Minix

Minix-tan
Character Information
Common Names	Minix-tan
Other Names	n/a
Human Name(s)	Minnie Tanenbaum
Faction	Linux Unix Consortium
Lineage	Unix-like
Rival(s)	Various Unix-tans
Appearance
Height	Varies - has been depicted as small as 6 and as tall as 4'
Hair Color	Dark plum
Eye Color	Unknown; has never been pictured without tinted glasses
Weapon(s)	No known weapon; has healing abilities
Design
First Appearance	Sep. 2006
Technical Information
System Personified	Minix versions 1, 2 and 3.x
Developer(s)	Andrew S. Tanenbaum
Debut	1987
Latest release	Minix 3.1.2a (May 29 2006)

Technical details

Originating from Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, Minix is a minimalistic Unix-like operating system originally created for educational purposes. It served as a source of inspiration for Linux Torvalds and is best known for its influence on his Linux kernel.

Character details

Minix-tan was originally personified as an inches-tall woman with short magenta hair, light skin, racoon ears, wearing plain casual clothing, teardrop-shaped sunglasses and wooden shoes and often holding a book and riding a floppy disk.

Later designs portray her as standing somewhere in the mid-4' range, with medium-length, plum-colored hair (usually held into a ponytail), racoon ears and horn-rimmed, black-tinted glasses. She generally dresses in business-like clothing, reflecting her profession, and often carries around floppy disks - referencing the earlier design.

Minix-tan works as a teacher. She is a quiet person, but only because she wants to let others find out about her than just telling them outright. No one understands how she sets her priorities, her own stuff is always more important than anything someone else can want from her (referencing Minix's scheduling algorithms). Despite that, she is reliable. As a reference to Minix's reincarnation server, Minix-tan can always pick herself up after falling down and possessed powers of self-healing. She has been depicted as having a daughter, Minix VMD-tan; although there exist few drawings or writings concerning this character and it is unclear whether or not she is still a part of "fanon".

She was Linux-tan's mentor during her childhood and taught Linux-tan many things she would need to know to succeed in life - along with providing her general education, Minix-tan taught her how to navigate Unix society and various forms of sorcery, in particular healing magic (although Linux-tan was essentially magically-powerless until the mid-90s). While the two get along for the most part, their early relationship was shaky and the two argued a lot (referencing the legendary Linux vs. Minix debate on the internet of the early 90's).

OSC Notes/backstory

Minix-tan was Linux-tan's mentor in the early 1990's. During this time, the Unix Wars were going on and Minix-tan was abandoned by UNIX for teaching a copycat what she knows (this was before Linux-tan and UNIX became friends). In the early 1990s, Minix-tan sent the young Linux-tan on a journey to save Linux-tan from dealing with the Unix Family (who was out to get her at the time, especially UNIX who wanted her destroyed), and to keep her away from the entangled mess of the Unix Wars (and later the OS Wars).

In recent years, Minix-tan has gotten in better graces with the Unixes. She is in the Linux/Unix Consortium and serves as the mediator between the Linuxes and Unices.