History and evolution of operating systems What have been the most important and most used?

operating systems they play a great role today in our highly computerized society. Without them we could not do everything we do, since allow us to develop of multitasking by means of a computer.

Although this is so simple today, and so broad in its different versions and types of operating systems (MacOS, LINUX, Windows), began based on a very basic structure that it only allowed the execution of a single task. If you want to know a little more, we invite you to read below.

In this post you will find a brief history of operating systems and all their versions up to the one we know today. All these systems, despite being different and with different objectives, started from the same mother known as UNIX.

What is an operating system and what is its main function in a computer?

The operating system is the main software that we must have installed on our computer, since without it it is as if we did not have an active computer.

Primordial to be able to install programs, operating systems are also in charge of giving correct function of the drivers so they can recognize the hardware. example of this are the keyboards, mouse, cameras and others.

Sometimes operating systems have much greater responsibility, for example, that of the traffic police, which ensures that programs and users are working correctly and at the same time. Also can be used for securityso that external people cannot access private information, and so on, many more things.

What was the first operating system that existed? Who and why was it created?

what we know today as computer science comes from a constant evolution through time. The first steps were taken after World War IIin the mid 40’sa time when not even the term ‘Operating System’ existed.

back then programmers communicated through computerswhich had a machine language, programming only with 0s and 1s. Then in the 1950s, he started to emerge the concept of Operating Systemspecifically in 1956, used for an IBM 704 computer, which basically only allowed other programs to run on it.

This system evolved again, in the 60s, creating a modification of the initial operating system to one that allowed multitasking or multipurpose, being in this same decade when UNIX appeared, which is the main base of operating systems.

In the 1970s, the personal computer was born, with an operating system created using the C programming languagethis being the evolution of UNIX.

As a consequence of this, in the 1980s operating systems such as MacOS, MS-DOS, and Windows. In competition, new companies joined in the creation of new systems and linux was bornthis being already in the 90s, which later joined the GNU project, which it is a completely free operating system.

UNIX What was the impact of this OS in the history of Computing?

As we already mentioned, Unix was not the first operating system, but it is the one that had the most impact on society and on the evolution of operating systems. He was born specifically in 1969, created by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie and Rudd Canaday, among others.

At first it was baptized as UNICS, but because it was unsuccessful, it was modified to UNIX, developed by AT&T’s Bell Laboratories and General Electric, although its first release was somewhat discriminated against for being an expensive and slow operating system.

Over time, UNIX was used as a prototype by the University of California at Berkeley to release a more up-to-date version. Later, Windows works with UNIX, although it says that it works with DOS.

Microsoft created a version of UNIX for them, called XENIX, with the purpose of using it in microcomputers, slightly smaller equipment and some machines of that time. This version was released in 1980, with constant updates until 1989. Microsoft later decided to work with DOS, which helped improve your architecture of the system and noticeably increase their sales.

Just as it happened with Windows, it happened but a little differently with Linux, which was rewritten from scratch with the goal of a completely free architecture, which could be adapted to devices and computers.

LINUX I use MINIX and UNIX as support to create your systemwhere it was given the name MINUX, until Richard Stallman’s GNU project was later born.

As there is so much competition in the market, the Apple company was not far behind, and in 2001 leaned on UNIX, though not completely, giving birth to Mac OS X, which was written entirely from scratch. With this we can conclude that UNIX is the mother of operating systems, since without him those we know today would not have been born.

Birth of modern OS When and how were Windows, MacOS and Linux born?

Next, we tell you more about the most famous operating systems:

Windows

Windows was born as such in 1975 by William H. Gates III and Paul Allenwho at that time were simple students and shared a great fondness for computers, decided to program using a Digital Equipment Corporation PDP-10 computer.

As we already mentioned, its main architecture was inspired by UNIX. However, some time later the MS-MOD Windows was formed with a slightly different architecture, and with such striking improvements that from that moment their sales began to increase in a notorious way, giving rise to that after 2000 new versions will be created until today that there is Windows 10.

Linux

This, as we already know, is an operating system that was implemented with the idea of ​​a free system and open so that anyone can access the writing of it and modify its structure according to their taste.

It was in 1983 that Richard Stallman I first created the GNU projectall designed from a UNIX structure, and compatible with POSIX, for two years later to stop being a simple project, and become a free software foundation.

Because it is a system that allows people to write structures and make modifications to them, it was seen with great growth, even greater than that of Windows. Although it did not have a good Kernel. Thanks to UNIX It was growing and evolving strongly.

Even though he grew up very fast, he never they dared to launch the first version of LINUX, since they did not consider it good, leaving it for the personal use of its creator Linus Torvalds. Some time later (1991) they released the second version, which did go to market known as Linux 0.02.

