-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Thu, 13 Oct 2011 19:02:04 -0500 Fred James wrote: >>> Wayne E. Van Loon Sr. wrote: >>> >>>>> Pete Lancashire wrote: >>>>> >>>>>>> http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2011/10/dennis-ritchie/ >>>> >>>>>>> >>> >>>>> This story may be apocryphal, and, I can't recall just >>>>> where I read or heard it, but the story goes that Dennis >>>>> Ritchie was on a committee at Bell Labs that was outlining >>>>> a new computer operating system. Some on the committee were >>>>> more conservative the Ritchie, who started referring to the >>>>> committee as the "eunuchs committee". The name for the >>>>> operating systems was later sanitized, of course, to Unix. >>>>> Wayne >>>>> >>> I believe the name was meant to be a play on Multics. >>> >>> http://www.livinginternet.com/i/iw_unix_dev.htm >>> http://www.multicians.org/unix.html >>> > And ... <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix>
I like the "eunuchs committee" story lots better than the "Unics" story. The wikipedia entry seems to be a good overview and objective about the checkered, if not tortured path of Unix development to what we have now. For those who enjoy Unix history, there is another narrative written by Dr Peter Salus that's available free online at Groklaw: http://www.groklaw.net/staticpages/index.php?page=20051013231901859 . I'm happy to have missed the Unix wars and all the turmoil they created while I was ignoring it and working on IBM mainframes instead, but I do like where it wound up in Linux, even if it uses little-endian machines. Robert -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.10 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org/ iEYEARECAAYFAk6Y2j4ACgkQ+qYMIUkNJCzaeACeMq29fE+0DGST5vc65CKiXFW+ S0sAn1pivIPtzS+mkLqxx8c0pGCAtPny =ehew -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- _______________________________________________ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug