Features of UNIX

FEATURES OF UNIX

UNIX is an operating system, so it has all the features of an operating system is expected to have and it also possesses unique to itself.

Major features of UNIX:

1. UNIX : A Multi-user system    
2. UNIX : A Multitasking system    
3. UNIX : The building block approach
4. The UNIX toolkit
5. Pattern matching
6. Programming facility

1. UNIX : A Multi-user system :

• Multiple user can run separate jobs.
• A single user can also run multiple jobs.
• You can see several process constantly running on the Unix system
• The resources are actually shared between all the users.

2. UNIX : A Multitasking system 

• A single user can also run multiple tasks concurrently.
• One job runs in the foreground and the rest run in the background.
• User can switch jobs between foreground and background

3. UNIX: The building block approach

• Designers never attempted to pack too many features into few tools instead they felt "small is beautiful"
• Developed a few hundred commands each of which performed one simple job.

4. UNIX toolkit

• Applications are quite diverse in the scope.
• There are general-purpose tools.
• Test manipulation utilities(called filters).
• Compilers and interpreters.
• Network applications and administration tools.

5. Pattern Matching

• UNIX features very sophisticated pattern matching features.
• The * is a special character used by the system to indicate that it can match a number of file names.

6. Programming Facility

• The UNIX shell is also a programming language.
• It was designed for the programmers.
• It has all necessary ingredients , like control structures, loops and variables that establish it as a powerful programming language in its own right.
• System's features can be controlled and automated by using shell scripts.