Unix International Inc has awarded the contract for the development of its applications binary interface-compliance test suite to Unisoft Corp, and expects to have them ready by the end of the year, according to president Peter Cunningham. Unisoft is to work on generic versions of the test suite and then work with the major chip manufacturers on architecture specific versions, but will be providing the tools, not carrying out the actual testing. According to a heads of agreement letter circulated by Unisoft, it will cost a company $150,000 to put its first architecture through its Unix System V.4 paces, $50,000 for each additional chip, with $60,000 maintenance for at least two years. For chip makers to pass along the suite to OEM customers will cost the latter $20,000 in X/Open-Unisoft-written VSX3 source fees. Despite complaints in some quarters about the hefty cost (which comes on top of Unix International membership and other source code fees), the AT&T Unix supporters club’s vice-president Joanne Miller says the pricing is in keeping with the other bids received. Unisoft is not receiving any payment from Unix International to create the test suite. There were up to seven bidders for the contract, including 88Open/Pencom and Mindcraft Inc: UI is paying 88Open $30,000 to cover its costs for providing some 4,000 assertions, which will be used, where needed, for the criteria on which test suites are based. Both Unix International and Unisoft are concerned about time to market, with the project specification process set to be completed by August 10. Unisoft chief Jeremy Thomas claimed that 60% of the product is already completed, with much of it based on the already-completed X/Open XPG3 VSX compatibility test suite. Most of the work is being done at Unisoft’s London headquarters, despite the fact that the chip manufacturers in question – versions for Intel, Motorola, Sparc, MIPS and AT&T 3B processors are under way – are almost to a man US-based.
