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Comparison of operating systems

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The following tables compare general and technical information for a number of widely used and currently available operating systems. Please see the individual products' articles for further information.

Due to the large number and variety of available Linux distributions, all of these operating systems are grouped under a single entry in these tables. See comparison of Linux distributions for a detailed comparison. There are also a wide variety of minor BSD operating sytems, many of which can be found at Comparison of BSD operating systems.

The tables specifically do not include subjective viewpoints on the merits of each operating system. For this kind of information, please see operating system advocacy.

  • 1 Technical information
  • 2 Security
  • 3 See also
  • 4 External links
    • -->

    Creator First public release Predecessor Latest stable version (release date) Cost (USD) license Target system type
    AIX IBM 1986 System V R3 5.3 (August 2004) Bundled with hardware Proprietary Server, Network Appliance, Workstation
    AmigaOS Amiga, Inc. 1985, July 23rd TRIPOS 4.0 (July 2005) Bundled with hardware Proprietary Workstation, Home Desktop
    FreeBSD The FreeBSD Project December 1993 386BSD 6.1 (May 8, 2006) style="background: #ddffff" | Free BSD Server, Workstation, Network Appliance
    HP-UX Hewlett-Packard 1983 Unix 11.23 "11i v2" (December 2005) style="background: #ff99dd" |0 Proprietary Server, Workstation
    Inferno Bell Labs 1997 Plan 9 Fourth Edition / (July 2005) style="background: #ddffff" | Free MIT/GPL/LGPL/LPL Network Appliance, Server, Embedded
    GNU/Linux Various authors September 17, 1991 Minix Kernel 2.6.17.4 (July 6, 2006) style="background: #ddffff" | Free Usually GNU GPL/Copyleft See: Comparison of Linux distributions
    Mac OS Apple Computer January 1984 9.2.2 (May 12, 2002) Proprietary Workstation, Home Desktop
    Mac OS X Apple Computer March 2001 NeXTSTEP, Mac OS 10.4.7 "Tiger" (June 27, 2006) style="background: #ff99dd" |Desktop 9
    Server 9 (10 clients)     		Open source core system (APSL, GPL, others) with proprietary higher level API layers Workstation, Home Desktop, Server
    NetBSD The NetBSD Project May 1993 386BSD 3.0 (December 23, 2005) style="background: #ddffff" | Free BSD Network Appliance, Server, Workstation, Embedded
    NetWare Novell 1985 S-Net 6.5 SP4 (September 2005) style="background: #ff99dd" |4 (1 user connection) Proprietary Server
    OpenBSD The OpenBSD Project October 1995 NetBSD 1.0 3.9 (May 1, 2006) style="background: #ddffff" | Free BSD Server, Network Appliance, Workstation, Embedded
    OpenVMS DEC (now HP) February 1978 RSX-11M 8.2-1 (September 2005) Free for non-commercial use Proprietary Server
    OS/2 IBM / Microsoft December 1987 MS-DOS 4.52 (December 2001) style="background: #ff99dd" |0 Proprietary Home Desktop, Server
    Plan 9 Bell Labs 1993 Unix Fourth Edition (Daily snapshots) style="background: #ddffff" | Free LPL Workstation, Server, Embedded, HPC
    Solaris Sun July 1992 SunOS 10 6/06 (June, 2006) style="background: #ddffff" | Free CDDL Server, Workstation
    Windows Server 2003 Microsoft April 2003 Windows 2000 Windows NT 5.2 SP1 (March 30, 2005) style="background: #ff99dd" |9 Web Edition, 0 Small Business Server (Includes Exhange, ISA 2004, and more) Proprietary Server
    Windows Microsoft October 2001 (Windows XP) Windows Me, Windows 2000 Windows XP Professional x64) style="background: #ff99dd" |Home 9, Professional 9 Proprietary Workstation, Home Desktop
    RISC OS Acorn Computers, RISC OS Limited March 8th, 2006 ARTHUR, also the BBC Master OS RISC OS 4.39 "Adjust" style="background: #ff99dd" |7 (£70) Proprietary; originally bundled with computer educational desktop, home computer
    yellowTAB ZETA yellowTAB June 2005 BeOS R5 1.2 (April 27, 2006) style="background: #ff99dd" |Professional 0, Student Proprietary Home Desktop, Media Workstation
    Creator First public release Predecessor Latest stable version (release date) Cost (USD) license Target system type

    Note 1: Most OS distributions include bundled software with various other licenses.
    Note 2: Although Lisa OS ran on the same microprocessor and was developed by Apple Computer at the same time as Mac OS, very little code was shared between the two. [link]
    Note 3: Mac OS versions up to 7.5.5 are available free of charge [here].
    Note 4: Version NT 5.2 is the latest release of Windows XP Professional x64 Edition. The latest 32-bit build is version NT 5.1 SP2
    Note 5: Minix inspired Linux. No code from Minix was used to create the Linux kernel

