About a thousand years ago, I recall hand-building programs for 8-bit microprocessors (in what we'd call embedded systems today). In many cases, I was the "assembler", writing directly in machine code which was then either keyed in through front-panel switches or burned into a PROM.... -- Ian -----Original Message----- From: Johnny Billquist [mailto:bqt@update.uu.se] Sent: Thu 9/5/2002 5:05 AM To: Tim Bradshaw Cc: pups(a)minnie.tuhs.org Subject: Re: [pups] Bringing up the fist C compiler On Thu, 5 Sep 2002, Tim Bradshaw wrote: [...] Ah. Ok, now I understand what you're asking for. You want to know what the first C was written in, and what that compiler/assembler was written in/on, and so on... No, I'm just deducting. Since the reference posted said that TMG was the first higher level language implemented, it follows that it must have been written in a low level language, namely assembler. Admittedly, the PDP-7 TMG *could* have been written in some high level language on some other machine using some tool that made a PDP-7 executable, so your guess is as good as mine. But even though I cannot account for all steps, I can guarantee that at the end of the chain, you *will* find assembler. I guess my MACRO-11 implementation of C isn't good enough. :-) (Well, it ain't mine, it's the normal DECUS C, but I'm hacked some at it.) Johnny Johnny Billquist || "I'm on a bus || on a psychedelic trip email: bqt(a)update.uu.se || Reading murder books pdp is alive! || tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol _______________________________________________ PUPS mailing list PUPS(a)minnie.tuhs.org http://minnie.tuhs.org/mailman/listinfo/pups