What is the more popular UNIX flavor?

Artificer

I am an IT trainer and I usually train different product like ORACLE,
SQL Server and C # and windows server. I am pondering about studying
a Unix Flavor to add it to my trainer repertory. However I haven't
been able to choose between solaris, AIX, HP UX and maybe redhat
linux.
I know that this question depend on the region but I will like to read
a couple of opinions about what is the UNIX flavor that is more common
among commercial companies.
Since I usually train mid size companies I would like to study first
the flavor that is more common. Any Suggestions?

Todd H.

Artificer <> writes:

> I am an IT trainer and I usually train different product like ORACLE,
> SQL Server and C # and windows server. I am pondering about studying
> a Unix Flavor to add it to my trainer repertory. However I haven't
> been able to choose between solaris, AIX, HP UX and maybe redhat
> linux.
> I know that this question depend on the region but I will like to read
> a couple of opinions about what is the UNIX flavor that is more common
> among commercial companies.
> Since I usually train mid size companies I would like to study first
> the flavor that is more common. Any Suggestions?

Thank god, a Windows centric trainer who is clueful enough to
entertain learning a second OS! Kudos.

These are educated guesses:

Linux (though technically not a UNIX) would be by far the most
installed. RedHat used to be an easy choice of distro to aim at for
enterprise stuff. I think that may still be the case.

Solaris I'm guessing is probably second by a healthy margin.

AIX and HP-UX... too close for me to hazard a guess.

--
Todd H.

Artificer

Thanks a lot! Anybody else with opinions?

Moe Trin

On Mon, 12 Nov 2007, in the Usenet newsgroup comp.unix.questions, in article
<1194896895.215131.116710@50g2000hsm.googlegroups. com>, Artificer wrote:

NOTE: Posting from groups.google.com (or some web-forums) dramatically
reduces the chance of your post being seen. Find a real news server.

>I am pondering about studying a Unix Flavor to add it to my trainer
>repertory. However I haven't been able to choose between solaris,
>AIX, HP UX and maybe redhat linux.

OK - let's get technical first, and then drop it:

Identifies those O/S
allowed to call themselves "UNIX" which is a trademark. Linux isn't
one of them. This is because no one has dropped the coins to have
a distribution (there are around 300[1]) of Linux tested. You get a
bunch of flame-wars over this subject. Outside of the trolls and
lawyers, few people care (and I'm one who doesn't).

>I know that this question depend on the region but I will like to
>read a couple of opinions about what is the UNIX flavor that is
>more common among commercial companies.

The problem is as you state - regional. I'll agree with Todd's
rankings - Solaris is pretty popular. I've got a few dozen Sol 9
and Sol 10 boxes here, and almost as many FreeBSD, but we're mainly
a Linux house. We _also_ have two lonely HPUX 11.11 boxes for some
bizarre reason - don't ask me, I'm a network guy. I vaguely recall
having an AIX 5.something box about two years ago, along with a couple
of SGI boxes running IRIX 6.5.something. They don't seem to be here
any more (or at least aren't running/connected to any of my wires).

>Since I usually train mid size companies I would like to study first
>the flavor that is more common. Any Suggestions?

Two things to think about. First, *nix is a family of operating
systems that share a lot of traits/kinks/warts. If you _learn_ (to
the point that you are comfortable at the command line) ANY of them,
you'd be able to hack it - admittedly with some difficulty - in just
about any other. An interesting thought is that

[compton ~]$ ls `echo $PATH | tr ':' ' '` | egrep -vc '(:|^$)'
1435
[compton ~]$ find `echo $PATH | tr ':' ' '` -type f -atime -30 -print
| wc -l
168
[compton ~]$

The first command says to count the number of files in the directories
in my PATH. On this system (a version of Linux), there are 1435. But
the interesting part is the second command. Of those 1435, only 168
have been "used" in the last 30 days. There's a lot there - but you
rarely use even a significant amount of it. By the way, the '$'
prompt suggests I'm doing this as an ordinary user running a Bourne
style shell. If I ran this as root, there would be more in the first
result, but not the second (more commands available - about the same
number of a different selection used).

Second thing to think about is that each flavor of *nix (and most
specifically each distribution of Linux) has a lot of distribution
specific tools, and desktop eye-candy. And it is exactly that -
specific to a UNIX product, or a Linux distribution. Knowing how to
use Red Hat's toy administration tool isn't going to do you any good
on Mandriva, SUSE or Ubuntu (three other "popular" distributions of
Linux) much less Solaris, AIX, HP-UX, or OSX. _THAT_ is why that
command line knowledge is desirable.

is a Free and Open Operating System
centric website - caters more to Linux than any other, but you may
determine some rankings from the content. But taking it back to
your point about regions - what do _your_ customers use? The entire
rest of the world might use $FOO, but if your customers are using
$BAR or $BAZ, you'd better know $BAR and $BAZ - what-ever they are.

