<div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div></div><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Wed, Mar 5, 2025 at 11:03 PM John Levine <<a href="mailto:johnl@taugh.com" target="_blank">johnl@taugh.com</a>> wrote:<br></div><div> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
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I believe the earliest versions of C were on a GE 635, a word addressed<br>
machine comparable to a PDP-10. But it moved to a PDP-11 soon enough<br>
where the byte and word addresses motivated the datatypes that turne<br><br></blockquote><div><font color="#0000ff"><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> I believe the history is this.... </span> <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Ken write the original B interpreter/subsystem for in Assembl;er (see the Unix V0 stuff). Dennis write a new B compiler in B. That was moved the GE635 (and Steve Johnson brought it with him to Waterloo). When the PDP-11 came, Dennis started change the compiler to add features for the PDP-11. This was originally called "New B" (or nb). He used a continuous development scheme. Originally, nb could accept B, but ass Dennis added more and more features that were not compatible (basically as typing was added), nb became so different it was renamed C.</span></font></div><div><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><font color="#0000ff"><br></font></span></div><div><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><font color="#0000ff">Johnson's comment was that by the time he returned from Waterloo, no one was using B anymore.</font></span></div><div><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><font color="#0000ff"><br></font></span></div><div><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><font color="#0000ff">At some point, Synder (who was a summer student) wrote a C compiler for the PDP-10. I am unclear if that was before the Honeywell 6000 back end, although given the dates, if you look at the code repositories, I >>think<< it was. FWIW: by 1978, Dennis and Brian do not mention the PDP-10 on page 179 of K&R — only the PDP-11, Honeywell, IBM 360/370 and Interdata 8/32. </font></span></div></div></div><div hspace="streak-pt-mark" style="max-height:1px"><font color="#0000ff"><img alt="" style="width:0px;max-height:0px;overflow:hidden" src="https://mailfoogae.appspot.com/t?sender=aY2xlbWNAY2NjLmNvbQ%3D%3D&type=zerocontent&guid=8ca37e3c-847a-4532-af82-103bad76e289"><font size="1">ᐧ</font></font></div>
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