As widely expected, AT&T Co’s Unix Software Operation began shipments of its Unix System V Release 4.0 operating system to vendors on the first day of Unix Expo, and gathered together wide ranging support for the new Unix release from exhibitors. The salient points of 4.0 have already been widely previewed: most importantly, the new release merges the Xenix, System V and Berkeley environments, and also has a set of Application Binary Interfaces that will ensure binary compatibility standards for each major processor family. Core services of V.4 include an enhanced Streams input-output capability, a virtual file system, virtual memory, real-time enhancements, new internationalisation capabilities and operations, administration and maintenance support. Extensions to networking services, the C compilation system and user interfaces have also been made. Unix International Inc, which co-ordinated the release with AT&T Unix Software Operation, said that over 170 companies – 80% of the industry according to Unix International president Peter Cunningham – had announced support for the product, and had representatives along from AT&T, Fujitsu Ltd, NCR Corp, Olivetti & Co, NEC Corp, Unisys Corp, Toshiba Corp, Sun Microsystems and ICL to endorse V.4 at the launch. And on the show floor, Unix International set out a major demonstration of the new operating system, the result of work on pre-release versions of V.4. The stand was divided into four sections: the portability section showed shrink-wrapped software running on Intel-based machines from Prime Computer, Olivetti, Intel itself, Dell Computer Corp and Unisys; scalability was demonstrated with System V.4 on a Toshiba laptop, through a Commodore International Amiga 2000 to a Pyramid Technology Inc minicomputer and a Fujitsu mainframe; a compatibility section with applications runnning on current Unix versions as well as System V.4; and interoperability, where a train graphic was shown chuffing between the screens of Sun, Pyramid, NEC, Dell, Commodore and AT&T machines. Source code tapes are shipping immediately from AT&T in Greensboro, North Carolina, and from the Unix Software Operation in London and Tokyo. Systems should begin hitting the market in the first two quarters of next year.
