CLARIFICATIONS - The history of XNU is shrouded in quite a bit of mystery and I did my best to sort through it but here are some notes: 1. XNU was definitely being used by NeXTSTEP before 1997 - yes, Apple made some changes when they got it but the core of XNU was already there. They wanted NeXT just as bad as Steve Jobs for a reason. 2. There is much debate over whether XNU is a hybrid or monolithic kernel - BSD is mostly monolithic and Mach evolved to hybrid over time making XNU also hybrid - almost every single source on XNU refers to it as a hybrid kernel alongside Windows NT - I think the issue is more in the varying definitions of what a hybrid kernel actually is. 3. The evidence that the X in Mac OS X came from NeXTSTEP and XNU is a bit ambiguous but many believe it played a role. Even if it wasn't on purpose, the "X" did a good job of representing the legacy of XNU and NeXT and XNU is certainly still the X that has been in macOS since 2001. 4. Technically, Apple used the XNU kernel in a few OSes before OS X but none of them were mass-marketed or, at least, reached the average user (Rhapsody in 1997, Mac OS X Server 1.0 in 1999 and Mac OS X Public Beta in 2000) - those releases were essentially Apple's public testing grounds for XNU. 5. XNU borrowed a lot from Unix but it is most certainly not Unix - remember, it stands for "X is Not Unix". 6. The "Home" directory I mentioned also had earlier roots in Unix and most likely was carried over from there. 7. I wish I had covered XNU's use in iOS more but I was laser focused on macOS in this one - for another time... As I mentioned, I did my best to unveil the mysterious history of XNU and NeXTSTEP but am hoping this video can be a launching pad for more discussion and debate here in the comments - which many of you have already participated in. Thanks for that! I'll update this comment if anything else comes up.
Out of literally hundreds of subscribed channels, this is one of a tiny handful that earn my respect and admiration all the way. Adult, no-nonsense, useful information without frivolity, sensationalism or infantilism. And every word clearly enunciated -- a big bonus for hearing-impaired viewers. Much appreciated -- every time.
Couple of corrections here, NeXTStep was bought during OS7’s era, with some stability improvements for 7.6 and 7.6.1. OS8 was released to effectively kill off the clone market which was eating Apple’s market share, killing the goose that laid the golden egg and the first master stroke that Steve Jobs implemented. OS9 was the transitional OS to bridge the divide for both developers and users, and was a few years after the purchase of NeXT. The first use of the MACH Kernel wasn’t 2001, but 2000 as the server system first utilising the methods for using classic environment in OS X, but needed serious amounts of memory and processor power to run. Essentially it was the classic OS9 interface sat on top of NeXTStep. It ran poorly, but was enough to demonstrate the stability coming in future OS updates. Then we get Cheetah in 2001, alongside the later OS9 releases to improve crossover codebases, along with better and more efficient running in the classic environment within OS X itself. OS9.22 didn’t officially die until around 2004, when people often chose to boot into the new OS and more applications were now specifically written for it.
A few inaccuracies- the first fruits of the XNU kernel at Apple wasn't Mac OS X 10.0 - Cheetah, it was Mac OS X Server (Rhapsody) 1.0, which was a commercial product 2 full years before the client version of Mac OS X 10.0 - Cheetah - shipped. And Nextstep and Openstep were two different versions of the same OS. Nexstep ran on Next hardware, Openstep ran on x86 hardware.
Windows NT is an interesting parallel. I'm not as familiar with how it handles things compared to XNU, but it also has been around for just about as long on the windows side.
Thank you for the wonderful post. The "Home" folder/directory was not exclusive to NextStep. It is present in all unix-like OSs, including all the Linux distros. Kudos!
I'm appalled by the fact that I haven't found any computer science program in any university that teach computer history. How these new kids will understand he what, where, when, how and why everything is like it is now?? i want badly to create a curriculum for computer history to be taught in universities.
I still have a NeXT Workstation (similar to the one Job's was using in the video), matching mouse, keyboard, monitor etc... as you note NeXT is based upon BSD which split off from AT&T's System V.
At the end you mention XNU/Darwin adapting as part of the transition to Apple Silicon, but actually XNU was already running on iPhones since the very first release which uses the same architecture as apple silicon
0:30 Ehh. I think this is a BIG stretch. Steve's never even hinted at this. Not to metnion this tenuous connection could also reference the X in "UNIX". Given that Apple has also used X now in iPhone and a few other places, I am pretty sure it was *never* a reference to NextStep explicitly.
