Microsoft chief Bill Gates says his Windows 'standard' has prevented the personal computer suffering the fate of Unix. What he means is that Unix is a divided world, without standards.
The Open Group is trying to change that with the release of Unix 98, with which the non-profit organisation aims to create open and universal information technology (IT) standards.
It launched Unix 98 in May with the intention of creating a universal standard to which Unix vendors could adopt their products. Unix 98 covers base (operating systems), workstations and servers.
Unix 98 had brought Unix closer to total integration, the Open Group's managing director for Asia-Pacific, John Hendy, said.
'We have the basics. We have the Unix workstation with CDE [common desktop environment], as well as a Unix server and an Internet server.' The inability to inter-operate between the different 'flavours' of Unix created by competing hardware vendors has been a stumbling block for the industry.
Some corporations have moved to the Windows NT platform because it is cheaper and also offers more products, written by developers who are not prepared to write to each version of Unix.