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{{Short description|Series of discontinued Unix operating systems by DEC}}
{{Infobox_OS |
{{Infobox OS
name = Ultrix |
logo = | | name = ULTRIX
screenshot = | | logo =
| screenshot = Ultrix-RISC-4.5.png
caption = |
| size = 100px
developer = ] |
| caption = RISC/ULTRIX 4.5, running ]
family = ] ] |
| developer = ]
source_model = |
| source_model = ]
latest_release_version = 4.5 |
| kernel_type = ]
latest_release_date = 1995 |
| supported_platforms = ], ], ]
working_state = Historic |
| ui = ], ] ]
kernel_type = monolithic|
| programmed_in = ]
license = |
| family = ] (])
website = |
| released = {{Start date and age|1984}}
| latest_release_version = 4.5
| latest_release_date = {{Start date and age|1995}}
| marketing_target =
| language =
| updatemodel =
| package_manager =
| working_state = Historic
| license = ]
| preceded by = ]
| succeeded by = ]
| website =
}} }}
'''Ultrix'''<ref name=UltrixSNA.NYT88>{{cite news |newspaper=]
'''Ultrix''' (officially all-caps '''ULTRIX''') was the brand name of ]'s (DEC) native ] systems. While ''ultrix'' is the ] word for avenger, the name was chosen solely for its sound.
|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1988/08/24/business/company-news-networking-products-introduced-by-digital.html
|title=Networking Products Introduced by Digital
|date=August 24, 1988}}</ref> (officially all-caps '''ULTRIX''') is the brand name of ]'s (DEC) discontinued native ] operating systems for the ], ], ]<ref>{{cite news
|newspaper=]
|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qpTn_XtzdAMC
|date=October 1, 1984 |page=50 |title=DEC offers Ultrix-32 for Microvax I}}</ref> and ]s.


==History== ==History==
The initial development of Unix occurred on DEC equipment, notably DEC ] and ] (Programmable Data Processor) systems. Later DEC computers, such as their ] systems were also popular platforms to run Unix on; the first port to VAX, ], was finished in ] (the VAX was only released in ] ]). However DEC supplied their own proprietary ] operating system for a long time before they acknowledged Unix. The initial development of Unix occurred on DEC equipment, notably DEC ] and PDP-11 (Programmable Data Processor) systems. Later DEC computers, such as their VAX, also offered Unix.<ref name="fiedler198310">{{cite news | url=https://archive.org/stream/byte-magazine-1983-10/1983_10_BYTE_08-10_UNIX#page/n133/mode/2up | title=The Unix Tutorial / Part 3: Unix in the Microcomputer Marketplace | work=BYTE | date=October 1983 | access-date=30 January 2015 | author=Fiedler, Ryan | pages=132}}</ref> The first port to VAX, ], was finished in 1978, not long after the October 1977 announcement of the VAX, for which – at that time – DEC only supplied its own proprietary operating system, ].


Absolutely key to bringing Unix to inside the company, DEC's Unix Engineering Group (UEG) was started by Bill Munson with Jerry Brenner and Fred Canter, both from DEC's premier Customer Service Engineering group, Bill Shannon (from Case Western University), and Armando Stettner (from Bell Labs). Other later members of UEG included Joel Magid, Bill Doll, and Jim Barclay recruited from DEC's various marketing and product management groups. DEC's Unix Engineering Group (UEG) was started by Bill Munson with Jerry Brenner and Fred Canter, both from DEC's Customer Service Engineering group, Bill Shannon (from ]), and ] (from ]). Other later members of UEG included Joel Magid, Bill Doll, and Jim Barclay recruited from DEC's marketing and product management groups.


The UEG team, under Canter's direction, released '''V7M''', a modified version of ] (q.v.). Under Canter's direction, UEG released '''V7M''', a modified version of ] (q.v.).

