Solutions to Saturday Mac riddles 322
I hope that you enjoyed Saturday’s Mac Riddles, episode 322. Here are my solutions to them.
1: It’s about evolution, and open source for 25 years.
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Darwin
It’s about evolution (when Steve Jobs announced Darwin as open source in 1999, he said this to link it with Charles Darwin), and open source for 25 years (first released as open source in 2000, and still being posted on GitHub). (Darwin consists of the open source components in macOS, and includes its kernel.)
2: If the kernel isn’t Unix, this is it.
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XNU
If the kernel isn’t Unix, this is it (XNU is the open source kernel within Darwin, and is available as part of the GitHub distribution. Its name is an abbreviation for X isn’t Unix).
3: Mud puddles in Pittsburgh misheard as the basis for 2.
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Mach
Mud puddles in Pittsburgh misheard (it was originally intended to be called Muck in honour of these, but was misheard and incorrectly written down as Mach) as the basis for 2 (the Mach microkernel, developed by Richard Rashid and Avie Tevanian, formed the basis of XNU. Tevanian went on to work at Apple, then NeXT, where he designed NeXTSTEP).
The common factor
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They are all open source elements in macOS.
I look forward to your putting alternative cases.