Later it released its version 0.03. Although, due to failures and tests, it jumped from all versions to 0.10. then in 1992 increase your versions up to 0.95, and thanks to the recognition and good acceptance we have today’s versions of LINUX.

macOS

This is one of the operating systems younger, and it is that its first release was in mid-2001, although it was given the name of MAC Operating System, thanks to its Mac OS X version released in 1984.

Unlike its predecessors, the operating system of MAC OS X is very similar to that of UNIX, which allowed it to make a great contribution with the technology promoted by NeXT, in the mid-1980s.

time after apple bought the company (1997), releasing its true and first version in 1999, known as Mac OS X Server 1.0, that was launched to compete in the market in March 2001, and that it was really version number 10.

Its growth It wasn’t very easy because parts of his system were a bit more complicated and expensive than the others, In addition, because he was one of the youngest, he competed until today against Microsoft and LINUX..

Timeline of major operating system releases in history

Take note of the following:

Windows

Windows was one of the first operating systems to hit the market. For that reason has a lot of versionsand others as we call them editions or sub-versions.

• Windows 1 (1985)
• Windows 2 (1987)
• Windows 3 (1990)
• Windows NT (1993)
• Windows 95 (1994)
• Windows 98 (1998)
• Windows Me (2000)
• Windows XP (2001)
  • Windows XP Home Edition and Windows XP Professional
  • Windows XP Media Center
  • Windows XP Tablet PC Edition

Exclusive sale editions

• Windows XP Starter
• Windows XP N
• Windows XP K & KN
• Windows XP Embedded
• Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PC
• Windows XP Professional x64 Edition
• Windows Vista (2007)
  • Windows Starter.
  • Windows Vista HomeBasic.
  • Windows Vista Home Basic N (European antitrust version)
  • Windows Vista Home Premium (the most widespread)
  • Windows Vista Business.
  • Windows Vista Business N (European antitrust version)
  • Windows Vista Enterprise.
  • Windows Vista Ultimate.
• Windows 7 (2009)
  • starter
  • HomeBasic
  • HomePremium
  • Professional
  • Ultimate
  • business
  • Embedded Standard

N and KN editions

• Windows 7 Home Premium N
• Windows 7 Professional N
• Windows 7 UltimateN

• Windows 8 (2012)
  • Windows 8 (home)
  • Windows 8 Pro (networking)
  • Windows 8 Enterprise (only available for companies)
  • Windows 8 RT (for ARM processors in tablets, comes pre-installed)
  • Windows 8.1
• Windows 10 (2015)
  • Windows 10 Home
  • Windows 10 Pro
  • Windows 10 Enterprise
  • Windows 10 Enterprise LTSB
  • Windows 10 Education
  • Windows 10 Mobile
  • Windows 10S
  • Windows 10 Pro for Workstation
  • Windows 10 Mobile Enterprise
  • windows 10 team
  • Windows 10 ProEducation
  • Windows 10 IoT
  • Windows 10 N and KN

macOS

Let us remember that Mac OS is an operating system that has been generating systems and software since mid-1984, but after becoming Apple released its first official OS in 2001.

• 1984: System 1
• 1985: System 2
• 1986: System 3
• 1987: System 4
• 1988: System 6
• 1990: System 7
• 1997: Mac OS 8
• 1999: Mac OS 9
• 2001: Mac OS X 10.0 Cheetah
• 2001: Mac OS X 10.1 Cougar
• 2002: Mac OS X 10.2 Jaguar
• 2003: Mac OS X 10.3 Panther
• 2005: Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger
• 2007: Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard
• 2009: Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard
• 2011: Mac OS X 10.7 Lion
• 2012: Mac OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion
• 2013: Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks
• 2014: Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite
• 2015: Mac OS X 10.11 El Capitan
• 2016: Mac OS X 10.12 macOS Sierra
• 2017: Mac OS X 10.13 macOS High Sierra
• 2018: Mac OS X 10.14 macOS Mojave
• 2019: Mac OS X 10.15 macOS Catalina

Linux

After the announcement of its release to the market in 1991, this project has had the contribution of hundreds of developersand then We will see some of its main milestones:

• 1983 – 1989: The first version of the GNU GPL was created
• 1991: The Linux kernel is created.
• 1992: The LINUX kernel is licensed under the GNU GPL license.
• 1993: Many test versions are created
• 1994: The first version of LINUX 1.0 is published
• 1996: The second version (LINUX 2.0) is launched on the market.
• 1997: LINUX is considered an open system and several software companies created Apps and programs for it and its versions
• 1998: Oracle is created with support for LINUX
• 2001: LINUX is discriminated for 64 bits and 32 bits, for better processing.
• 2007: Dell becomes the first computer manufacturer with the UBUNTU system pre-installed
• 2015: Simplifies your designs so anyone can add new versions or designs.