In 1988 ''The New York Times'' reported that Ultrix was ] compliant.<ref name=UltrixSNA.NYT88/>


===BSD=== ===BSD===
Shannon and Stettner worked on low-level ] and device driver support initially on UNIX/32V but quickly moved to concentrate on working with the ]'s ]. Berkeley's ] came to New Hampshire to work with Shannon and Stettner to wrap up a new BSD release, incorporating the UEG CPU support and drivers, and to do some last minute development and testing on other configurations available at DEC's facilities. As an aside, the three brought up a final test version on the main VAX used by the VMS development group. No comments were heard from the VMS developers whose terminals greeted them the next morning with a Unix login prompt... UEG's machine was the first to run the new Unix, labeled 4.5BSD as was the tape Bill Joy took with him. The thinking was that 5BSD would be the next version - university lawyers thought it would be better to call it 4.1BSD. After the completion of 4.1BSD, Bill Joy left Berkeley to work at ]. Bill Shannon later moved from New Hampshire to join him. Shannon and Stettner worked on low-level ] and device driver support initially on UNIX/32V but quickly moved to concentrate on working with the ]'s ]. Berkeley's ] came to New Hampshire to work with Shannon and Stettner to wrap up a new BSD release.{{citation needed|date=October 2022|reason=The previous citation seemed to involve a book discussing this very text in the context of Misplaced Pages editing practices, not an actual source for the information itself!}} UEG's machine was the first to run the new Unix, labeled 4.5BSD as was the tape Bill Joy took with him. The thinking was that 5BSD would be the next version - university lawyers thought it would be better to call it 4.1BSD. After the completion of 4.1BSD, Bill Joy left Berkeley to work at ]. Shannon later moved from New Hampshire to join him. Stettner stayed at DEC and later conceived of and started the Ultrix project.


Shortly after ] announced plans for a native UNIX product, Stettner and Bill Doll presented plans for DEC to make a native VAX Unix product available to its customers; DEC founder ] agreed.
As an aside, DEC UEG's main VAX, named decvax, was also one of the central nodes in the ] and ] network. It was the first system to link, in real time for email and Usenet news article, the east and west coasts of the US, ] (duke) and UC Berkeley (ucbvax). Later, after some compression capability was added to netnews, decvax was linked with Europe (], Amsterdam) and then Australia (]), making calls at least twice per day each.


===V7m===
Armando Stettner suggested to Bill Doll during a hallway conversation that it was time for DEC to make a native VAX Unix product available to its customers. A proposal was made to Bill Munson who later presented the idea to ]. It was said that Olsen grabbed a ], slapped it on someone's chest and said let's do it. Thus began Ultrix.
DEC's first native UNIX product was V7M (for modified) or V7M11 for the PDP-11 and was based on ] from Bell Labs. V7M was developed by DEC's original Unix Engineering Group (UEG); work was done primarily by Fred Canter and Jerry Brenner, with their teammates Stettner, Bill Burns, Mary Anne Cacciola, and Bill Munson. V7M contained many fixes to the kernel including support for separate instruction and data spaces,<ref>{{cite web|last=Canter|first=Fred|title=V7M 2.1 SPD|url=http://bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/pdp11/ultrix-11/Unix_V7M_Release_2.1_Software_Description_Sep81.pdf|publisher=Digital Equipment Corp|access-date=7 January 2012}}</ref> significant work for hardware error recovery, and many device drivers. Much work was put into producing a release that would reliably bootstrap from many tape drives or disk drives. V7M was well respected in the Unix community. UEG evolved into the group that later developed Ultrix.


