17 Oct
2011
17 Oct
'11
4:01 p.m.
The ongoing thread about the origins of C and UNIX have made me
wonder about something I was told years ago:
"UNIX was written as a host platform for C *development* and was not
originally envisioned as the production platform for applications
developed on it."
In other words, the intent was that developers would write code on
UNIX, then port it to an "application-oriented" OS for production.
Is there any truth to that?
Doc
17 Oct
17 Oct
6:37 p.m.
From: Doc Shipley
Sent: Monday, October 17, 2011 1:02 PM
The ongoing thread about the origins of C and UNIX
have made me
wonder about something I was told years ago:
"UNIX was written as a host platform for C
*development* and was not
originally envisioned as the production platform for applications
developed on it."
In other words, the intent was that developers
would write code on
UNIX, then port it to an "application-oriented" OS for production.
Is there any truth to that?
Well, since Unix (nee "Unics") originated before the C language, that
would seem to put paid to the claim at all, as would the fact that it
was an experimental operating system created to host an application
that already existed.
Rich Alderson
Vintage Computing Sr. Server Engineer
Vulcan, Inc.
505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900
Seattle, WA 98104
mailto:RichA at vulcan.com
mailto:RichA at LivingComputerMuseum.org
http://www.LivingComputerMuseum.org/
7:16 p.m.
On 17/10/11 4:01 PM, Doc Shipley wrote:
The ongoing thread about the origins of C and UNIX
have made me wonder
about something I was told years ago:
"UNIX was written as a host platform for C *development* and was not
originally envisioned as the production platform for applications
developed on it."
In other words, the intent was that developers would write code on UNIX,
then port it to an "application-oriented" OS for production.
Is there any truth to that?
Early on, Unix was justified to the boss as a monetiseable
typesetting/documentation prep system, to which considerable effort was
devoted, and of course we deal with the legacy of that every time we use
'man'...
The late Dennis Ritchie gave the story in his well known paper on Unix
history. That paper should shed light on your question:
http://cm.bell-labs.com/who/dmr/hist.html
The papers in the BSTJ Unix edition, and the rich bundled toolset, make
it pretty clear (imho) that Unix was also meant to support program
development.
--Toby
Doc
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doc＠vaxen.net -
RichA＠vulcan.com -
toby＠telegraphics.com.au