A group of Unix vendors, including Compaq Computer Corp, Hewlett-Packard Co, IBM Corp, the Santa Cruz Operation Inc and Sequent Computer Corp are to publish guidelines they say will reduce the development, maintenance and testing costs for developing IA-64 Unix servers and applications. The effort aims, once again, to establish a basis for high volume, shrink-wrapped shipments of Unix on Intel.
Interestingly, the industry’s largest Unix vendor, Sun Microsystems Inc, is absent from a list of supporters which also includes Groupe Bull, Intel Corp, BEA, Informix Software Inc, Oracle Corp, PeopleSoft International Inc, Micro Focus Plc, Progress Software Corp, the SAS Institute and Tivoli Systems Inc, which are all said to contributing to the API developers guide. But the effort does include all the partners of the existing Monterey project that IBM, SCO and Sequent have been working on since last year.
The vendors say the guidelines will describe APIs and services for enterprise-class Unix operating systems and an ABI for IA-64 processor enabling applications to run on Unix systems from a variety of manufacturers. They’ll supposedly allow developers to focus on differentiating their products rather than porting to each platform and in that way compete more effectively against Windows NT rather than each other. They are going to offer up the guidelines to The Open Group for inclusion in its Single Unix Specification.
The guidelines will build upon the Single Unix SpecÆs Public Key Encryption, Lightweight Directory Access Protocols, management and software integration services using Corba and Java, and the base line will be the Open Group’s Unix 98 specification. IBM said the work would also anticipate the adoption of technologies such as network computers and NUMA architectures. The APIs will also include packaging and installation guidelines. The APIs might also be taken up for use in non-Intel implementations of Unix.
The work appears to build upon a relationship these vendors established in defining the Project UDI Uniform Drive Interface for creating portable device drivers that can be used for Intel-based servers running any version of Unix. IBM says that all the relevant companies, including Sun, were invited to join. Sun hadn’t got back to us with its comment by press time Thursday night.
The vendors claim an initial release of the guidelines will be ready in the third quarter of 1999. Reference implementations, development tools and compliance test suites are to follow, they say in good time before Intel’s first IA-64 part ships in mid 2000.