===First release of Ultrix=== ===First release of Ultrix===
The first Ultrix OS, Ultrix-32, was based on 4.2BSD with some features from ], and was released in ]. Its purpose was to provide a DEC-supported native Unix for VAX. It also incorporated several modifications and scripts from Usenet/UUCP experience gained while running decvax. Later, Ultrix-32 incorporated support for ] and other proprietary DEC protocols such as ]. It did not support ]. Shortly thereafter, DEC also offered a product based upon its V7M release. Given ]/AT&T Unix licensing, DEC (and others) were restricted to selling binary-only licenses. A significant part of the engineering work was in making the systems relatively flexible and configurable despite their binary-only nature. The first native VAX UNIX product from DEC was Ultrix-32, based on 4.2BSD with some non-kernel features from ], and was released in June 1984. Ultrix-32 was primarily the brainchild of Armando Stettner. It provided a Berkeley-based native VAX Unix on a broad array of hardware configurations without the need to access kernel sources. A further goal was to enable better support by DEC's field software and systems support engineers through better hardware support, system messages, and documentation. It also incorporated several modifications and scripts from Usenet/UUCP experience. Later, Ultrix-32 incorporated support for ]<ref name=DECnet.NYT>{{cite news |newspaper=]
|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1988/10/22/business/company-news-ashton-digital-software-pact.html
|title=Ashton-Digital Software Pact |date=October 22, 1988}}</ref> and other proprietary DEC protocols such as ]. It did not support ]. Given ]/AT&T Unix licensing, DEC (and others) were restricted to selling binary-only licenses. A significant part of the engineering work was in making the systems relatively flexible and configurable despite their binary-only nature.


Later on, DEC provided native Unix operating systems on three platforms: ] minicomputers (where it was one of many available operating systems), ] based computers (where it was one of two primary OS choices), and DEC's first line of ] systems, the ] workstations and ] servers (where it was the only OS choice offered). Note that the DECstation systems used ] processors, not the much later ]. DEC provided Ultrix on three platforms: PDP-11 minicomputers (where Ultrix was one of many available operating systems from DEC), VAX-based computers (where Ultrix was one of two primary OS choices) and the Ultrix-only DECstation workstations and ] servers. Note that the DECstation and the later DECsystem products (as opposed to DEC's original ] line) used ] processors and predate the much later ]-based systems.<ref name="electronicnews19890710_dec">{{cite magazine | url=https://archive.org/details/sim_electronic-news_1989-07-10_35_1766/page/n12/mode/1up | title=Hear DEC to Air VAX Vector Plans | magazine=Electronic News | date=10 July 1989 | access-date=10 August 2022 | last1=Stedman | first1=Craig | pages=13 }}</ref>


===Later releases of Ultrix===
The original versions were known as ''Ultrix-11'' and ''Ultrix-32'', but as the PDP-11 faded from view it became known simply as ''Ultrix'', or to its detractors as ''Buglix'' or ''Scrofulix''. When the MIPS versions of Ultrix was released, the VAX and MIPS versions were referred to as VAX/ULTRIX and RISC/ULTRIX respectively. Much engineering emphasis was placed on supportability and reliable operations including continued work on CPU and device driver support (which was, for the most part, also sent to UC Berkeley), hardware failure support and recovery with enhancement to error message text, documentation, and general work at both the kernel and systems program levels. Later Ultrix-32 incorporated some features from 4.3BSD and included ] in addition to the standard ], and both the ] and DEC's ] protocols.
The V7m product was later renamed to ''Ultrix-11''<ref>{{cite web|title=Ultrix-11 2.0 SPD|url=http://bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/pdp11/ultrix-11/2.0/AE-X370C-TC_ULTRIX-11_2.0SPD_Sep84.pdf|publisher=Digital Equipment Corp|access-date=7 January 2012}}</ref> to establish the family with ''Ultrix-32'', but as the PDP-11 faded from view Ultrix-32 became known simply as ''Ultrix''. When the MIPS versions of Ultrix was released, the VAX and MIPS versions were referred to as VAX/ULTRIX and RISC/ULTRIX respectively. Much engineering emphasis was placed on supportability and reliable operations including continued work on CPU and device driver support (which was, for the most part, also sent to UC Berkeley), hardware failure support and recovery with enhancement to error message text, documentation, and general work at both the kernel and systems program levels. Later Ultrix-32 incorporated some features from 4.3BSD and optionally included ] and ]<ref name=UltrixSNA.NYT88/><ref name=NYNEXsystrat.NYT92>{{cite news
|newspaper=]
|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1992/05/13/business/company-news-764892.html
|title=Company News |date=May 13, 1992}}</ref> in addition to the standard ], and both the ] and DEC's ] protocols.


