[TUHS] The Case of UNIX vs. The UNIX System

[Rob Pike]

The lawyers insisted that Unix be upper case and only used as an adjective.
Also, to attempt to make others go along, they applied the rule to other
companies' trademarks too. At one point we were putting together a
commemorative issue of the Bell Labs Technical Journal to include some old
papers that would do well collected together, and the lawyers tried to edit
the old papers to honor the new rules. Dennis objected furiously: their
coinage of "PDP-11 computer system UNIX System file system" was multiple
bridges too far. It was hard to rile Dennis, and eventually they realized
this and pulled back. But sheesh, that was inane.

"The UNIX Programming Environment" was the title of bwk's and my book, and
that took some doing too.

I spent literal years of my time at Bell Labs dealing with lawyers. Years.
Only to have others tell me that I should have asked the lawyers to do
something different, assuming I hadn't tried. It could make one cry in
frustration.

-rob


On Sat, Feb 15, 2025 at 7:37 AM segaloco via TUHS <tuhs at tuhs.org> wrote:

> So in most technical circles and indeed in the research communities
> surrounding
> UNIX, the name of the system was just that, UNIX, prefixed often with some
> descriptor of which stream, be it Research, USG, BSD/Berkeley, but in any
> case
> the name UNIX itself was descriptive of the operating system for many of
> its
> acolytes and disciples.
>
> However, in AT&T literature and media, addition of "System" to the end of
> the
> formal name seemed to become de facto if not de jure.  This can be seen for
> instance in manual edits in the early 80s with references to just "UNIX"
> being
> replaced with variations on "The UNIX System", sometimes haphazardly as if
> done
> via a search and replace with little review.  This too is evident in some
> informative films published by AT&T, available on YouTube today as
> "The UNIX Operating System" and "UNIX: Making Computers Easier to
> Use"[1][2].
> Discrepancies in the titles of the videos notwithstanding, throughout it
> seems
> there are several instances where audio of an interviewee saying
> "The UNIX System" were edited over what I presume were instances of them
> simply
> saying UNIX.
>
> I'm curious if anyone has the scoop on whether this was an attempt to echo
> the
> "One Bell System" and related terminology, marketing tag lines like
> "The System is the Solution", and/or the naming of the revisions
> themselves as
> "System <xyz>".  On the other hand, could it have simply been for clarity,
> with
> the uninitiated not being able to glean from the product name anything
> about it,
> making the case for adding "System" in formal descriptions to give them a
> little
> bit of a hint.
>
> Bell Labs folks especially, was there ever some grand thou shalt call it
> "The UNIX System" in all PR directive or was it just something that
> organically
> happened over time as bureaucratic powers at be got their hands on a part
> of the
> steering wheel?
>
> - Matt G.
>
> [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tc4ROCJYbm0
> [2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvDZLjaCJuw
>
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