A different perspective – from UNIX to smartphones and tablets – who did what first

This is not definitive, is incomplete, focuses on certain developments, omits Windows completely, and any suggestions would be welcome.

Year	Type/version	Lineage	Platform(s)	Company
1975	Version 6 UNIX			Bell Labs
1976	PWB/UNIX			Bell Labs
1978	1BSD	Version 6 UNIX	PDP	Berkely UC
1979	Version 7 UNIX	Version 6 UNIX		Bell Labs (AT&T)
	UNIX/32V	Vesrion 7 UNIX		Bell Labs (AT&T)
	2BSD	1BSD	PDP	Berkely UC
	3BSD	2BSD	VAX	Berkely UC
1980	4BSD	3BSD	VAX	Berkely UC
1982	System III	PWB/UNIX + UNIX/32 etc.	VAX + PDP	AT&T
1983	System V R1	System III + 4.1BSD	VAX + PDP	AT&T
	GNU	OS development + Free sotware		GNU-O/S
1984	System V R2	SVR1	Xenix/386	AT&T
	Psion.1	OPL	Hitachi 6301	Psion
1986	System V R3	SVR2		AT&T
	4.3BSD	4BSD		Berkely UC
	Psion.2	EPOC+OPL	Hitachi 6301	Psion
	Mach	4.3BSD	VAX + SUN-68030 + IBM-PC/RT	CMU
1987	Mach 1	Mach	Sequent	CMU
	Minix		x86
1988	Mach 2	Mach-1		CMU
	Mach 2.5	Mach-2		CMU + OSF
	XNU	Mach-2.5 + BSD 4.3		NeXTstep
	L3	rewrite of Mach	x86	GMD+SET
	SVR4	SVR4 + 4.3BSD + Xenix + SunOS	x86 + SPARC	AT&T
	GridPad	MS-DOS (1st touch-screen tablet)	8086	(Jeff Hawkins for) Samsung
1990	Mach 3	Mach-2		CMU
	GNU-Hurd	GNU + Mach-3
1991	Solaris 2	SVR4	SPARC
	Psion S.3	SIBO (EPOC+OPL)	NEC v30	Psion
	Linux
1992	GNU/Linux	GNU + Linux
1993	netBSD	4.3BSD
	Zoomer	GEOS (Grid-pad based tablet)		Palm+Tandy+Casio (Hawkins)
	Newton	NewtonOS (pen-input tablet)	ARM	Apple (with Palm apps)
1994	OSF/1	AIX + Mach-2.5 + 4.3BSD	Alpha	OSF
	Mach-4	Mach-3		Utah
	GNU-Hurd	GNU + Mach-4		GNU
	OpenStep	Mach-3 + 4.3BSD		NeXTstep
	Java 1	C/C++		Sun
	Simon	Personal Communicator	1st Smartphone w/touchscreen	IBM/BellSouth
	FreeBSD-1	4.3BSD
1995	4.4BSD-lite			AT&T
	openBSD	4.3BSD
	FreeBSD-2	4.4BSD-lite
1996	GNU-Mach-1+Hurd
	n9000 Communicator	GEOS v.3	i386 clamshell PDA/smartphone	Nokia+HP
	Pilot	PalmOS (Zoomer development)	Motorola 683xx	(Jeff Hawkins for) Palm
	MkLinux	Mach-3 + Linux		OSF + Apple
1997	Psion S.5	EPOC32	32-bit ARM	Psion
	LighSurf	First MMS camera-phone		Philippe Khan – Lightsurf Tech
	L4	L3		IBM
1998	Debian-GNU/Hurd	GNU/Hurd+Mach
	L4/Fiasco	L4		Dresden Uni
	Symbian	Psion EPOC	ARM	Psion+Nokia+Ericsson+Motorola
	Mac Rhapsody	MkLinux + OpenStep
1999	L4Ka::Hazelnut	L4		Karlsruhe Uni
	Mac OSX Server 1	XNU+Darwin+MkLinux+4.3BSD+Mach.3	PowerPC
2000	Darwin	OSX Server 1 + Rhapsody	PowerPC	Apple
	iPaQ	Windows CE	ARM	Compaq
	Ericsson R380	Symbian	EPOC-based smartphone
	Nokia 9210	Symbian	EPOC-based smartphone
2001	OSX.10.0	Darwin+OSX Server 1	PowerPC	Apple
	L4Ka::Pistachio	L4		Karlsruhe Uni
	Kyocera 6035	PalmOS PDA + cellphone	1st smartphone marketed in USA	Kyocera+Palm
2002	OpenDarwin	OpenSource Darwin		Apple
2003	Android Inc formed	Linux based mobile OS development		Android
2004	OpenDarwin.7			Apple
	Nokia 9500	Symbian	smartphone with camera and WiFi	Nokia
2005	Google buys Android			Google
	OS2005/Maemo.1	Linux+GTK+Nokia proprietary	n770 tablet	Nokia
2006	OSX.10.4		PowerPC & Intel	Apple
	OpenDarwin ends
2007	OS2007/Maemo.3	Linux+GTK+Nokia proprietary	n800 tablet	Nokia
	iPhone OSX	OSX+services+media+Cocoa Touch	iPhone smartphone	Apple
	Android source	Linux+Dalvik+Apache Harmony (Java)	Arm & Intel	Google
	pureDarwin	Apple-free OpenSource Darwin
	OSX.10.6		Intel	Apple
2008	Android.1	Linux+Dalvik+Apache Harmony (Java)	HTC Dream smartphone	HTC+Google
	Moblin	Linux based OS	Intel	Intel
	Diablo/Maemo.4	Linux+GTK+Nokia proprietary	n810 tablet	Nokia
	Mer	Ubuntu/Linux/LXDE	Nokia n800/n810
2009	Maemo.5	Linux+QT+Nokia proprietary	Nokia n900 smartphone	Nokia
	ChromeOS	Linux based OS	Intel & Arm	Google
	ChromiumOS	OpenSource version of ChromeOS	Intel & Arm	Google
	Moblin.2	Linux based OS	Intel	Intel
	WebOS	Linux based OS		HP/Palm
2010	MeeGo	Moblin+Maemo Linux merger	Intel+Arm	Intel+Nokia+LSF
2011	Chromebook			Various
	Harmattan/MeeGo	Maemo+MeeGo Nokia fork	Arm	Nokia
	Android.4	Linux kernel 3.x	Arm+Intel	Google
2012	Tisen	MeeGo+Mer	Arm+Intel	Samsung+Intel+LSF