Notably, implemented in Ultrix were the ] (IPC) facilities found in System V (], ], ], and ]). While the converged Unix from the ] (that spawned the ] or OSF), released late ], put BSD features into System V, DEC took the best from System V and added it to a BSD base. Notably, Ultrix implemented the ] (IPC) facilities found in System V (]s, ], ], and ]). While the converged Unix from the ] (that spawned the ] or OSF), released late 1986, put BSD features into System V, DEC, as described in Stettner's original Ultrix plans, took the best from System V and added it to a BSD base.


Originally, on the VAX workstations, Ultrix-32 had a ] called UWS, Ultrix Workstation Software, which was based on a version of the ]. Later, the widespread version 11 of the ] (X11) was added, using a look and feel called ] that was devised in order to mimic the look and feel of the UWS system. Eventually DECwindows also provided the ] look and feel. Originally, on the VAX workstations, Ultrix-32 had a ] called UWS, Ultrix Worksystem Software, which was based on ] and the ]. Later, the widespread version 11 of the ] (X11) was added, using a window manager and ] named ] (X User Interface), which was also used on VMS releases of the time. Eventually Ultrix also provided the ] toolkit and ].


Ultrix ran on ] systems from both the VAX and DECsystem families. Ultrix-32 supported ] disks and tapes<ref>{{cite magazine |magazine=]
Ultrix ran on ] systems from both the VAX and DECsystem families. The ] supported ] while not being fully ]. As such, there was liberal use of locking and some tasks could only be done by a particular CPUs (e.g. the processing of ]s). This was not uncommon in other SMP implementations of that time (e.g. ]). Sadly, Ultrix was slow to support many then new or emerging Unix system capabilities found on competing Unix systems (e.g. it never supported shared libraries or ] executables; delay in implementing bind, 4.3BSD system calls and libraries especially the math libraries; etc.) and suffered from some problems, most notably file system integrity issues (having never picked up the 4.3BSD filesystem and fixes).
|date=February 16, 1987 |page=21
|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0DAEAAAAMBAJ
|title=MicroVax 2000}}</ref> and also proprietary ] and CI peripherals employing DEC's ], although lacking the OpenVMS distributed lock manager it did not support concurrent access from multiple Ultrix systems. DEC also released a combination hardware and software product named Prestoserv which accelerated NFS file serving to allow better performance for diskless workstations to communicate to a file serving Ultrix host. The ] supported ] while not being fully ] based upon pre-Ultrix work by ] and earlier work by ] at Purdue University. As such, there was liberal use of locking and some tasks could only be done by particular CPUs (e.g. the processing of ]s). This was not uncommon in other SMP implementations of that time (e.g. ]). Also, Ultrix was slow to support many then new or emerging Unix system capabilities found on competing Unix systems (e.g. it never supported shared libraries or ] executables); and a delay in implementing bind, 4.3BSD system calls and libraries.{{citation needed|date=August 2022}} The absence of memory-mapped file support was regarded as a particular deficiency with Ultrix in comparison to its competitors in the early 1990s.<ref name="unixreview199210_decstation">{{ cite magazine | url=https://archive.org/details/sim_unix-review_1992-10_10_10/page/n53/mode/1up | title=Tested Mettle | magazine=UNIX Review | date=October 1992 | access-date=10 August 2022 | last1=Wilson | first1=David | pages=50, 52, 54, 57–58 }}</ref>{{rp|pages=50|quote=Our overall feeling is that Ultrix is an old operating system. Memory-mapped disk files is an important feature, and Ultrix does not offer it.}}


