For some, the battle for the hearts and minds of the client/server world is between Unix and Microsoft's Windows NT operating systems. For others, NT, although emerging quickly, is still a small player.
Unix giants like Sun Microsystems, Hewlett-Packard and Digital are thinking about how to handle NT. HP and Digital have each decided that the only way to deal with NT is to join.
Digital is trying to promote the fact that it has Windows NT running on its Alpha chip - known for its technology but also considered expensive. Digital is also developing NT on the Intel platform, with lower priced servers running on Intel or Intel-compatible chips.
HP also jumped in with its NT offering and it claims to have the total office solution. HP can provide high-end servers running Unix, smaller ones running NT and a host of other computers for almost any purpose.
Recently, HP has been making strong claims about its ability to integrate an office that runs both NT and Unix. (The Gartner Group has said that nearly all computer networks in the next century will be mixed networks of Windows and Unix.) Sun Microsystems is the only top Unix company that has not jumped on the NT train. Sun's claim is that NT is simply not up to what Unix can do.
Sun's confidence is based on a number of things it has in its favour. Sun is considered by most analysts to be the number one Unix vendor. It has a near-monopoly on universities, engineering workstations and Internet service providers.