# Why \*nix or Un\*x instead of Unix **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 11, 2003, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543 "2003-03-11T14:04:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![minor7flat5](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/minor7flat5/32/258_2.png) [@minor7flat5](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minor7flat5)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/1 "2003-03-11T14:04:07Z")
At this moment, I am patiently working my way through some open-source code to find a bug (“Cruise Control” if you want to know). I have again encountered that often-used alias for Unix in some of the source code comments: “\*nix” I have seen “Un\*x” as well in many places. I feel that I am missing some obvious inside joke here. Once upon a time, I thought it might be some kind of copyright issue, but I find that people often use “Un\*x” and “Unix” randomly in the same document. I also considered that it might be a slam that a non-Unix user might use, in the same way that non-Windows users sometimes refer to the platform as “Windoze.” I dismissed this because I often see very pro-Unix folks using these variants. So tell me, where does this come from? ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/2 "2003-03-11T14:11:12Z")
I assumed \*\*nix is to refer to both Linux and Unix. I dunno about Un\*x. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/3 "2003-03-11T14:11:58Z")
Mainly because there are a host of mostly-similar Unix clones in the world and if you write portable code, your programs will probably be able to run on all of them. They even seem to have similar names: Unix, Linux, Minix, HP-UX, Xenix, etc. The asterisk is the Kleene star, and it matches zero or more contiguous characters. Notionally, it’s used to refer to \*nixes as a general class of machines without singling out any example of that class. And Unix (or UNIX?) _is_ a registered trademark of AT&T, via its former Bell Labs department (since divested and turned into Lucent Technologies). But I don’t think \*nix is in any way related to that. ---
**Author:** ![Floater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/dc4da7/32.png) [@Floater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Floater)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/4 "2003-03-11T14:16:39Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by minor7flat5 \* > I also considered that it might be a slam that a non-Unix user might use, in the same way that non-Windows users sometimes refer to the platform as “Windoze.” I would say that in many case it’s W_nd_ws users that call it “Windoze”. C:\WINDOWS C:\WINDOWS\GO C:\PC\CRAWL C:\DOS C:\DOS\RUN RUN\DOS\RUN 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/5 "2003-03-11T14:39:02Z")
As **Darleth** points out, _nix or Un_x are idioms used to refer to any Unix-like operating system, such as Linux, the BSDs, the UXes, Solaris, and so-forth. Also “Unix” is a trademark now owned by The Open Group. Use of those idioms is to differentiate between Unix the specific trademarked product name, and Unix-like, which refers to dozens (hundreds?) of seperate OSes. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/6 "2003-03-11T14:52:27Z")
**freido** : Ah! I forgot about The Open Group. Yeah, they determine POSIX compliance and thereby determine who can call themselves a Unix. (Or am I completely confused?) I got confused by the fact that Bell Labs’ big OS after Unix, Plan 9, was handed over to Lucent. Oh, well. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/7 "2003-03-11T15:05:59Z")
Come to think of it, I have no idea really what The Open Group does. Their website is [here](http://www.opengroup.org/), though. Plan 9 is cool. ---
**Author:** ![John\_T.Conklin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_t.conklin/32/3307_2.png) [@John\_T.Conklin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_T.Conklin)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/8 "2003-03-11T15:44:10Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Derleth \* > \*\ ***freido** : Ah! I forgot about The Open Group. Yeah, they determine POSIX compliance and thereby determine who can call themselves a Unix. (Or am I completely confused?) > \*\* POSIX is a set of IEEE Standards (1003.1, etc.) , which at least at the beginning defined the common subset of API’s among \*NIX implementations. The Open Group is responsible for the Single Unix Specification, which is a much closer to a superset, with conflicts being resolved slanting towards the SysV rather than the BSD branches of UNIX ancestry. As new POSIX standards have been adopted (realtime, threads, etc.), they’ve been pulled into the SUS. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/9 "2003-03-11T16:07:37Z")
Ok. And I gather that only those OSes which conform to the SUS, a near-superset of POSIX, can call themselves UNIXes? (Unices?) ---