===Last release=== ===Last release===
As part of its commitment to the OSF, Armando Stettner went to DEC's Cambridge Research Labs to work on the port of ] to DEC's RISC-based ] 3100<ref name=R3100.NYT89>{{cite news |newspaper=]
As part of its commitment to the OSF, DEC replaced its Ultrix-32 as its Unix offering with ], which was released shortly before the Alpha-based computers that supplanted the VAX and MIPS-based machines. OSF/1 had a ]-based kernel with many of the features missing from Ultrix. Again, the UEG (by now the Ultrix Engineering Group) worked at making the new OSF/1-based Digital Unix run well on DEC hardware, with the reliability and maintainability that people came to expect from DEC operating systems.
|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/01/09/business/digital-will-introduce-pc-s-and-work-stations.html
|title=Digital Will Introduce PC's and Work Stations
The last major release of Ultrix was version 4.5 in ], which supported DECstations and VAXen. There were some subsequent Y2K patches.
|author=John Markoff |date=January 9, 1989}}</ref> workstation. This was released in 1991 with a ]-based kernel for the MIPS architecture. A port of Ultrix to Alpha was carried out during the initial development of the Alpha architecture, but was never released as a product.<ref>{{cite journal|url=http://www.dtjcd.vmsresource.org.uk/pdfs/dtj_v04-04_1992.pdf|title=Using Simulation to Develop and Port Software|author1=George A. Darcy III|author2=Ronald F. Brender|author3=Stephen J. Morris|author4=Michael V. Iles|journal=Digital Technical Journal|volume=4|issue=4|year=1992|pages=181–192}}</ref> Later, DEC replaced Ultrix with OSF/1 on ], ending Unix development on the MIPS and VAX platforms.

The last major release of Ultrix was version 4.5 in 1995, which supported all previously supported DECstations and VAXen. There were some subsequent ] patches.

==Application software==
], a scientifically oriented word processor, was among the application packages available for Ultrix.<ref>{{cite news |newspaper=The New York Times |date=May 29, 1999
|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1999/05/29/business/company-news-macneal-schwendler-to-buy-marc-analysis-research.html
|title=Macneal-Schwendler to buy MARC Analysis Research}}</ref>

The following shells were provided with Ultrix:<ref></ref>
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]


==See also== ==See also==
*] *]
*]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
*Ultrix/UWS Release Notes V4.1, AA-ME85D-TE
*Ultrix-32 Supplementary Documents, AA-MF06A-TE
*The Little Gray Book: An ULTRIX Primer, AA-MG64B-TE
*Guide to Installing Ultrix and UWS, AA-PBL0G-TE


==External links== ==External links==
* *
* (last updated April 10, 2002) * (version as of Jan 11 2006)
*{{dead link|date=March 2018 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}
*
*


{{Digital Equipment Corporation}}
]
{{Unix-like}}
]
{{Berkeley Software Distribution}}


]
]
]
]
]
]
]
]

Latest revision as of 05:48, 3 November 2024

Series of discontinued Unix operating systems by DEC Operating system
ULTRIX
RISC/ULTRIX 4.5, running Motif Window Manager
DeveloperDigital Equipment Corporation
Written inC
OS familyUnix (4.2BSD)
Working stateHistoric
Source modelClosed source
Initial release1984; 40 years ago (1984)
Latest release4.5 / 1995; 29 years ago (1995)
PlatformsPDP-11, VAX, MIPS
Kernel typeMonolithic kernel
Default
user interface		Command-line interface, DECwindows GUI
LicenseProprietary
Preceded byUNIX/V7M
Succeeded byOSF/1

Ultrix (officially all-caps ULTRIX) is the brand name of Digital Equipment Corporation's (DEC) discontinued native Unix operating systems for the PDP-11, VAX, MicroVAX and DECstations.

History

The initial development of Unix occurred on DEC equipment, notably DEC PDP-7 and PDP-11 (Programmable Data Processor) systems. Later DEC computers, such as their VAX, also offered Unix. The first port to VAX, UNIX/32V, was finished in 1978, not long after the October 1977 announcement of the VAX, for which – at that time – DEC only supplied its own proprietary operating system, VMS.

DEC's Unix Engineering Group (UEG) was started by Bill Munson with Jerry Brenner and Fred Canter, both from DEC's Customer Service Engineering group, Bill Shannon (from Case Western Reserve University), and Armando Stettner (from Bell Labs). Other later members of UEG included Joel Magid, Bill Doll, and Jim Barclay recruited from DEC's marketing and product management groups.

Under Canter's direction, UEG released V7M, a modified version of Unix 7th Edition (q.v.).

In 1988 The New York Times reported that Ultrix was POSIX compliant.