As a MacAddict since the 1992 when I first used a Macintosh LC back at elementary school (I was a 4th grader that year), and being a main system administrator of the macOS platform where I work today, this is the first video from you that I watched. It's impressive enough that you just earned my subscription, a like, and selected "All" in the bell icon. I'm looking forward to watch more of your videos. :)
As far as remember, xnu was first used by apple in Mac OS 10 Server in the late 90s, at least before Mac OS X. The UI looked like Mac OS 9 back then. Correct me if I'm wrong.
So, XNU was first built for NextStep in the late 80s / early 90s (the exact dates are hard to find). As far as I can tell, it was named XNU at that time. When Apple bought Next, they made everything official. Here is the trail according to the Darwin wiki page: "After Apple bought NeXT in 1996, it announced it would base its next operating system on OPENSTEP. This was developed into Rhapsody in 1997, Mac OS X Server 1.0 in 1999, Mac OS X Public Beta in 2000, and Mac OS X 10.0 in 2001." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darwin_(operating_system)
NextStep used Mach 2.7 which was a monolithic kernel. Mac OS X used Mach 3.0 wrapped in kFreeBSD to form the hybrid kernel XNU which essentially runs as a monolithic kernel. NT is similarly also a hybrid kernel. Hybrid kernel's essentially runs as a monolithic kernel despite having a micro kernel inside and is no better than a linux kernel. They could have very well used a linux kernel also. Would have made no difference to the end users. MacOSX has an userland of a mix of open source BSD distro such as FreeBSD, OpenBSD and NetBSD. I think NestStep was using BSD 4.3 which was not open source.
Hey man, good video, been enjoying your channel! Question - Are you a doctor, is that surgery scrubs your wearing? If not what do you do outside of youtube for a living.
Does anyone know, if those MacOS Servers one or two decades ago were "Unix-Certified" (which was for some reason very important for some companies those days, a reason not to just use Linux but buy expensive propriety Unix OS's ) or was it still more XNU-like?
The iteration of MacOS 9? NeXT? X11? In MacOS X using xQuartz you could run anything linux over TCP/IP: ssh -Y linuxbox, then launch firefox& or xeyes&
Excellent presentation! Thank you for explaining the reasoning behind the X in Mac OSX all these years. Sadly, it's been dropped now but, as you point out, it still lives on underneath the hood. Can you cover why iOS hasn't been rebranded (yet) to phoneOS? And maybe iCloud to cloudOS? Thank you!
There is a lot of evidence that the "X" was a purposeful shout to Next, NeXTSTEP and XNU but, regardless, this was a historical overview about the "X" that has never left macOS - the XNU kernel - and it's importance to macOS, iOS and Apple. I hope you enjoyed.
A ye olde UNIX guy it's all UNIX... in fact the OSX "DOC" is a CDE, Common Desktop Envi. Ripoff.. which I used on SUN, HP, AIX, and tried it on SGI... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Desktop_Environment
BSD and Mach both came out of UNIX but, together, many consider them a hybrid kernel. First two "hybrid" kernels mentioned are Windows NT and Apple XNU: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_kernel
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CLARIFICATIONS - The history of XNU is shrouded in quite a bit of mystery and I did my best to sort through it but here are some notes:
1. XNU was definitely being used by NeXTSTEP before 1997 - yes, Apple made some changes when they got it but the core of XNU was already there. They wanted NeXT just as bad as Steve Jobs for a reason.
2. There is much debate over whether XNU is a hybrid or monolithic kernel - BSD is mostly monolithic and Mach evolved to hybrid over time making XNU also hybrid - almost every single source on XNU refers to it as a hybrid kernel alongside Windows NT - I think the issue is more in the varying definitions of what a hybrid kernel actually is.
3. The evidence that the X in Mac OS X came from NeXTSTEP and XNU is a bit ambiguous but many believe it played a role. Even if it wasn't on purpose, the "X" did a good job of representing the legacy of XNU and NeXT and XNU is certainly still the X that has been in macOS since 2001.
4. Technically, Apple used the XNU kernel in a few OSes before OS X but none of them were mass-marketed or, at least, reached the average user (Rhapsody in 1997, Mac OS X Server 1.0 in 1999 and Mac OS X Public Beta in 2000) - those releases were essentially Apple's public testing grounds for XNU.
