Unix System Laboratories Inc has made that expected $1m investment in French microkernel house Chorus Systemes SA, Paris, and the two say they plan to evolve Unix System V.4 and Chorus Mix in tandem, saying that their relationship isn’t any closer – Unix Labs is not yet adopting Mix – because the industry needs time to digest what has already come out, and recoup its investment in System V.4 before moving on to a microkernel. In the meantime, the pair are proposing a project for funding under the European Community’s Esprit III programme that would effectively lump together various other separate Esprit projects Chorus has in hand, make Mix Esprit’s de facto distributed operating system and help Chorus decide whether Mix needs more object-orientation. Mix, which with its suitability for fault-tolerance, massively parallel and real-time systems is usually associated with the high end, should also impact Unix Labs’ desktop endeavours.