**Author:** ![John\_T.Conklin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_t.conklin/32/3307_2.png) [@John\_T.Conklin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_T.Conklin)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/10 "2003-03-11T16:27:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Derleth \* > \*\*Ok. And I gather that only those OSes which conform to the SUS, a near-superset of POSIX, can call themselves UNIXes? (Unices?) \*\* That’s my understanding. Probably involves paying a licence fee for using the UNIX trademark as well. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/11 "2003-03-11T16:31:41Z")
THE Unix used to be quite vigilant about its trademark. Hence the semi-joke of Un\*x and GNU which stands for GNU’s not Unix. The Un\*x was meant to denote that it was a clone that could do everything Unix could do except it wasnt licensed as Unix. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/12 "2003-03-11T16:48:01Z")
Hm. Well, these days _nix doesn’t seem to have any trace of the copyright noninfringement attached to it. Maybe it’s seperate from Un_x for that reason. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/13 "2003-03-11T18:25:11Z")
[back in my day] The \*nix notation goes quite a ways back, before many Unix variants were born. There was just official AT&T Unix (which wasn’t distributed) and the original BSD Unix. AT&T was (and is) quite finicky in how their copyright was used. People got letters and such. Since an official © symbol didn’t exist in old ASCII text, it was simpler to \* than to try to appease AT&T. (Which also wanted a “Unix is a copyright of AT&T” attached to everything that used it. It would be a pain to include that in email and Usenet posts.) Corporate buttheads really should learn not to tick off geeks. [/back in my day] (What puzzles me are recent news stores about Unix losing market share due to the popularity of Linux. Excuse me?) ---
**Author:** ![Some\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Some\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Some_Guy)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/14 "2003-03-11T18:59:51Z")
Well, “officially”, most Linux distros aren’t Unix - a few of them have gotten SUS certified, but the vast majority don’t bother. Of course, this means that most Linux distros are “merely” 99% functionally identical to Unix. Of course, it’s a bit of a pain to keep saying “Unix-like” or “POSIX compliant” to mean that it works the same way as Unix, when the word Unix, itself, conveys this. Incidentally, in discussions of Linux internals, you’ll often see people ritually including the text “Linux is a trademark of Linus Torvalds.” This is a bit of an inside joke, since its a modification of the old AT&T ritualism. ---
**Author:** ![DarrenS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/977dab/32.png) [@DarrenS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DarrenS)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/15 "2003-03-11T22:13:09Z")
What the [Jargon Dictionary](http://info.astrian.net/jargon/terms/u/UN_X.html) has to say about it. ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2003, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/16 "2003-03-11T23:40:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Some Guy \* > \*\*Incidentally, in discussions of Linux internals, you’ll often see people ritually including the text “Linux is a trademark of Linus Torvalds.” This is a bit of an inside joke, since its a modification of the old AT&T ritualism. \*\* Actually, [Linux really is a trademark of Linus Torvalds](http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=2559). No ritual or joking about it. ---
**Author:** ![Some\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Some\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Some_Guy)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2003, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/17 "2003-03-12T02:21:35Z")
Oh, I know that. I was just pointing out why people tend to include such a notice in their discussions of the kernel - namely, because of all those old genuflections toward AT&T. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Slant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c57346/32.png) [@Mr.Slant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Slant)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2003, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/18 "2003-03-12T03:27:48Z")
By the way, the current owners of the Unix intellectual property appear to be the SCO group… they’re engaged in an IP legal battle to try to wring every last $ out of this property, too… ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2003, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/19 "2003-03-12T04:26:42Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Some Guy \* > \*\*Oh, I know that. I was just pointing out why people tend to include such a notice in their discussions of the kernel - namely, because of all those old genuflections toward AT&T. \*\* :smack: Color me whooshed. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2003, 5:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543/20 "2003-03-12T05:55:04Z")
You’ll also occasionally see the following: Unix is a footnote of AT&T Bell Laboratories Programmers started that way back when, as a wry comment on AT&T’s trademark. When I worked for DEC back in the early ULTRIX days, we had all sorts of fun trying to qualify to use the term UNIX. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-nix-or-un-x-instead-of-unix/160543.md?page=2)