UNIX is an operating system created in 1969 at Bell Labs. It has a kernel that allocates resources and schedules tasks. There are multiple ways to access a UNIX system through terminals or logging in with a username and password. UNIX is a multi-user, multi-tasking system that is portable across hardware. It has advantages like networking capabilities and security but also disadvantages like a cryptic command line interface. Common UNIX commands include ls to list files, cat to view files, and grep to search files.