    Technical information

    Supported architectures Supported file systems Kernel type GUI on by default Package management Update management APIs
    AIX POWER, PowerPC JFS, JFS2, ISO 9660, UDF, NFS, SMBFS, GPFS Microkernel 
    Northern Ontario
    		installp, RPM Service Update Management Assistant (SUMA) SysV, POSIX
    AmigaOS 68k, PowerPC Proprietary, FAT, ISO 9660, UDF, many others via 3rd party drivers Microkernel style="background: #ddffdd" | none none Proprietary
    FreeBSD x86, AMD64, PC98, SPARC, others UFS2, ext2, FAT, ISO 9660, UDF, NFS, ReiserFS (read only), XFS (experimental) and others Monolithic with modules 
    Northern Ontario
    		ports tree, packages by source (CVSup, portsnap), network binary update (freebsdupdate) BSD, POSIX
    HP-UX PA-RISC,IA-64 VxFS, HFS, ISO 9660, UDF, NFS, SMBFS Monolithic with modules 
    Northern Ontario
    		swinstall SysV, POSIX
    GNU/Linux x86, Alpha, AMD64, PPC, SPARC, others ext2, ext3, ReiserFS, FAT, ISO 9660, UDF, NFS, and others Monolithic with modules See: Comparison of Linux distributions POSIX
    Inferno x86, Alpha, MIPS, PPC,SPARC, others Styx/9P2000, kfs, FAT, ISO 9660 Monolithic with modules, user space file systems style="background: #ddffdd" | - proprietary
    Mac OS Classic PPC, 68k HFS+, HFS, AFP, ISO 9660, FAT, UDF Monolithic with modules style="background: #ddffdd" | Apple Installer Software Update proprietary, Carbon
    Mac OS X PPC, x86 HFS+ (default), HFS, UFS, AFP, ISO 9660, FAT, UDF, NFS, SMBFS, NTFS (read only), FTP, WebDAV Hybrid style="background: #ddffdd" | Mac OS X Installer Software Update Carbon, Cocoa, BSD/POSIX, X11 (since 10.3)
    NetBSD x86, 68k, Alpha, AMD64, PPC, SPARC, [many others] UFS, UFS2, ext2, FAT, ISO 9660, NFS, LFS, and others Monolithic with modules 
    Northern Ontario
    		pkgsrc by source (CVS, CVSup, rsync) or binary (using sysinst) BSD, POSIX
    NetWare x86 NSS, NWFS, FAT, NFS, AFP, UDF, ISO 9660 Hybrid 
    Northern Ontario
    		NWCONFIG.NLM, RPM binary updates, Red Carpet proprietary
    OpenBSD x86, 68k, Alpha, AMD64, SPARC, VAX, [others] ffs, ext2, FAT, ISO 9660, NFS, some others Monolithic with modules 
    Northern Ontario
    		ports tree, packages by source BSD, POSIX
    OpenVMS VAX, Alpha, IA-64 Files-11, ISO 9660, NFS Monolithic with modules 
    Northern Ontario
    		PCSI, VMSINSTAL - proprietary, Unix-like
    OS/2 x86 HPFS, JFS, FAT, ISO 9660, UDF, NFS Monolithic style="background: #ddffdd" | Feature Install and others - proprietary
    Plan 9 x86, Alpha, MIPS, PPC,SPARC, others fossil/venti, 9P2000, kfs, ext2, FAT, ISO 9660 Monolithic, user space file systems style="background: #ddffdd" | None replica Unix-like (and optional POSIX compatibility layer)
    Solaris SPARC, SPARC64, AMD64, x86 UFS, ZFS, ext2, FAT, ISO 9660, UDF, NFS, some others Monolithic with modules style="background: #ddffdd" | SysV packages (pkgadd) Sun Update Connection SysV, POSIX
    Windows Server x86, AMD64/EM64T, IA-64 NTFS, FAT, ISO 9660, UDF Hybrid style="background: #ddffdd" | MSI, custom installers Windows Update Windows API, .NET
    Windows x86, AMD64/EM64T NTFS, FAT, ISO 9660, UDF Hybrid style="background: #ddffdd" | MSI, custom installers Windows Update Windows API, .NET
    RISC OS ARM (both 26 and 32-bit) ADFS, Econet ANFS, FAT, ISO9660, many others as loadable filesystems Unprotected monotasking microkernel with large number of relocatable modules style="background: #ddffdd" | Applications self-contained; hardware drivers often in ROM No Huge number of SWI calls; extensive C libraries
    yellowTAB ZETA x86 BFS (default), FAT, ISO 9660, UDF, HFS, AFP, ext2, CIFS, NTFS (read only), ReiserFS (read only, up to v3.6) Hybrid style="background: #ddffdd" | SoftwareValet, script-based installers none POSIX, BeOS API
    Supported architectures Supported file systems Kernel type GUI on by default Package management Update management APIs

