FreeLists / openbeos / [openbeos] Re: Open BeOS

["Matthijs Hollemans" <matthijs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

From J. Grant:
> I expect [the BeOS kernel] could be slotted into a GNU system.

GNU is basically a collection of utilities that were once part of
closed-source Unix. The GNU folks took those utilities and made their own
open-source versions.

So the phrase 'a GNU system' implies a Unix-like operating system. Unlike
Linux, FreeBSD, and the rest, the design of BeOS is not at all Unix-like.
That's why it won't be realistic to expect that you can take the BeOS kernel
and use it as a replacement for the Linux/FreeBSD/whatever kernel.

That doesn't mean Unix or command line utilities are bad. In fact, the Bash
shell is one of the few things that BeOS _did_ borrow from Unix.

-Matthijs