BSD

Shannon and Stettner worked on low-level CPU and device driver support initially on UNIX/32V but quickly moved to concentrate on working with the University of California, Berkeley's 4BSD. Berkeley's Bill Joy came to New Hampshire to work with Shannon and Stettner to wrap up a new BSD release. UEG's machine was the first to run the new Unix, labeled 4.5BSD as was the tape Bill Joy took with him. The thinking was that 5BSD would be the next version - university lawyers thought it would be better to call it 4.1BSD. After the completion of 4.1BSD, Bill Joy left Berkeley to work at Sun Microsystems. Shannon later moved from New Hampshire to join him. Stettner stayed at DEC and later conceived of and started the Ultrix project.

Shortly after IBM announced plans for a native UNIX product, Stettner and Bill Doll presented plans for DEC to make a native VAX Unix product available to its customers; DEC founder Ken Olsen agreed.

V7m

DEC's first native UNIX product was V7M (for modified) or V7M11 for the PDP-11 and was based on Version 7 Unix from Bell Labs. V7M was developed by DEC's original Unix Engineering Group (UEG); work was done primarily by Fred Canter and Jerry Brenner, with their teammates Stettner, Bill Burns, Mary Anne Cacciola, and Bill Munson. V7M contained many fixes to the kernel including support for separate instruction and data spaces, significant work for hardware error recovery, and many device drivers. Much work was put into producing a release that would reliably bootstrap from many tape drives or disk drives. V7M was well respected in the Unix community. UEG evolved into the group that later developed Ultrix.

First release of Ultrix

The first native VAX UNIX product from DEC was Ultrix-32, based on 4.2BSD with some non-kernel features from System V, and was released in June 1984. Ultrix-32 was primarily the brainchild of Armando Stettner. It provided a Berkeley-based native VAX Unix on a broad array of hardware configurations without the need to access kernel sources. A further goal was to enable better support by DEC's field software and systems support engineers through better hardware support, system messages, and documentation. It also incorporated several modifications and scripts from Usenet/UUCP experience. Later, Ultrix-32 incorporated support for DECnet and other proprietary DEC protocols such as LAT. It did not support VAXclustering. Given Western Electric/AT&T Unix licensing, DEC (and others) were restricted to selling binary-only licenses. A significant part of the engineering work was in making the systems relatively flexible and configurable despite their binary-only nature.

DEC provided Ultrix on three platforms: PDP-11 minicomputers (where Ultrix was one of many available operating systems from DEC), VAX-based computers (where Ultrix was one of two primary OS choices) and the Ultrix-only DECstation workstations and DECsystem servers. Note that the DECstation and the later DECsystem products (as opposed to DEC's original DECsystem line) used MIPS processors and predate the much later Alpha-based systems.

Later releases of Ultrix

The V7m product was later renamed to Ultrix-11 to establish the family with Ultrix-32, but as the PDP-11 faded from view Ultrix-32 became known simply as Ultrix. When the MIPS versions of Ultrix was released, the VAX and MIPS versions were referred to as VAX/ULTRIX and RISC/ULTRIX respectively. Much engineering emphasis was placed on supportability and reliable operations including continued work on CPU and device driver support (which was, for the most part, also sent to UC Berkeley), hardware failure support and recovery with enhancement to error message text, documentation, and general work at both the kernel and systems program levels. Later Ultrix-32 incorporated some features from 4.3BSD and optionally included DECnet and SNA in addition to the standard TCP/IP, and both the SMTP and DEC's Mail-11 protocols.

Notably, Ultrix implemented the inter-process communication (IPC) facilities found in System V (named pipes, messages, semaphores, and shared memory). While the converged Unix from the Sun and AT&T alliance (that spawned the Open Software Foundation or OSF), released late 1986, put BSD features into System V, DEC, as described in Stettner's original Ultrix plans, took the best from System V and added it to a BSD base.

Originally, on the VAX workstations, Ultrix-32 had a desktop environment called UWS, Ultrix Worksystem Software, which was based on X10 and the Ultrix Window Manager. Later, the widespread version 11 of the X Window System (X11) was added, using a window manager and widget toolkit named XUI (X User Interface), which was also used on VMS releases of the time. Eventually Ultrix also provided the Motif toolkit and Motif Window Manager.