    Note 6: Operating systems where the GUI is not installed and turned on by default are often bundled with an implementation of the X Window System. However, installing X is usually optional.
    Note 7: Most operating systems use proprietary APIs in addition to any supported standards.
    Note 8: Unlike NetBSD and FreeBSD, OpenBSD includes the X Window System as base install sets rather than packages within the ports collection. It includes some local changes and is managed as part of the OpenBSD source tree.

    Security

    Resource access control Subsystem isolation mechanisms Integrated firewall Encrypted file systems Data execution prevention Known unpatched vulnerabilities9
    hardware emulation number oldest
    AIX Unix, ACLs chroot IP Filter, IPSec VPNs, basic IDS 
    Northern Ontario
    		[2] 2002-10-11
    FreeBSD Unix, ACLs, MAC chroot, jail, MAC Partitions IPFW2, IPFilter, PF style="background: #ddffdd" | [0] -
    HP-UX Unix, ACLs chroot IPFilter 
    Northern Ontario
    		[0] -
    Inferno Unix [Namespaces] 
    Northern Ontario

    Northern Ontario
    		n/a
    GNU/Linux Unix, ACLs, MAC chroot, capabilities, seccomp, SELinux, IPSec Netfilter/Varied by distribution style="background: #ddffdd" | style="background: #ddffdd" | 
    Northern Ontario
    		See comparison of Linux distributions
    Mac OS Classic none none none 
    Northern Ontario

    Northern Ontario

    Northern Ontario
    		[0] -
    Mac OS X Unix, ACLs chroot ipfw style="background: #ddffdd" | [0] style="background: #ececec" | N/A
    NetBSD Unix, Veriexec chroot, systrace IPFilter, PF style="background: #ddffdd" | style="background: #ddffdd" | 
    Northern Ontario
    		n/a
    NetWare ACLs none IPFLT.NLM style="background: #ddffdd" | style="background: #ddffdd" | 
    Northern Ontario
    		[1] 2003-10-30
    OpenBSD Unix chroot, systrace PF style="background: #ddffdd" | style="background: #ddffdd" | style="background: #ddffdd" | [0] -
    OpenVMS ACLs [logical name tables] [0] -
    OS/2 ACLs none none 
    Northern Ontario
    		n/a
    Plan 9 Unix (?) [Namespaces] ipmux style="background: #ddffdd" | 
    Northern Ontario

    Northern Ontario
    		n/a
    Solaris Unix, RBAC, ACLs, Privileges chroot, Containers IPFilter style="background: #ddffdd" | 
    Northern Ontario
    		[2] 2005-04-13
    Windows Server 2003 ACLs Win32 WindowStation, Desktop, Job objects Windows Firewall,IPSec TCP\IP Filtering style="background: #ddffdd" | style="background: #ddffdd" | style="background: #ddffdd" | [8] 2003-06-11
    Windows ACLs Win32 WindowStation, Desktop, Job objects Windows Firewall (XP and later), TCP\IP Filtering (NT Based systems), IPSec NTFS Only style="background: #ddffdd" | style="background: #ddffdd" | [19] 2002-12-30
    yellowTAB ZETA Unix none none 
    Northern Ontario

    Northern Ontario

    Northern Ontario
    		n/a
    Resource access control Subsystem isolation mechanisms Integrated firewall Encrypted file systems hardware emulation number oldest
    Data execution prevention Known unpatched vulnerabilities9

    Note 9: Comparison of known unpatched vulnerabilities is based on Secunia vulnerabilities reports with a severity of less critical and above. Updated daily.
    Note 10: Posix ACL support is included in Linux 2.6, but requires a file system capable of storing them (such as ext3, XFS or ReiserFS).
    Note 11: A jail mechanism is available separately in the Linux-VServer project, but is not integrated into any mainline Linux kernel.
    Note 12: The Exec Shield and PaX extensions provide NX emulation on x86 hardware. They are not yet integrated inside the mainline kernel but are available as patches or separate kernels
    Note 13: ACLs were added to Mac OS X beginning with version 10.4.
    Note 14: ACLs are available only in OS/2 Server versions with HPFS386 filesystem.
    Note 15: "Solaris Containers" (including "Zones") are a jail-type mechanism introduced with Solaris 10.
    Note 16: Zeta has full Unix file permissions, but the OS is single user, and users always run as superuser.

    See also

    External links

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