Is Unix still relevant? Will you really ever need to use or work in a Unix environment?

Unix is an old operating system. Sometimes its age shows. Some Unix applications seem to use odd choices for interpreting special keys; some interpret mouse clicks in unexpected (to Windows users) ways; some have odd mechanisms for ocopying and pasting and sometimes the windows look funny. Take something as simple as as copy-and paste. Windows users know that the keyboard shortcut to paste information is Control-v. This is pretty much universal among Windows programs. But in the Unix emacs editor, instead of "pasting", you "yank" information with Control-y. Ask an emacs fan why emacs didn't adopt the same "standard" key stroke as the rest of the world was already using, and you will be given a condescending smile while the fan explains that emacs adopted the Control-y yank long before Microsoft even existed, and that the real question is why the rest of the world agreed to the idea that "v" somehow stood for "paste",

Unix is a new operating system. It has been continually changed, updated, evolved, and used as the basis for new "Unix-like" operating systems. In fact, it really makes more sense to think of Unix as a family of operating systems (sometimes denoted as "*nix"). There is an actual standards process that allows an operating system to certify that is it a "real" Unix. But there may be even more machines out there running Unix-like operating systems, in other words, something in the *nix family.

You might well be using a Unix or Unix-like operating system without realizing it:

So there's actually a pretty good chance that any computerized system that you lay your hands on that isn't running WIndows will actually be running something in the Unix family. Although some of these hide the operating system deeply enough that you won't notice it when you use them, if your future profession should involve programming for any ofthem, you may find yourself working on a *nix system as the closet thing to the platform where your code will eventually run.