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Gnome 2.3 is still alive and kicking, if you want it.

I originally installed VirtualBox when somebody suggested this could be a useful way I could still run some old XP programs I needed for astronomy on a Linux PC.

So, I have XP available to me as a VirtualBox guest on my Ubuntu 11.04 (Gnome 2.32) laptop host.

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As well as Windows 7…

(one way of recycling the original licences…)

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I also run Ubuntu 12.04, with Gnome failsafe, on an old Dell P4 PC in the garage that dual-boots XP. Ubuntu for Midi, Yamaha keyboard and Music Studio, XP for ASCOM telescope control. Ubuntu also serves to play my MP3’s held on an atom file server running Debian in the office. Rather than Unity, I installed gnome-fallback, which gives me a desktop very similar to Gnome 2.3.

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I do use Unity on a little netbook, but it can also run XFCE, which I prefer.

I use Debian 6 (Gnome 2.3) on a 2GB dual-core atom-based file & print server. This also runs a 500MB XP VB guest (primarily so that we can print to a Canon multi-function Laser Printer that has no Linux drivers). The Debian file server runs NFS, CUPS & Samba (CIFS), to allow access to files, the HP scanner/inkjet, and the Canon A3 photo-quality inkjet. The workaround for the Canon MF printer is to have Chromium loaded up with GooglePrint, which means I can print from Linux+Chromium -> Chromium+Windows.

