| UNIX is an open standard, and although
it varies somewhat from one manufacturer to another, it is basically
still UNIX. Most major computer manufacturers support some form of
UNIX, a tribute to its importance as an operating system. It is one of
the most powerful, flexible and scalable operating systems in the
world.
UNIX in general continues to advance
its position as the bulletproof operating system of choice for mission
critical applications. Mission critical applications are those that
are crucial to the operation of a business or other organization. UNIX
is also tightly integrated with Transmission Control Protocol /
Internet Protocol or TCP/IP. TCP/IP basically grew out of UNIX due to
the need for LAN and WAN communications. TCP/IP is the acknowledged
standard protocol of the Internet and many private networks. All
computers (workstations and servers) running the TCP/IP protocols are
referred to as hosts and are given an IP address and a host name. The
IP address is what allows the host to be uniquely identified on the
Internet. If a name server is available, the computer can be referred
to by its name, which will then be translated to its IP address. The
TCP/IP protocols, IP addresses and name servers will be covered more
in Chapter 16 on Networking Basics.
Sun Microsystems' Solaris Operating
Environment, with its core operating system, SunOS, is a high
performance, versatile 64-bit implementation of UNIX. Solaris runs on
a wide variety of computers from Intel-based personal computers to
powerful mainframes and supercomputers. Solaris is currently the most
widely used version of UNIX in the world for large networks and
Internet web sites. Sun is also the developer of the Write Once, Run
Anywhere™ Java™ technology.
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