Old guy

[1] 300 distributions - not as bad as it seems, as a lot are just
clones of another i.e., WhiteBox, PinkTie, CentOS, and several more
are GPL copies of Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Chris McDonald

Artificer <> writes:

>Thanks a lot! Anybody else with opinions?

OS-X?

--
Chris.

Todd H.

Chris McDonald <.edu.au> writes:

> Artificer <> writes:
>
> >Thanks a lot! Anybody else with opinions?
>
> OS-X?

Chris makes a good point to the letter of the question. Heh.

Problem with it of course, from a learning perspective, is that you
can be fancied an advanced user of OS X and not even know where the
Terminal program is hidden. :-)

That's a testament to the elegance of the gui, I suppose.

--
Todd H.

Golden California Girls

Todd H. wrote:
> Chris McDonald <.edu.au> writes:
>
>> Artificer <> writes:
>>
>>> Thanks a lot! Anybody else with opinions?
>> OS-X?
>
> Chris makes a good point to the letter of the question. Heh.
>
> Problem with it of course, from a learning perspective, is that you
> can be fancied an advanced user of OS X and not even know where the
> Terminal program is hidden. :-)

That's why he should have said Darwin.

> That's a testament to the elegance of the gui, I suppose.
>

Mister.Fred.Ma@gmail.com

On Nov 12, 2:48 pm, Artificer <> wrote:
> I am an IT trainer and I usually train different product like ORACLE,
> SQL Server and C # and windows server. I am pondering about studying
> a Unix Flavor to add it to my trainer repertory. However I haven't
> been able to choose between solaris, AIX, HP UX and maybe redhat
> linux.
> I know that this question depend on the region but I will like to read
> a couple of opinions about what is the UNIX flavor that is more common
> among commercial companies.
> Since I usually train mid size companies I would like to study first
> the flavor that is more common. Any Suggestions?

This is a bit late of a follow-up, but cygwin must be right up there.
You get the simultaneous M$ Windows, Unix shells, and X-windows.
Launching M$ apps from the unix shell is simple ("cygstart").

Grant

On Wed, 5 Dec 2007 03:41:39 -0800 (PST), wrote:

>On Nov 12, 2:48 pm, Artificer <eliezerfigue...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> I am an IT trainer and I usually train different product like ORACLE,
>> SQL Server and C # and windows server. I am pondering about studying
>> a Unix Flavor to add it to my trainer repertory. However I haven't
>> been able to choose between solaris, AIX, HP UX and maybe redhat
>> linux.
>> I know that this question depend on the region but I will like to read
>> a couple of opinions about what is the UNIX flavor that is more common
>> among commercial companies.
>> Since I usually train mid size companies I would like to study first
>> the flavor that is more common. Any Suggestions?
>
>This is a bit late of a follow-up, but cygwin must be right up there.
>You get the simultaneous M$ Windows, Unix shells, and X-windows.
>Launching M$ apps from the unix shell is simple ("cygstart").

Yes, but you don't get the full unix flavour, because basic OS elements
are missing in windoze

Grant.

Mister.Fred.Ma@gmail.com

On Dec 5, 4:29 pm, Grant <g_r_a_n...@dodo.com.au> wrote:
> On Wed, 5 Dec 2007 03:41:39 -0800 (PST), Mister.Fred...@gmail.com wrote:
> >On Nov 12, 2:48 pm, Artificer <eliezerfigue...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> I am an IT trainer and I usually train different product like ORACLE,
> >> SQL Server and C # and windows server. I am pondering about studying
> >> a Unix Flavor to add it to my trainer repertory. However I haven't
> >> been able to choose between solaris, AIX, HP UX and maybe redhat
> >> linux.
> >> I know that this question depend on the region but I will like to read
> >> a couple of opinions about what is the UNIX flavor that is more common
> >> among commercial companies.
> >> Since I usually train mid size companies I would like to study first
> >> the flavor that is more common. Any Suggestions?
>
> >This is a bit late of a follow-up, but cygwin must be right up there.
> >You get the simultaneous M$ Windows, Unix shells, and X-windows.
> >Launching M$ apps from the unix shell is simple ("cygstart").
>
> Yes, but you don't get the full unix flavour, because basic OS elements
> are missing in windoze

Would you be speaking from a network admin perspective? From a plain-
old user perspective, I found cygwin to be more flexible and up-to-
date than a solaris system I was using. The plain-old user can update
and add cygwin packages whenever he/she wishes, while only a sysadmin
can do that on a more traditional networked unix . Well, you still
need admin privileges on your own PC, but that's a typically
considered a lesser risk than in a sysadmin on networked unix.

Fred