Ultrix ran on multiprocessor systems from both the VAX and DECsystem families. Ultrix-32 supported SCSI disks and tapes and also proprietary Digital Storage Systems Interconnect and CI peripherals employing DEC's Mass Storage Control Protocol, although lacking the OpenVMS distributed lock manager it did not support concurrent access from multiple Ultrix systems. DEC also released a combination hardware and software product named Prestoserv which accelerated NFS file serving to allow better performance for diskless workstations to communicate to a file serving Ultrix host. The kernel supported symmetric multiprocessing while not being fully multithreaded based upon pre-Ultrix work by Armando Stettner and earlier work by George H. Goble at Purdue University. As such, there was liberal use of locking and some tasks could only be done by particular CPUs (e.g. the processing of interrupts). This was not uncommon in other SMP implementations of that time (e.g. SunOS). Also, Ultrix was slow to support many then new or emerging Unix system capabilities found on competing Unix systems (e.g. it never supported shared libraries or dynamically linked executables); and a delay in implementing bind, 4.3BSD system calls and libraries. The absence of memory-mapped file support was regarded as a particular deficiency with Ultrix in comparison to its competitors in the early 1990s.

Last release

As part of its commitment to the OSF, Armando Stettner went to DEC's Cambridge Research Labs to work on the port of OSF/1 to DEC's RISC-based DECstation 3100 workstation. This was released in 1991 with a Mach-based kernel for the MIPS architecture. A port of Ultrix to Alpha was carried out during the initial development of the Alpha architecture, but was never released as a product. Later, DEC replaced Ultrix with OSF/1 on Alpha, ending Unix development on the MIPS and VAX platforms.

The last major release of Ultrix was version 4.5 in 1995, which supported all previously supported DECstations and VAXen. There were some subsequent Y2K patches.

Application software

WordMARC, a scientifically oriented word processor, was among the application packages available for Ultrix.

The following shells were provided with Ultrix:

See also

References

  1. ^ "Networking Products Introduced by Digital". The New York Times. August 24, 1988.
  2. "DEC offers Ultrix-32 for Microvax I". Computerworld. October 1, 1984. p. 50.
  3. Fiedler, Ryan (October 1983). "The Unix Tutorial / Part 3: Unix in the Microcomputer Marketplace". BYTE. p. 132. Retrieved 30 January 2015.
  4. Canter, Fred. "V7M 2.1 SPD" (PDF). Digital Equipment Corp. Retrieved 7 January 2012.
  5. "Ashton-Digital Software Pact". The New York Times. October 22, 1988.
  6. Stedman, Craig (10 July 1989). "Hear DEC to Air VAX Vector Plans". Electronic News. p. 13. Retrieved 10 August 2022.
  7. "Ultrix-11 2.0 SPD" (PDF). Digital Equipment Corp. Retrieved 7 January 2012.
  8. "Company News". The New York Times. May 13, 1992.
  9. "MicroVax 2000". InfoWorld. February 16, 1987. p. 21.
  10. Wilson, David (October 1992). "Tested Mettle". UNIX Review. pp. 50, 52, 54, 57–58. Retrieved 10 August 2022.
  11. John Markoff (January 9, 1989). "Digital Will Introduce PC's and Work Stations". The New York Times.
  12. George A. Darcy III; Ronald F. Brender; Stephen J. Morris; Michael V. Iles (1992). "Using Simulation to Develop and Port Software" (PDF). Digital Technical Journal. 4 (4): 181–192.
  13. "Macneal-Schwendler to buy MARC Analysis Research". The New York Times. May 29, 1999.
  14. ULTRIX Worksystem Software, Version 4.2 Software Product Description

Further reading

  • Ultrix/UWS Release Notes V4.1, AA-ME85D-TE
  • Ultrix-32 Supplementary Documents, AA-MF06A-TE
  • The Little Gray Book: An ULTRIX Primer, AA-MG64B-TE
  • Guide to Installing Ultrix and UWS, AA-PBL0G-TE

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