Plan 9 from User Space is a port

Porting

In computer science, porting is the process of adapting software so that an executable program can be created for a computing environment that is different from the one for which it was originally designed...

 of many Plan 9 from Bell Labs

Plan 9 from Bell Labs

Plan 9 from Bell Labs is a distributed operating system. It was developed primarily for research purposes as the successor to Unix by the Computing Sciences Research Center at Bell Labs between the mid-1980s and 2002...

 libraries and applications to Unix-like

Unix-like

A Unix-like operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, while not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification....

 operating systems. Currently it has been tested on a variety of operating systems including: Linux

Linux

Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...

, Mac OS X

Mac OS X

Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...

, FreeBSD

FreeBSD

FreeBSD is a free Unix-like operating system descended from AT&T UNIX via BSD UNIX. Although for legal reasons FreeBSD cannot be called “UNIX”, as the direct descendant of BSD UNIX , FreeBSD’s internals and system APIs are UNIX-compliant...

, NetBSD

NetBSD

NetBSD is a freely available open source version of the Berkeley Software Distribution Unix operating system. It was the second open source BSD descendant to be formally released, after 386BSD, and continues to be actively developed. The NetBSD project is primarily focused on high quality design,...

, OpenBSD

OpenBSD

OpenBSD is a Unix-like computer operating system descended from Berkeley Software Distribution , a Unix derivative developed at the University of California, Berkeley. It was forked from NetBSD by project leader Theo de Raadt in late 1995...

, Solaris and SunOS

SunOS

SunOS is a version of the Unix operating system developed by Sun Microsystems for their workstation and server computer systems. The SunOS name is usually only used to refer to versions 1.0 to 4.1.4 of SunOS...

.

A number of key applications have been ported, as have programs used by the system itself, and the requisite libraries from Plan 9. All of these have been made to work on top of a Unix-like environment, rather than their native Plan 9. Some of the most significant ported components are:

• v9fs - a client and server implementation of the 9P
  9P
  9P is a network protocol developed for the Plan 9 from Bell Labs distributed operating system as the means of connecting the components of a Plan 9 system. Files are key objects in Plan 9. They represent windows, network connections, processes, and almost anything else available in the operating...
  
   distributed file system protocol for Unix-like
  Unix-like
  A Unix-like operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, while not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification....
  
   operating system
  Operating system
  An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...
  
  s, including loadable kernel module
  Loadable Kernel Module
  In computing, a loadable kernel module is an object file that contains code to extend the running kernel, or so-called base kernel, of an operating system...
  
  s for Linux
  Linux kernel
  The Linux kernel is an operating system kernel used by the Linux family of Unix-like operating systems. It is one of the most prominent examples of free and open source software....
  
   2.4 and 2.6.
• rc
  Rc
  rc is the command line interpreter for Version 10 Unix and Plan 9 from Bell Labs operating systems. It resembles the Bourne shell, but its syntax is somewhat simpler. It was created by Tom Duff, who is better known for an unusual C programming language construct called Duff's device.A port of the...
  
   - The Plan 9 shell.
• sam
  Sam (text editor)
  Sam is a multi-file text editor based on structural regular expressions. It was originally designed in the early 1980s at Bell Labs by Rob Pike with the help of Ken Thompson and other Unix developers for the Blit windowing terminal running on Unix; it was later ported to other systems. Sam...
  
   - A text editor.
• acme
  Acme (text editor)
  Acme is a text editor and graphical shell from the Plan 9 from Bell Labs operating system, designed and implemented by Rob Pike. It can use the sam command language. The design of the interface was influenced by Oberon. It is different from other editing environments in that it acts as a 9P server...
  
   - A user interface for programmers.
• mk - A tool for building software, analogous to the traditional Unix make utility.
• plumber - An interprocess messaging facility.
• Venti
  Venti
  Venti is a network storage system that permanently stores data blocks. A 160-bit SHA-1 hash of the data acts as the address of the data...
  
   - A network storage system that permanently stores data blocks.

The project's name is a reference to the 1950s Ed Wood film Plan 9 from Outer Space

Plan 9 from Outer Space

Plan 9 from Outer Space is a 1959 science fiction film written and directed by Edward D. Wood, Jr. The film features Gregory Walcott, Mona McKinnon, Tor Johnson and Maila "Vampira" Nurmi...

.

External links

• Homepage of Plan 9 from User Space
• Plan 9 from User Space manual pages
• Glendix - a Linux kernel with Plan9 user space
• v9fs homepage
• http://www.usenix.org/events/usenix05/tech/freenix/hensbergen.html