5. XNU borrowed a lot from Unix but it is most certainly not Unix - remember, it stands for "X is Not Unix".
6. The "Home" directory I mentioned also had earlier roots in Unix and most likely was carried over from there.
7. I wish I had covered XNU's use in iOS more but I was laser focused on macOS in this one - for another time...
As I mentioned, I did my best to unveil the mysterious history of XNU and NeXTSTEP but am hoping this video can be a launching pad for more discussion and debate here in the comments - which many of you have already participated in. Thanks for that! I'll update this comment if anything else comes up.
Out of literally hundreds of subscribed channels, this is one of a tiny handful that earn my respect and admiration all the way. Adult, no-nonsense, useful information without frivolity, sensationalism or infantilism. And every word clearly enunciated -- a big bonus for hearing-impaired viewers. Much appreciated -- every time.
Thank you for the kind words. I'm glad you hear you're enjoying my videos and my direct style! I'll try to keep it up! Thanks for watching!
Yes, keep it up!
Couple of corrections here, NeXTStep was bought during OS7’s era, with some stability improvements for 7.6 and 7.6.1. OS8 was released to effectively kill off the clone market which was eating Apple’s market share, killing the goose that laid the golden egg and the first master stroke that Steve Jobs implemented. OS9 was the transitional OS to bridge the divide for both developers and users, and was a few years after the purchase of NeXT.
The first use of the MACH Kernel wasn’t 2001, but 2000 as the server system first utilising the methods for using classic environment in OS X, but needed serious amounts of memory and processor power to run. Essentially it was the classic OS9 interface sat on top of NeXTStep. It ran poorly, but was enough to demonstrate the stability coming in future OS updates.
Then we get Cheetah in 2001, alongside the later OS9 releases to improve crossover codebases, along with better and more efficient running in the classic environment within OS X itself. OS9.22 didn’t officially die until around 2004, when people often chose to boot into the new OS and more applications were now specifically written for it.
A few inaccuracies- the first fruits of the XNU kernel at Apple wasn't Mac OS X 10.0 - Cheetah, it was Mac OS X Server (Rhapsody) 1.0, which was a commercial product 2 full years before the client version of Mac OS X 10.0 - Cheetah - shipped. And Nextstep and Openstep were two different versions of the same OS. Nexstep ran on Next hardware, Openstep ran on x86 hardware.
Windows NT is an interesting parallel. I'm not as familiar with how it handles things compared to XNU, but it also has been around for just about as long on the windows side.
Yes, that one definitely deserves a deep-dive. From what I know already, it was almost like a Cold War with XNU.
I would be very eager at see that video, I was thinking about that near the end.
Naming their attempt at a new kernel Copeland is poetic.
They probably used copium thermal paste on those devices
4:46 - /home/ was already a common directory in UNIX systems.
overall, great video :)
Thank you for the wonderful post. The "Home" folder/directory was not exclusive to NextStep. It is present in all unix-like OSs, including all the Linux distros. Kudos!
I'm appalled by the fact that I haven't found any computer science program in any university that teach computer history. How these new kids will understand he what, where, when, how and why everything is like it is now?? i want badly to create a curriculum for computer history to be taught in universities.
I had somewhat of computer history at the RWTH Aachen University. With the Zuse Z3 to so called Von Neumann Machines up to parallel computing.
@@vanCaldenborgh well, that’s awesome!
I still have a NeXT Workstation (similar to the one Job's was using in the video), matching mouse, keyboard, monitor etc... as you note NeXT is based upon BSD which split off from AT&T's System V.
Wow, that is amazing! I would hold on to that, that is a really unique piece of computing history to have.
At the end you mention XNU/Darwin adapting as part of the transition to Apple Silicon, but actually XNU was already running on iPhones since the very first release which uses the same architecture as apple silicon
0:30 Ehh. I think this is a BIG stretch. Steve's never even hinted at this. Not to metnion this tenuous connection could also reference the X in "UNIX".
Given that Apple has also used X now in iPhone and a few other places, I am pretty sure it was *never* a reference to NextStep explicitly.
2:39 Mach Microkernel*
Overall, great video!
Thanks!
