Saving Unix Heritage, One Kernel At a Time 169
coondoggie writes "In this, its 40th year of operating system life, some Unix stalwarts are trying to resurrect its past. That is, they are taking on the unenviable and difficult job of restoring to their former glory old Unix software artifacts such as early Unix kernels, compilers and other important historical source code pieces.
In a paper to be presented at next week's Usenix show, Warren Toomey of the Bond School of IT is expected to detail restoration work being done on four key Unix software artifacts all from the early 1970s — Nsys, 1st edition Unix kernel, 1st and 2nd edition binaries and early C compilers.
In his paper, Toomey states that while the history of Unix has been well-documented, there was a time when the actual artifacts of early Unix development were in danger of being lost forever."
Why? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Those that don't learn UNIX are doomed to reinvent it. Poorly.
Re:Why? (Score:3, Insightful)
Tron?
He fights for the users.
Re:Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
Obviously, history is more complicated, but idea is the same.
Re:Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Old source code gives us ideas, like looking at the design philosophy behind the code, and the ultimate operation of the software. These are actually *priceless* artifacts, and since they are mostly digital ( reserive the right for first pun... they are 'Digital' ), the study and the disemination of the early code is of extrodinary value to coders and software architects.
Of course its also invaluable to have their nemisises Multics and VMS alos preserved. I personally got an enourmous amount of respect for K&R reading the source code for the kernel (the V4), and the proto compiler. K&R, and the linux/GNU write well, wereas their MS counterparts wirte pretty crappy stuff. I would also venture to guess that the code alone can serve as an example of how to write code.
I will look forward to taking a detailed 'History of the UNIX Kernel' class in the near future.
History is history (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Which "Unix" are they talking about? (Score:2, Insightful)
Unix as an "Idea Mine" (Score:4, Insightful)
Very often the technically 'best' implementation doesn't win and I'd like to see those stories from inside Unix. For me, that's a more interesting angle than just version/feature stories.
Re:Why? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Worse is better (Score:4, Insightful)
The fact that MS-DOS outsold the Amiga and Atari ST is proof that best doesn't always win. The x86 is a great example as well. The 68k chip was a much better CPU than the 8088,8086, and even the 80286. Only when the 386 hit the market did Intel really have a CPU that wasn't a freaking nightmare.
Another example is PHP. Good grief $A[1]==$A['1'], that is just wrong.
PHP, Windows, x86, and so much of what we live with are all examples of good enough. Not great but good enough.
Re:Why? (Score:3, Insightful)
Old source code gives us ideas,
Like "WTF did they do here?!", "Why did they do it THAT way?!" and "That has got to be the ugliest kludge I've ever seen!"
Of course its also invaluable to have their nemisises Multics and VMS alos preserved.
Multics was hardly a 'nemesis' of Unix. Multics was basically dead when Unix arrived; its death inspired Ken Thompson and company to work on Unix.