/Open brand."
- -"In the next 18 months [NOTE: From February 1996], Softway Systems will release a series of products to provide complete branded XPG4 Unix conformance for Windows NT."
- -"Softway Systems has licensed the X/Open VSC Test Suite and will brand the resulting products through X/Open's branding program to provide a conformance guarantee to corporate and government customers who require open systems standards."
OpenNT satisfies what appears to be a critical element in Microsoft's strategy to increase network server and Internet market share.
COMPETITIVE PRODUCTS AND ALTERNATIVES
The value of the OpenNT opportunity depends on how well it stands up against alternatives for solving the Unix/NT co-existence problem. As Michael Goulde, VP and Senior Consultant, for the Seybold Group stated publicly:
- -"The need for a complete set of Unix interfaces on NT would primarily come from people who have already developed applications for Unix and want to be able to run them on Intel hardware and have NT compatibility. OpenNT is a way to dodge the greater cost of doing a whole other development effort. However, you can't underestimate the amount of Unix code that people want to run on NT. " (Goulde fails to recognize the attractiveness of a Unix environment for new, medium weight development, at half the cost of alternative Unix systems.)
In the absence of OpenNT, to achieve coexistence with NT, Unix software developers, suppliers and users must opt for one of the following alternatives: Port (with or without libraries); emulate Unix on NT; emulate NT on Unix.
Porting is porting, regardless of the tools, and frequently yields functionality that only approximates the original. Moreover it takes time, a luxury not always available to ISVs and corporate developers building production systems.
Emulation, whether NT on Unix or Unix on NT, levies a performance tax. In the case of the former (a product supplied by AT&T), increasing the performance of the underlying hardware likewise increases the cost of the already more expensive system. To date, Unix emulation on NT has proved sluggish at best.
The following public comments reflect and summarize the opinions about alternative technologies:
- -"Why would I want OpenNT when I can port an application using a product like Nutcracker or port directly to the Win32 subsystem? If I needed some custom app, I'd either port it directly or I might consider running it under OpenNT. The reason I might want to consider OpenNT is that it could seriously reduce my porting effort. However, I don't really consider it "ripe" enough for a commercial app. I do feel like they are worth watching. Eventually, they could make it to where a port to NT could be not much more than a recompile." (David LeBlanc, Software Engineer, Early OpenNT Evaluator, comp.os.windows.programmers.)
- -"I've had several occasions to help a number of vendors begin their ports from Unix to NT. Invariably, the best early indicator of success has been the choice of a native vs. a porting library approach. Folks choosing to use a porting library invariably get totally balled up learning to deal with the idiosyncrasies of the porting library." (Doug Hamilton, Software Engineer, comp.os.windows.programmers.)
- -"Potentially, OpenNT is a much better solution than running Windows apps under emulation or tying Unix desktops to a Windows NT server. This could be quite a bit faster." (Dan Kuznetsky, Director of Unix Systems Research, International Data Corp.)
THE REAL PROBLEM?
A number of experts do not subscribe to the ascendancy of NT and ignore the native port versus OpenNT issue all together. They pose a different question: How do you implement inter-operability and coexistence between Unix and NT? In the May 1997 edition of Sys Admin magazine ("Getting UNIX and NT on Speaking Terms", pp. 9, 10, 13-15), contributing author Arthur Donkers, contends that the best way to move between platforms, link two applications, or open an application to connectivity from a desktop GUI is through the use of advanced Remote Procedure Call (RPC) code generators. The output of these tools can be compiled, linked and deployed with any application. Mr. Donker's premise: It is not always possible, desirable, or worthwhile to migrate applications and data from one platform to another. Using RPCs opens up existing applications (whether ported or not) without imposing the penalties and inefficiencies of standard interfaces such as ODBC or SQLnet. Moreover!
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, the output of advanced RPC code generators permits exact, iterative prototyping of integration points. Such tools, through the use of IDLs
, eliminate the complexities and tedium of hand-coded RPCs and make possible application interface tuning and input parameter checking.
Vendors of these sorts of tools, for instance NobleNet ( http://www..unix-nt.com ) seem to recognize the different dimensions of the Unix NT coexistence problem. Consequently, they support advanced RPC, common IDL code generators on Unix, NT, OpenNT and a bevy of other platforms, that prove useful and efficient in either porting, application integration, or new development projects.
SOFTWAY SALES & MARKETING STRATEGY
As stated on their webpage, Softway plans to sell OpenNT through OEMs, resellers and government systems contracts. To accomplish their aims, to date their programs and activities include:
* Listing on the GSA schedule.
* Being written into the COE specification for DoD.
* On most of the major IDIQ contracts.
* Re-opened a Coast Guard contract.
