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| ▲ | p_ing 10 hours ago | parent [-] | | To certify any version of macOS as UNIX, the security had to be significantly altered (disabling SIP) among a few other things. This is why what is shipped is not what is certified as UNIX. You can /make/ it match what is certified as an administrator, but that would be inadvisable. https://www.osnews.com/story/141633/apples-macos-unix-certif... EDIT: And really, UNIX certification means nothing except to potentially government agencies and people who don't understand what UNIX and/or UNIX certification is. Or why being "certified UNIX" is generally meaningless: see the BSDs, which are much closer to "UNIX" origins than macOS will ever be. Or Windows, which is frankly just has better architected internals and abandons legacy UNIX ;-) | | |
| ▲ | rayiner 9 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > is. Or why being "certified UNIX" is generally meaningless: see the BSDs, which are much closer to "UNIX" origins than macOS will ever be MacOS is BSD over Mach, which is itself derived from BSD. | | |
| ▲ | p_ing 9 hours ago | parent [-] | | Yes, that's the point. It's further removed from UNIX than the BSDs are. macOS contains BSD userland, networking, file system, POSIX, and a couple of other things. But XNU, the kernel, is "X is Not UNIX", if there ever was a statement to be made about the underpinnings of macOS. https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/Da... | | |
| ▲ | inkyoto 6 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | You have just described OSF/1 (and later – Tru64) – a certified UNIX with a hybrid kernel operating over a Mach microkernel, BSD userland, POSIX conformance etc. What is the point that you are making? | |
| ▲ | KerrAvon 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | This is a very silly argument. There were several actual Unixes released based on Mach, and some of them more purely Mach than macOS/NeXT ever have been. | |
| ▲ | sbuk 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | The people that certify it say that you are wrong. What you think and what actually is are two entirely different things in this case. The fact remains that, according to the OpenGroup (and they are the one that matter here), macOS 26 is UNIX. | | |
| ▲ | p_ing 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | macOS 26 that is /altered/ is UNIX. macOS that ships on every Mac is not certified UNIX -- but it can be made to match if you're willing to give up security. You should read through the actual certification - https://www.opengroup.org/csq/repository/noreferences=1&RID=... (there are a couple more in the repo). To run the VSX conformance test suite we first disable SIP as follows:
[...] Feel free to disable SIP on your Mac. I certainly won't be doing so on mine. | | |
| ▲ | sbuk 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | You’re confusing operating mode with operating system. SIP/SSV don’t create a different macOS, they restrict mutation and introspection. They don’t change the POSIX surface, the SUS semantics, or the kernel interfaces being certified. They just stop test harnesses from instrumenting the system without elevated privilege. By your logic, no modern OS is anything it claims to be unless you run it in an insecure debug configuration. Linux isn’t POSIX because you need root. Windows isn’t Windows because kernel debugging exists. That’s obviously nonsense. The Open Group certifies macOS 26 as shipped. Temporarily relaxing protections to run a conformance suite does not produce a “different OS”, it produces a different trust configuration of the same one. Saying “it’s not really UNIX because SIP is on” is like saying a container isn’t Linux because it doesn’t let you mount /proc without extra privileges. | |
| ▲ | 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | [deleted] |
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| ▲ | runjake 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | > Or Windows, which is frankly just has better architected internals and abandons legacy UNIX ;-) Current macOS user, and former NT kernel dabbler and VMS user here. That's highly debatable. On the kernel side, Windows is still filled with legacy VMS-isms. Eg: Object Manager (object/resource model), named objects, handles, how processes and threads work, vmem, scheduling etc etc On the userspace side, Windows is still filled with legacy DOS-isms. Don't me wrong, I love the underlying Windows OS, despite its many quirks, but it's filled with perhaps even more legacy cruft and definitely isn't any sort of step above anything else. I also don't believe anyone actually runs macOS in a UNIX-compliant configuration. Rather, it's a checkbox on some RFP and nobody is clued into why it's actually there, because all the people that did know have since retired. | | |
| ▲ | p_ing 7 hours ago | parent [-] | | What lineage of OS predates both DOS and VMS? :-) | | |
| ▲ | runjake 7 hours ago | parent [-] | | As the popular phrase goes: "It's legacy, all the way down". What matters is what's left of those legacies in current revs. In both cases: "Quite a bit", but I wish the base Windows OS would evolve away from legacy as much as macOS has. Start with eliminating drive letters. | | |
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| Im sorry, but i dont buy that. Unix certification has nothing to do with number of processes running or "efficiency"! The OS must be SUS compliant, i.e have all the core interfaces in place, all the correct utilities (awk, grep, vi, sed etc) and theres something about header files, filesystem requirements etc. even if the macOS submitted for certification is super trimmed down, it does not matter as long as its a true subset of what is shipped to consumers. MacOS is certified UNIX i.e its "UNIX", like it or not. On this point the article is just wrong. |
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| ▲ | timetopay 17 hours ago | parent [-] | | Unix is both a family of operating systems and also a trademark. The name is overloaded - "Unix" is more than one thing at the same time. In addition, the trademark is "UNIX" and the operating system family is "Unix" MacOS is both UNIX and also not Unix at the same time. If the trademark holders decided to UNIX certify my cat, which is well within their legal right to do so, would that make her UNIX? | | |
| ▲ | greggsy 16 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Unlike macOS, your cat does not, and will not, meet the industry-accepted standard that describes unix as we know it today. https://www.opengroup.org/openbrand/register/xym0.htm | | |
| ▲ | shiomiru 7 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > as we know it today An important nuance you seem to be missing is that SUSv3 is equivalent to "IEEE Std 1003.1-2001" (that is, POSIX 2001). In practice, I've had to work around more POSIX compatibility issues in macOS than in all other actively developed (Free) Unix-likes, combined. | |
| ▲ | remix2000 16 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Mayhaps not with a `cat(1)` alone, but really they just need to expand their menagerie now. | |
| ▲ | bigyabai 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Like macOS, my cat does not qualify for the UNIX standard out-of-the-box and I'm far too lazy to configure my cat for an OS standard that's 25 years obsolete. |
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| ▲ | remix2000 16 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Or perhaps they just won't certify your cat just as Apple won't start making Windows PCs…? |
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