Back to VirtualBox VM’s.

Apart from Windows XP & 7, I run a copy of Debian 6 (Gnome 2.3) – which could be lost now I use it as a server as well, I guess.

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I have a copy of Fedora 17 running Gnome 3.4, just so I can see what I am missing.

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I have Mint 13 (Mate), which is a fork of Gnome 2.3, basically. Mint also allows me to look at their spin on Gnome 3.4 failsafe, looking like Gnome 2.32, called Cinnamon

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I have Suse 12, running KDE 4.7, so that I can watch those irritating bouncy transitions when I select something to run, and look at KDE if I want to.

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A recent addition was CentOS 6.3 (Gnome 2.28), because while I have Fedora, I wanted to see what the more stable Red Hat Enterprise Linux was like, and in itself as a potential alternative to Debian.

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I did install OpenSolaris, but as work on that effectively ceased in 2009 after Oracle took over, I have been looking at OpenIndiana (Gnome 2.3). This is a ‘proper’ Unix derivative. I think of all the UNIX variants I worked on over the year, I was fondest of Solaris, which had many features from SVR4. I was quite taken aback the first time I loaded openSolaris, to find myself looking at Gnome rather than CDE/Motif.

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VirtualBox has also allowed me to try out things like Moblin, MeeGo, ChromeOS, Android, JoliCloudOS etc.

The other ‘proper’ UNIX systems I wanted to try were pureDarwin and FreeBSD, unfortunately I could not get either of them to run as a guest, because my laptop does not support VTx or EPT.

So, I wiped Mint Debian Edition off my old Compaq Celeron Laptop, and managed to get FreeBSD running on that instead:

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Darwin will boot from CD on the same laptop, but there is no obvious way of installing it from there, and so no way of installing any graphical libraries that would let me run Darwin Xmas, for example.

Apart from Windows, Fedora and Suse, these are all running variations of Gnome 2.3. Ubuntu I found works quite well in fallback mode, and Cinnamon is Mint’s version of a post Gnome 3 implementation of Gnome. All the older, stable, releases still use Gnome 2.3, including the UNIX variants. The good news from last month is that the Common Desktop Interface has now been released as Open Source, and Motif may well be soon to follow. So, once some work has been done tidying those up, no doubt we will see revitalised versions of CDS/Motif on the open UNIX systems they were originally the main X interface for – and may even some of the LINUX variants as well.

So, whoever it was put me onto VirtualBox, if you happen to read this, I’m really grateful. I’m also grateful to whoever it was I tried installing on my relatively new laptop, rather than consigning it 5+ year-old kit; I think that is what converted me to linux once-and-for all.

None of these PC’s & laptops is younger than three years-old, some nearly ten years-old. The newest PC is the atom file/print server – which cost the equivalent of US$120-130 from an online-auction site. In fact, that’s the only bit of this kit purchased in the last three years. While I am keen on recycling older equipment, there is a significant energy cost in doing this, which was the reasoning behind the atom server – it consumes up to 1/10 of the energy of even a modern tower PC. That represents a cost of $20-30 a year, rather than the $200-300 older equipment can cost. So, my focus is starting to shift from recycling older kit, to investing in more energy efficient kit in the future.

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As a postcript, I had several problems running the Vbox guest additions updates to 4:20 on several distributions from a range of versions like 4.08 & 4.12 after updating the main system – CentOS being the trickiest. I had to drop into root at the terminal, install gcc and dependent libraries, then run the ‘autorun.sh’ from inside the /media directory that contained the updates. Debian, I had to drop into root, but the shell command didn’t work; in the end, I had to launch nautilus as root, and run thr autoprompt in the gui as root. With Mint, I had to log out and back into Cinnamon, and then it ran fine from the Devices menu. Fedora had to be run from a terminal, have gcc installed, then run with a ‘sudo sh autorun.sh’ command in the relevant directory. Suse involved much the same, installing the base C/C++ & kernel development in Yast before it would run properly.

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