* Marketing/reseller partnerships with: Microsoft, Digital Equipment Corporation, Computer Marketing Associates, EDS, Hughes Data Systems, OEM Relationship with Compaq, European subsidiary in France, building a program with Compaq and MS to attack Sun in Europe.
Softway is well on its way to accomplishing these initiatives.
THE MICROSOFT INGREDIENT
Given Softway's product strategy, the key to this deal is: Do you believe that this product will be important to Microsoft in, "rapidly extending its hegemony over the personal-computer industry into the vast market for network computing"? (WSJ, Microsoft Lines Up NT as Its Next Strategic Weapon, January 20, 1997.)
Microsoft repeatedly stalks, stakes, assimilates, and dominates major markets by consolidating fragmented technology supply. It almost never enters a market first. They build and capitalized upon their existing technology and installed base with initially inferior products, at substantially lower prices, frequently acquired from third parties. The stories of DOS vs. CP/M, Windows vs. Mac, Word vs. WordPerfect, Excel vs. Lotus, PC TCP/IP vs. the stack vendors serve as examples. Now, Bill Gates has his sights set on the Internet and the network server markets. Unix vendors, specifically SCO and Sun, stand in the way of Microsoft's domination of both.
Microsoft tested the Unix waters early on with a built-in, protected, POSIX.1 compliant subsystem. It starts automatically when a POSIX application loads and stays active (co-existing with Win32 applications) until shutdown. According to a MS resource kit, this limited capability, does not give POSIX applications direct access to any of the facilities and features of the Win32 subsystem, such as memory mapped files, networking, graphics, or dynamic data exchange. As a reviewer commented on a newsgroup:
- - "That one sentence says a lot! No networking means no Winsock or any other communication protocol. No graphics means that you are restricted to only console-based (Command Window) applications. No memory mapped files restricts one of the methods of communicating between processes under NT. Simply stated, applications using the POSIX subsystem of NT can't do a whole lot. To do anything interesting, you need to access Microsoft's Win32 API, or at least a series of Unix-like calls around the Win32 API. Why is the POSIX subsystem so brain-damaged? The general consensus is that Microsoft put in the POSIX subsystem in order to bid NT on U.S. government contracts where POSIX can be a requirement. The NT implementation is a strict implementation of the POSIX.1 standard and nothing more. So, the subsystem isn't so much as brain-damaged, but severely handicapped by not adding anything beyond the specification." (comp.os.windows.programmers)
Microsoft adopted the strict POSIX.1 implementation (developed by and OEMed from Software Spectrum) in order to penetrate the U.S. government market with NT. If history repeats itself, the approach predicts Microsoft's strategy for growing its share of government, international, and corporate markets with POSIX.2 and X/Open compliance requirements. The story is reminiscent of Microsoft's introduction of a windowing UI for DOS. Early reviews characterized Windows 1.0 as inferior and brain dead. Not long thereafter, Windows 3.1 hit the street and dominated the market.
In an authorized statement published by Softway Systems, Mike Nash, Group Product Manager, Windows NT Server, Microsoft Corporation, stated:
- - "We are excited by the launch of OpenNT for the Windows NT platform. By providing additional POSIX conformance, Softway Systems has provided Unix developers, ISVs and customers with a new incentive for bringing their applications to the Windows NT platform."
In the present absence of competitive implementations of Unix on the NT kernel, Microsoft will use OpenNT in waging war on Unix vendors. If this weapon proves effective, Microsoft has every incentive to acquire and control OpenNT and its supporting technologies, in order to take share of the multi-billion dollar Unix market.
CONCLUSION
Microsoft could reap tremendous financial and strategic rewards by offering a Win32/OpenNT dual-environment as "the new and improved NT", without charging an identifiable premium for the product. Dataquest estimated the Unix market for hardware and software at over $25 billion in 1996, growing at a rate of roughly 10%. During 1995, over 1 million new Unix licenses were sold. Extrapolating from Dataquest and WSJ estimates, 1.3 million and 1.5 million Unix licenses will be sold in 1998 and 1999. What percentage of those licenses will be sold to the purchasers of the estimated 2.5 million and 3.6 million NT licenses during the same period? Wouldn't it be easier and cheaper for them to get their Unix license and their NT license at the same time on the same box?
Bill Gates put a fine point on it in his Unix EXPO keynote address (October 96):
- -"...important to us is Unix compatibility coming back over to Windows. ... the Open Group can take that product (OpenNT) and brand it as Unix... in a very formal sense we can say when packaged that way, Windows NT actually bears the Unix trademarks."
Unix will be Assimilated. Resistance is Futile.
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This report is sponsored by NobleNet, provider of middleware programming tools for client/server and object-oriented software development, systems integration, migration and porting. NobleNet tools connect distributed logic, data sources, and objects across more than 40 platforms.
The report may be freely copied and redistributed without modification.
For more information on the topic of Unix NT integration and coexistence, visit http://www.unix-nt.com/
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