Although it has now digested its Unix System Laboratories Inc acquisition with the formation of the new Unix Systems Group, Novell Inc executives are quickly finding that there are plenty of other courses on the Unix menu. Indeed the company’s attention is now being focused on bringing outstanding matters like how to unify Unix and work with Unix International – to book. Owning the product is simply not enough in this quarter of the industry. Novell has already made it clear that it has little use for all the consortia created during the Unix wars and does not want business dependencies on external organisations, such as Unix International Inc. It was against this background that Unix Systems Group chief Kanwal Rekhi attended an extraordinary meeting of Unix International’s executive committee the week before last and challenged Unix International to come up with a plan for a new relationship between their organisations – a meeting that also spelled the end for Unix International as presently constituted. Novell, which is said to value the group as source of feedback from vendors and users alike, has given Unix International until the beginning of the fourth quarter to put an acceptable plan together: to prove that despite a fairly speckled history, it can finally cut the mustard. Unix International, however, has already stepped smartly forward into the breech.
Administering
Although it hasn’t been specifically assigned the task by Novell, the planned role that Unix International has in mind for itself includes executing and administering a range of initiatives that it believes are necessary to achieve Novell’s goal of simplifying and unifying Unix. Unix International’s plan will include recommendations for converging the variety of Unix implementations around a set of common, basic interface specifications, and the establishment of a new branding mechanism that will lead to as many Unix implementations as possible – and they currently go under a vast number of vendor-specific product names – being explicitly branded as conformant at some basic level, with the Novell technology. Unix International believes it can oversee the creation of a new set of application programming interfaces that will enable vendors to offer users and independent software vendors greater Unix compatibility, and at the same time allow them to compete more vigourously on implementation. It envisages programming interfaces for the graphical user interface – where despite the efforts of the Common Open Software Environment firms, it thinks there is a lot more work to be done – for networking and some further down at the operating system level. Quite how this sits alongside the objectives of the COSE initiative, also focused on these (and other) technology areas – and in which Unix Labs and Univel Inc are both involved – is unclear, although Unix International has well-documented reservations about the ability of COSE to deliver on all of its goals. Perhaps re-inforcing Unix International’s case, speculation in the US press last week suggested that COSE may be considering cutting back on its goals.
By William Fellows
Unix International thinks the programming interfaces could eventually be meshed into some form of overall Unix Application Programming Interface. Unix International envisages being responsible for the administration and evolution of these programming interfaces via new development groups that will be established under its new structure. Novell wants to resolve Unix’s needless incompatibilities – indeed it believes pursuing any other strategy would be suicidal – but whether Unix International’s plan can fulfill that role, given the plethora of other industry initiatives and efforts currently under way, won’t become clear until Novell puts the plan under scrutiny. Unix International’s objectives appear all the more challenging given that it hasn’t managed to achieve much along these lines under its own steam, although its hand is now being forced by Novell’s desire for a new form of relationship. Novell, meanwhile, is adamant t
hat initiatives leading to greater unity in the Unix industry should happen as quickly as possible. Although Unix International’s plan is due for further discussion over the next couple of months – and a relationship, if agreed, will be enshrined in a contractual document – Unix International president Peter Cunningham believes that, for example, a mechanism for branding could be in place by the end of this year or the beginning of next. Other components of Unix International’s plan for the relationship with Novell include things more familiar to it, such as establishing an early access programme to Unix Systems Group technologies for vendors and software developers and providing input to Unix Group on licensing and conformance issues for the branding scheme. It remains unclear – and has yet to be decided – whether branding will mean Unix, Unix System V.4.2, UnixWare or some other stamp. For Novell, the main requirement is that a level of branding should embrace as many suppliers as possible. Unix International says it’ll detail a system software roadmap based on these initiatives if they eventually form the basis of a new relationship with Novell. Beyond Kanwal Rekhi’s challenge to Unix International to make itself useful in the new scheme of things, Novell is also involved in discussions with individual Unix vendors – at the highest levels – about achieving much broader participation in the Unix process and unifying Unix. Nothing is precluded in the talks, which have been going on for some time according to one source, although nothing has actually been decided either.
Unix dues
Novell wants all the Unix suppliers to have input into Unix and is keen to pick a path through the industry’s war-torn landscape. The effort embraces Digital Equipment Corp, Hewlett-Packard Co and IBM Corp as well as Unix System V.4 adherents and goes well beyond the machinations and posturing of the industry’s existing mouthpieces. Unix International for one recognises that it cannot hope to bring about agreement at such a fundamental level and will support any effort to bring about overall unity. The bottom line for it, and other consortia however, is Novell’s belief that if there is going to be a unification of Unix then there has to be a unification of the Unix groups. The process to find unifying themes on which all can agree will be a lengthy process, but Novell can fall back on a new relationship with Unix International in the meantime, which – at least according to Unix International’s parlance will embrace at least some of these threads. Indeed Novell is confident that some level of agreement will be reached, but believes the likes of DEC, Hewlett and IBM need to feel under much more pressure from UnixWare and Microsoft Corp Windows NT in the market to make them reach for their pens. Novell observes ruefully that some firms pay more to the Open Software Foundation in membership dues than they do to Novell in Unix royalties.
