[TUHS] Re: History of non-Bell C compilers?

[Rob Pike <robpike@gmail.com>]

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By the way, the unmatched portability of Plan 9 and Go stems from the way
Ken structured that compiler. My talk at GopherCon about the Go assembler
describes this architecture and why it worked so well. Others feel that by
being unorthodox it is clearly bogus and we are jackasses, but such
complainers only notice the difference and don't ask why the difference is
there.

-rob


On Fri, Mar 8, 2024 at 12:10 PM Rob Pike <robpike@gmail.com> wrote:

> Yes. Ken wrote the first version for the National 32000 (maybe even
> 16000?) on the Sequent. He ported to the MIPS when we started Plan 9.
>
> -rob
>
>
> On Fri, Mar 8, 2024 at 12:08 PM Bakul Shah <bakul@iitbombay.org> wrote:
>
>> What is the history of Plan9's C compiler? Was it a from scratch
>> implementation?
>>
>> On Mar 7, 2024, at 4:57 PM, Rob Pike <robpike@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Chris Fraser and Dave Hanson did LLC and wrote a book about it, very
>> clean and pedagogically valuable.
>>
>>
>> https://www.amazon.com.au/Retargetable-C-Compiler-Design-Implementation/dp/0805316701
>>
>> -rob
>>
>>
>> On Fri, Mar 8, 2024 at 11:31 AM Warner Losh <imp@bsdimp.com> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thu, Mar 7, 2024 at 5:08 PM Rich Salz <rich.salz@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> I believe Snyder was an MIT Master's thesis, finished in 1975[1].
>>>> There was a fair amount of C and compiler work at MIT LCS, perhaps JNC can
>>>> post some info. I think Snyder's compiler was used for the MIT PC/IP[2]
>>>> project; the links at BitSavers imply they are related. PC/IP brought TCP
>>>> and clients to DOS 3 machines and was commercialized as FTP software and
>>>> was one of the reasons for the creation of the MIT license[4]. BDS C[3] was
>>>> done by an MIT drop-out, Leor Zolman. I bought my first motorcycle from him
>>>> :) BDS C was used for the first implementations of MINCE (mince is not
>>>> complete emacs -- those kinds of acronyms were popular) and Scribble,
>>>> downsized clones of emacs and Scribe, respectively.
>>>>
>>>> [1] http://www.lcs.mit.edu/publications/specpub.php?id=717
>>>> [2] https://web.mit.edu/Saltzer/www/publications/pcip-1986.pdf
>>>> [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BDS_C
>>>> [4] https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9263265
>>>>
>>>
>>> Judging from what's at the bitsavers I posted, the source for pcip and
>>> this is the backstory to them.
>>>
>>> Warner
>>>
>>
>>

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