Macs

[Chris Rees]

On 16 Sep 2009 14:32, Liam Proven <lproven at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wed, Sep 16, 2009 at 1:48 PM, Chris Rees utisoft at googlemail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> > Darwin is based on the Mach microkernel, and Apple took the USERLAND
>
> > (tcsh, ls etc) from FreeBSD. The kernel of Darwin is nothing like the
>
> > kernel of FreeBSD; FreeBSD has a monolithic kernel like the Linux
>
> > kernel, and Darwin is microkernel based.
>
>
>
> Not to disagree with anything you've said, which is all bang-on the nail...
>
>
>
> But...  :¬)
>
>
>
> I've been reading up on Mach & OS X and things recently. On top of
>
> Mach, OS X runs a single large monolithic "server" to provide the
>
> Unix-compatible APIs, and that server too is derived from BSD. So it's
>
> not a pure microkernel, because of its Unix compatibility. The purists
>
> say it's not a µK at all.
>
>
>

Yeah, you're right about the purists. I haven't time to research this
new point of yours right now, but off the top of my head they have
merely implemented the BSD-style APIs, which have many differences
from the Linux APIs, but are true 'Unix' and more Free than the Linux
kernel, too.

That's a hand waving explanation, and anyone who wants to tell me it's
crap can do so :P

Chris


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