As a MacAddict since the 1992 when I first used a Macintosh LC back at elementary school (I was a 4th grader that year), and being a main system administrator of the macOS platform where I work today, this is the first video from you that I watched. It's impressive enough that you just earned my subscription, a like, and selected "All" in the bell icon. I'm looking forward to watch more of your videos. :)
Great video. Well done!👍🏽
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed!
I really liked the aqua UI. I wish you could still use it.
Anson , another great video ! Flying with my unsupported Mac mini , with Firefox .
Sounds like a nice flight! Glad you enjoyed!
As far as remember, xnu was first used by apple in Mac OS 10 Server in the late 90s, at least before Mac OS X. The UI looked like Mac OS 9 back then. Correct me if I'm wrong.
So, XNU was first built for NextStep in the late 80s / early 90s (the exact dates are hard to find). As far as I can tell, it was named XNU at that time. When Apple bought Next, they made everything official. Here is the trail according to the Darwin wiki page:
"After Apple bought NeXT in 1996, it announced it would base its next operating system on OPENSTEP. This was developed into Rhapsody in 1997, Mac OS X Server 1.0 in 1999, Mac OS X Public Beta in 2000, and Mac OS X 10.0 in 2001."
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darwin_(operating_system)
NeXTStep is mentioned in the anime Serial Experiments Lain, with the tagline: Close the world, open the NeXT.
NextStep used Mach 2.7 which was a monolithic kernel. Mac OS X used Mach 3.0 wrapped in kFreeBSD to form the hybrid kernel XNU which essentially runs as a monolithic kernel. NT is similarly also a hybrid kernel. Hybrid kernel's essentially runs as a monolithic kernel despite having a micro kernel inside and is no better than a linux kernel. They could have very well used a linux kernel also. Would have made no difference to the end users. MacOSX has an userland of a mix of open source BSD distro such as FreeBSD, OpenBSD and NetBSD. I think NestStep was using BSD 4.3 which was not open source.
Hey man, good video, been enjoying your channel! Question - Are you a doctor, is that surgery scrubs your wearing? If not what do you do outside of youtube for a living.
Know what else was part of NextStep? The Spinning Beachball of Death
The simple reason as to why they did not replace XNU after renaming OS X to macOS: if it ain't broke, don't fix it
The X is still in the internal files of macOS. For example, DSMOSX (Don't steal Mac OS X)
I enjoyed this video. Thank you.
the falloff is crazy
Does anyone know, if those MacOS Servers one or two decades ago were "Unix-Certified" (which was for some reason very important for some companies those days, a reason not to just use Linux but buy expensive propriety Unix OS's ) or was it still more XNU-like?
Also i think the X actually was used to symbolise that the possibilities are endless and that anything could happen in the future.
Hello guys hope y´all are doing fine. God Bless
You too. Thanks for watching!
The iteration of MacOS 9? NeXT? X11? In MacOS X using xQuartz you could run anything linux over TCP/IP: ssh -Y linuxbox, then launch firefox& or xeyes&
Excellent presentation! Thank you for explaining the reasoning behind the X in Mac OSX all these years. Sadly, it's been dropped now but, as you point out, it still lives on underneath the hood.
Can you cover why iOS hasn't been rebranded (yet) to phoneOS? And maybe iCloud to cloudOS?
Thank you!
Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed it. Good thoughts on the other OS names. Your ideas make sense - I'll have to look into it!
GNU ?
W vid can I have a pin
Pins are tough... go for heart first! Thanks for watching!
I’m sorry bro, but you’re wrong. The X never meant to represent the XNU kernel.
There is a lot of evidence that the "X" was a purposeful shout to Next, NeXTSTEP and XNU but, regardless, this was a historical overview about the "X" that has never left macOS - the XNU kernel - and it's importance to macOS, iOS and Apple. I hope you enjoyed.
A ye olde UNIX guy it's all UNIX... in fact the OSX "DOC" is a CDE, Common Desktop Envi. Ripoff.. which I used on SUN, HP, AIX, and tried it on SGI...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Desktop_Environment
BSD and Mach both came out of UNIX but, together, many consider them a hybrid kernel. First two "hybrid" kernels mentioned are Windows NT and Apple XNU: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_kernel
Did you mean "dock"? CDE came out in 1993. The NextStep design exists since 1988, so no. CDE ripped off Workspace seven years after the fact.
Of course I know it never left with the amount of __MACOSX folders I still see in zips that I get sent REGULARLY!!!