From: Peter Yardley <peter.martin.yardley@gmail.com>
To: Marc Rochkind <mrochkind@gmail.com>
Cc: "tuhs@tuhs.org" <tuhs@tuhs.org>
Subject: [TUHS] Re: History of non-Bell C compilers?
Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2024 09:28:29 +1100 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <EC9B447B-924B-47D8-AF26-F86D3EA804A4@gmail.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <CAOkr1zU-85C=Bj8_bY31V-_zSQBCmaKeRJVfsOrNZ3cGZKg2cg@mail.gmail.com>
I used the DEC VMS C compiler extensively while I was at NSWIT. I ported a lot of Berkley (I think) C code to VMS. Some of their VLSI design suite, KIC etc. There weren’t a lot of changes to make, the compiler and library was pretty K&R from what I remember. The usual small header issues applied. VMS IO is a bit different from UNIX IO but they had a mode (stream I think) that meant minimal changes to UNIX code.
http://bitsavers.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de/pdf/dec/vax/lang/c/AI-L370C-TE_Guide_to_VAX_C_V2.3_Mar1987.pdf
It did help that the code I was working with was pretty damn good. I learn C porting KIC to VMS.
> On 12 Mar 2024, at 7:44 AM, Marc Rochkind <mrochkind@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Since it came up in this thread, here's my review of Coherent in BYTE Magazine (1985):
>
> https://www.mrochkind.com/mrochkind/docs/Byte-Pick-Coherent-Theos.pdf
>
> Marc
>
> On Mon, Mar 11, 2024 at 11:13 AM Paul Ruizendaal <pnr@planet.nl> wrote:
> On Thu, Mar 7, 2024, 4:14 PM Tom Lyon <pugs78 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > For no good reason, I've been wondering about the early history of C
> > compilers that were not derived from Ritchie, Johnson, and Snyder at Bell.
> > Especially for x86. Anyone have tales?
> > Were any of those compilers ever used to port UNIX?
>
> An unusual one would be the “revenue bomb” compiler that Charles Simonyi and Richard Brodie did at Microsoft in 1981.
>
> This compiler was intended to provided a uniform environment for the menagerie of 8 and 16-bit computers of the era. It compiled to a byte code which executed through a small interpreter. This by itself was hardly new of course, but it had some unique features. It generated code in overlays, so that it could run a code base larger than 64KB (but it defined only one data segment). It also defined a small set of “system” commands, that allowed for uniform I/O. I still have the implementation spec for that interpreter somewhere.
>
> This compiler was used for the first versions of Multiplan and Word, and my understanding is that the byte code engine was later re-used in Visual Basic. I think the compiler also had a Xenix port, maybe it even was Xenix native (and at this time, Xenix would still essentially have been V7).
>
> I am not sure to what extent this compiler was independent of the Bell compilers. It could well be that it was based on PCC, Microsoft was a Unix licensee after all and at the time busy doing ports. On the other hand, Charles Simonyi would certainly have been capable of creating his own from scratch. I do know that this compiler preceded Lattice C, the latter of which was distributed by Microsoft as Microsoft C 1.0.
>
> Maybe others know more about this Simonyi/Brodie compiler?
>
> Paul
>
> Notes:
> http://www.memecentral.com/mylife.htm
> https://web.archive.org/web/20080905231519/http://www.computerworld.com/softwaretopics/software/appdev/story/0%2C10801%2C76413%2C00.html
> http://seefigure1.com/images/xenix/xenix-timeline.jpg
>
>
> --
> My new email address is mrochkind@gmail.com
Peter Yardley
peter.martin.yardley@gmail.com
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2024-03-11 22:28 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 60+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2024-03-11 17:12 Paul Ruizendaal
2024-03-11 20:44 ` Marc Rochkind
2024-03-11 22:28 ` Peter Yardley [this message]
2024-03-12 0:30 ` ron minnich
2024-03-12 13:31 ` Larry Stewart
2024-03-12 16:41 ` Paul Winalski
2024-03-12 14:55 ` Henry Bent
2024-03-12 17:17 ` Marc Rochkind
2024-03-13 14:37 ` Clem Cole
2024-03-13 15:28 ` Marc Rochkind
2024-03-13 15:33 ` Warner Losh
2024-03-13 15:50 ` [TUHS] PC/IX, VPIX, DOS/merge, etc. [was " Charles H Sauer (he/him)
2024-03-13 15:53 ` [TUHS] " Clem Cole
2024-03-12 15:42 ` Paul Ruizendaal
[not found] <aee297f1-2f6a-4620-87f7-f1672ae03b61@osta.com>
2024-03-15 3:34 ` Heinz Lycklama
-- strict thread matches above, loose matches on Subject: below --
2024-03-12 23:08 Steve Simon
2024-03-07 23:14 [TUHS] " Tom Lyon
2024-03-07 23:24 ` [TUHS] " Warner Losh
2024-03-07 23:39 ` Dave Horsfall
2024-03-07 23:49 ` Larry McVoy
2024-03-07 23:56 ` Luther Johnson
2024-03-08 14:03 ` John Foust via TUHS
2024-03-07 23:59 ` Greg 'groggy' Lehey
2024-03-08 0:08 ` Rich Salz
2024-03-08 0:30 ` Warner Losh
2024-03-08 0:57 ` Rob Pike
2024-03-08 1:08 ` Bakul Shah via TUHS
2024-03-08 1:10 ` Rob Pike
2024-03-08 1:12 ` Rob Pike
2024-03-08 1:22 ` Bakul Shah via TUHS
2024-03-08 9:33 ` arnold
2024-03-08 9:45 ` Wesley Parish
2024-03-08 13:06 ` Luther Johnson
2024-03-08 18:33 ` William H. Mitchell
2024-03-10 3:14 ` Adam Thornton
2024-03-11 22:21 ` Phil Budne
2024-03-07 23:52 ` Warner Losh
2024-03-08 0:15 ` Charles H Sauer (he/him)
2024-03-08 0:30 ` Marc Rochkind
2024-03-08 0:54 ` Heinz Lycklama
2024-03-08 1:48 ` segaloco via TUHS
2024-03-08 2:12 ` Tom Lyon
2024-03-08 2:13 ` Lawrence Stewart
2024-03-08 3:15 ` Jonathan Gray
2024-03-07 23:24 ` Luther Johnson
2024-03-07 23:27 ` Luther Johnson
2024-03-07 23:44 ` Tom Lyon
2024-03-08 0:24 ` Marc Rochkind
2024-03-08 1:27 ` Jeffry R. Abramson
2024-03-10 2:13 ` Greg A. Woods
2024-03-08 2:26 ` Will Senn
2024-03-08 3:03 ` Peter Yardley
2024-03-08 3:28 ` George Michaelson
2024-03-08 3:58 ` Luther Johnson
2024-03-08 5:53 ` Lars Brinkhoff
2024-03-08 13:42 ` Henry Bent
2024-03-08 14:00 ` arnold
2024-03-08 14:16 ` Warner Losh
2024-03-08 15:44 ` Paul Winalski
2024-03-08 17:18 ` Adam Thornton
2024-03-10 2:31 ` Damian Wildie
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