[TUHS] Lost Origins of the Plan 9 C Compiler

[Aram Hăvărneanu]

The Plan 9 C compiler must predate Plan 9 and therefore it must
have been created on Research Unix.

The v10 manual doesn't mention them, fair enough, they document
Unix and not Plan 9, but they do say that rc(1) is the Plan 9
shell...

Research Unix of the time ran on VAX. A natural question arises,
was VAX the original target of the Plan 9 compilers? Where is it?
Why isn't it mentioned anywhere?

If VAX was never a target, then what was the original purpose of
these compilers and how were they tested on a target that Research
Unix never ran on?

One might think they might have been used for the Jerq/Blit/DMD-5620,
but no, the Unix manual documents a different compiler used for
these (which is distinct from the main C compiler).

The Plan 9 compilers seems to have appeared out of thin air, but
this certainly can't be the case.

--
Aram Hăvărneanu