Talk:Operating system

Partially proprietary?

This is a meaningless phrase. Either the whole item is generically available from multiple sources, or else you have to get it from one vendor. The "Darwin" article is confusing (as usual for Wikipedia computer articles) as it isn't clear (to me, anyway) that I can take a blank hard drive in a Macintosh, a Darwin disribution and expect to run Mac OS X applications on it. Certainly if you upload a complete Mac OX X distribution to your friendly local FTP server, Apple will quite firmly instruct you to take it down as soon as they find out about it; this indicates a proprietary interest, to me. --Wtshymanski (talk) 15:09, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

As I understand it, something is either proprietary or it isn't. Mac OS is owned by Apple and is a licensed product, thus it is proprietary. Mine may be a simplistic view but it is ridiculous to use (as Wtshymanski has already said) the phrase "partially proprietary" as this is (as I see it) simply not possible. There may be licencing and/or sourcing concerns that make Mac OS available without paying for it but that certainly doesn't make it free or any less proprietary. -- fg^TC 17:46, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

The underlying BSD Unix portion of OS X is free and open source software. Apple does not own and cannot restrict the copying or use of that portion of the OS. OS X will not operate without this underlying open source component. All the other portions of OS X are Apple-proprietory, but the whole OS is not, being a combination of open source components with proprietary components. "Partially proprietary" is a perfectly good phrase to describe this situation. You can take and sell parts of OS X without transgressing Apple's copyrights on the other parts. Yworo (talk) 23:03, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Ducking out on the ground I can see how both sides are correct. "Partially proprietary" does sound twisted however true it may be. -- fg^TC 23:42, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Can you take and sell enough of OS X that the parts are a complete operating system? Doubt it. Can you sell something called "OS X" and not run afoul of Apple's proprietary interests? Also doubtful. Why is the murky distinction "partially proprietary" useful? --Wtshymanski (talk) 00:39, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, you can. It's called Darwin (operating system)! --Cybercobra (talk) 02:24, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

That's a different product, though? Anyway, "open core" is a better description and not so absurd on the face. --Wtshymanski (talk) 13:52, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

MVS in history

MVS introduced some important concepts, but transparrent data caching wasn't one of them. Both Multics and IBM Time Sharing System (TSS/360) were there first.

I believe that I can provide references for compatibility from OS/360 through z/OS. Howeveer, there are some edge cases that are not compatible. Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 00:07, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Market share changes; the alphabet doesn't

Although I can see why it is tempting to reorder the examples of OS's to suit our view (or the view of the market), the market and our cultural view changes over time. In this case another editor will want to swap the list around to suit and then another and another. To see examples of this behaviour we need only look at the article history. I set the list in alphabetical order some time ago (and at the time added a note hinting as to why). I strongly suggest that the article features lists that will be reordered (time and time again for various and often pointless reasons) to be ordered alphabetically and left that way. fg^t_c 21:26, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

• I was the editor who recently changed the order to reflect market share. I did it because I saw another re-ordering get reverted and thought "oh, the ordering seems to be chosen at random, so I'll order it in a less arbitrary way." If you prefer to order it alphabetically, I have no specific objection, so please proceed. SocratesJedi | Talk 03:09, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

No particular order matters which is actually the problem. Everyone has their own view of which way around they should be so the order gets shifted around for all kinds of reasons (I think typically it comes down to favouritism). The only order that has no connotations seems to me to be alphanumerical. Unless we are enslaved and indoctrinated by 12 fingered telepathic aliens, I think there is little chance the order will get out of date. I added a note a while back reading that the list was not exhaustive and was alphabetical in order to try to avoid this constant flux but the note was thought to be un-encyclopaedic. Alphabetical or alphanumerical lists are however very encyclopaedic so I really think that would be best. Thanks for your input. fg^t_c 03:28, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I also agree it should go alphabeticaly. As you say it will never change. --JetBlast (talk) 04:13, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

me too; go the alphabet Steev (talk) 20:46, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Linux is not an operating system

Linux is just the kernel of several operating systems. Operating systems provide the interface between applications and the hardware device handling program. The kernel handles the hardware devices. The operating systems that use the kernel Linux are GNU, BSD, Unix and others. So the article should replace the term "Linux" with "GNU, Unix and BSD". Quiliro (talk) 22:17, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

Too much water under that bridge to turn back now. Even if strictly correct, "Linux" is known to be an operating system. fredgandt 00:00, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

We don't entertain the GNU/Linux naming controversy here. The Wikipedia manual of style specifies that we use the most commonly used names for things. Thus the article about Linux is titled Linux, not GNU/Linux and there is a separate article on the Linux kernel. (As a caution, editors who edit war over this generally earn blocks for violating this policy.) Yworo (talk) 00:06, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Technically Linux kernel is the operating system, and it is not wrong to call Linux kernel only as Linux because it is its name after all. It is just plain wrong to call anything else than Linux kernel (bundle of different software) as Linux. And Linux is not used by any other OS because it is technically impossible. Linux is a monolithic operating system, like original Unix and BSD's are. While HURD is server-client operating system. Golftheman (talk) 08:43, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Fire fox — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.91.116.34 (talk) 22:27, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Mini computers

I'm not much of an author so I will leave editing the article to a better writer with more details. This article misses not just an operating system but a class of computers. 'Mini computers' include IBM's AS400 which can run several operatng systems including OS400, and HPs HP3000 using the MPE operating system. (I was an HP3000 system operator.) Introduced sometime in the 1970's, HP stopped making the HP3000 in 2002 and stopped supporting it in 2004. I think that the MPE operating system is now owned by OpenMPE. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 4.254.228.86 (talk) 14:33, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

"User interface" section

I guess that the statement

“ The user interface is not actually a part of the operating system ”

was a result of incorrectly narrow perception of the "operating system" concept by some user, not some point of view well-established in the industry. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 16:45, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

Real-time

Under the 'Types of operating systems' section in the 'Real-time' paragraph the writer starts to talk about event driven vs time shared systems. I fail to see how these design notions are specific for real time operating systems. I would agree that in a real time OS these things require a closer look, but the concepts are so universal that they are wider (and older) than the concept of the OS itself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.87.238.229 (talk) 17:45, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Computer crashes

I do not think that the IP’s addition is something really “out of place”, so not only this Wtshymanski’s edit constitutes a biting of a newcomer, but his edit summary deceives Wikipedia users about the true nature of that reverted addition. Opinions? Incnis Mrsi (talk) 06:43, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Normally I would assume good faith, but given Wtshymanski's long history of deliberately making "mistakes" in order to remove content (look at how many times has he proposed a speedy deletion for a reason not on the list of criteria for speedy deletion), I must conclude that he knew perfectly well that the top part of his edit "moved" a reference without changing what is displayed on the page and that the edit comment was a deliberate attempt to deceive the reader into missing the content removal below.

There is a partially-constructed WP:RFC/U at User talk:DieSwartzPunkt/WTS, and this search turns up many previous issues with Wtshymanski's behavior. --Guy Macon (talk) 08:36, 8 April 2013 (UTC)