Although we sometimes talk about Unix in singular form as if Unix is a single operating system, it is in fact a general name given to dozens of operating systems (i.e., "flavors") by different companies, organizations, or groups of individuals. In that it is a different concept than, for example, Windows, which is a series of operating systems by the same company—Microsoft. Although based on the same core set of Unix commands, different flavors (also known as "Unix variants", "Unix types" or "Unix implementations") can have their own unique commands and features, and may be designed to work with different types of hardware.
No one knows exactly how many Unix flavors there are, but it is safe to say that if we include all those that are obscure and obsolete, the number of Unix flavors is at least in the hundreds. Click here to view a list of several dozen well-known Unix flavors, with links to their official home pages.
Widely Used Unix Flavors
Click on the links for information and resources.
So, Which Unix Flavor Should I Choose?
That would depend on the kind of computer you have and what you are using it for. Commercial Unix operating systems are usually developed by companies to run on their server lines. For example, HP-UX is designed to run on HP servers; MacOS X on Apple Macintosh computers; Solaris on Sun servers. Although it is not impossible to adapt an operating system to run on different platforms, it is no easy feast, especially when the manufacturer does not support such an effort and does not provide source code and hardware specifications.
If you are looking for a Unix operating system for your PC with an Intel compatible processor, and this is going to be your first Unix experience, I would recommend that you get either a Linux distribution such as Red Hat Linux or Mandrake Linux, or FreeBSD. All of them are completely free and open source and you can find plenty of information online.
Both Red Hat and Mandrake are newcomer-friendly and would be ideal for your induction into Linux.
FreeBSD belongs to a different Unix family, the BSDs. Other members of the family are BSDi, OpenBSD and NetBSD. FreeBSD is the most actively developed of all and is very popular. I am providing an introduction on the BSD family (its history and variants) and a step-by-step guide on FreeBSD installation and configuration.
After you use one of the above to become familiar and comfortable with Unix, you can always choose to move on to other flavors. There is whole world of Unix products to be discovered out there; and the best part-–much of it is "free". Don’t forget to also check out the software selections for Unix. Many of them are free, too.
