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From: murphy@world.std.com (Dan Murphy)
Subject: Re: Retro-Computing!
In-Reply-To: peter@bonkers.taronga.com's message of Sat, 8 Apr 1995 15:34:53 GMT
Message-ID: <MURPHY.95Apr13103622@world.std.com>
Sender: murphy@world.std.com (Dan Murphy)
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA
References: <D5yxwn.5BG@sdf.saomai.org>
	<Pine.NXT.3.92.950330155824.2916A-100000@Tomobiki-Cho.CAC.Washington.EDU>
	<D6o173.8p3@lincoln.gpsemi.com>
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	<D6q3A5.Ht9@bonkers.taronga.com>
Date: Thu, 13 Apr 1995 14:36:22 GMT
Lines: 56

In article <D6q3A5.Ht9@bonkers.taronga.com> peter@bonkers.taronga.com (Peter da Silva) writes:

>    Yeh, and it required systems far more powerful than UNIX, which is the real
>    reason we're using UNIX today rather than TOPS-20 or Multics. TOPS was just
>    not economical at the time (I remember when they got rid of the TOPS system
>    at Berkeley for APL work and replaced it with an IBM running VM/CMS. Bleh).

    Largely true.  Even Dennis Ritchie is reported to have said once
    in a speech, "If TENEX had run on a PDP-11, Dan Bobrow [leader of
    the group at BBN that did TENEX] would be standing here instead of
    me."
    
    TENEX *could* have run on smaller, cheaper hardware.  The main
    reason it didn't is that we didn't code it in a portable language.
    The original TENEX systems supported a dozen or more users on a 64
    kword (or 288 kbyte if you prefer) machine with a 1 mword swapping
    store.  Yes, that's somewhat larger than contemporary UNIX
    systems, but advancing hardware technology erased the importance
    of that difference long ago.

    Richard M. Alderson III writes:

> Of course, Tops-20 wasn't around when Unix was created, nor was TENEX, its
> predecessor.

    On the contrary. TENEX came on the air in 1970 and was in use at
    multiple sites in 1971.  My understanding is that the earliest
    versions of Unix didn't exist until a year or two after that.

    I just looked at the Bell System Technical Journal issue on Unix
    (July/Aug 1978), and the very first paper says:

        "The Unix story begins with Ken Thompson's work on a cast-off
        PDP-7 minicomputer in 1969."
    
    The paper by Ritchie and Thompson says:

        "There have been four versions of the UNIX time-sharing
        system.  The earliest (circa 1969-70) ran on the Digital
        Equipment Corporation PDP-7 and -9 computers."
    
    Another paper by Ritchie says:
    
        "Since [Unix] became operational in 1971..."

    So apparently the origins of TENEX and Unix were very close.
    However, if Ritchie's last statement is taken at face value, TENEX
    was both operational and then in use at multiple sites somewhat
    earlier than Unix.

    In any event, perhaps newness is inversely related to goodness.
    After all, DOS is newer than VMS is newer than Unix is newer than
    TOPS20...
    
    
    dlm
