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* [TUHS] Earliest UNIX Workstations?
@ 2023-01-26 15:58 Paul Ruizendaal
  2023-01-26 16:04 ` [TUHS] " Larry McVoy
                   ` (4 more replies)
  0 siblings, 5 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Paul Ruizendaal @ 2023-01-26 15:58 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs


As a result of the recent discussion on this list I’m trying to understand the timeline of graphical computing on Unix, first of all in my preferred time slot ’75 -’85.

When it comes to Bell Labs I’m aware of the following:

- around 1975 the Labs worked on the Glance-G vector graphics terminal. This was TSS-516 based with no Unix overlap I think.
- around the same time the Labs seem to have used the 1973 Dec VT11 vector graphics terminal; at least the surviving LSX Unix source has a driver for it
- in 1976 there was the Terak 8510; this ran primarily USCD pascal, but it also ran LSX and/or MX (but maybe only much later)
- then it seems to jump 1981 and to the Blit.
- in 1984 there was MGR that was done at Bellcore

Outside of the labs (but on Unix), I have:

- I am not sure what graphics software ran on the SUN-1, but it must have been something
- Clem just mentioned the 1981 Tektronix Magnolia system
- Wikipedia says that X1 was 1984 and X11 was 1987; I’m not sure when it became Unix centered
- Sun’s NeWS arrived only in 1989, I think?

Outside of Unix, in the microcomputer world there was a lot of cheap(er) graphics hardware. Lot’s of stuff at 256 x 192 resolution, but up to 512 x 512 at the higher end. John Walker writes that the breakout product for Autodesk was Interact (the precursor to AutoCAD). Initially developed for S-100 bus systems it quickly moved to the PC. There was a lot of demand for CAD at a 5K price point that did not exist at a 50K price point.






^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 15:58 [TUHS] Earliest UNIX Workstations? Paul Ruizendaal
@ 2023-01-26 16:04 ` Larry McVoy
  2023-01-26 16:37   ` emanuel stiebler
  2023-01-26 16:29 ` Clem Cole
                   ` (3 subsequent siblings)
  4 siblings, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: Larry McVoy @ 2023-01-26 16:04 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Paul Ruizendaal; +Cc: tuhs

On Thu, Jan 26, 2023 at 04:58:11PM +0100, Paul Ruizendaal wrote:
> - I am not sure what graphics software ran on the SUN-1, but it must have been something

Probably SunView, that's the first one I saw.  It was

	SunView
	OpenLook (SunView ported to X11)
	CDE
	NeWS

I used either straight X11 or OpenLook but replacing the window manager
with twm and then ctwm.  Did the same thing at SGI, I hated all the
fancy desktops each vendor did.  In the days of 4MB or 8MB or even
32MB desktops, all that "fancy" used memory that I needed for actual
real work, like building the kernel.  Straight X11 with a simple window
manager gave me a lot of memory back.

I viewed that fancy stuff as stuff for people who didn't do real work.
A bit of a snob, I was :-)

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 15:58 [TUHS] Earliest UNIX Workstations? Paul Ruizendaal
  2023-01-26 16:04 ` [TUHS] " Larry McVoy
@ 2023-01-26 16:29 ` Clem Cole
  2023-01-26 22:17   ` Paul Ruizendaal
  2023-01-26 16:51 ` Warner Losh
                   ` (2 subsequent siblings)
  4 siblings, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: Clem Cole @ 2023-01-26 16:29 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Paul Ruizendaal; +Cc: tuhs

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On Thu, Jan 26, 2023 at 10:58 AM Paul Ruizendaal <pnr@planet.nl> wrote:

>
> As a result of the recent discussion on this list I’m trying to understand
> the timeline of graphical computing on Unix, first of all in my preferred
> time slot ’75 -’85.
>
> When it comes to Bell Labs I’m aware of the following:
>
> - around 1975 the Labs worked on the Glance-G vector graphics terminal.
> This was TSS-516 based with no Unix overlap I think.
> - around the same time the Labs seem to have used the 1973 Dec VT11 vector
> graphics terminal; at least the surviving LSX Unix source has a driver for
> it
> - in 1976 there was the Terak 8510; this ran primarily USCD pascal, but it
> also ran LSX and/or MX (but maybe only much later)
>
 In the famous picture of Ken and Dennis you see a Tek display connected to
the 11/20.
Simply during that time there were a number of graphics systems from the
DVST (storage tubes) like Tek 4014 to Raster Systems like the GDPs we had
at CMU. There really are too many to list.



> - then it seems to jump 1981 and to the Blit.
> - in 1984 there was MGR that was done at Bellcore
>
> Outside of the labs (but on Unix), I have:
>
> - I am not sure what graphics software ran on the SUN-1, but it must have
> been something
>
Again - W was the windowing system for the Sun board, running on the V
kernel.  It was original envisioned as a very smart terminal to bigger
systems.  Remember it did not have an MMU to start with.  Andy added and
MMU and then eventually changed it to a 68010.  VLSI Tech was born and
eventual became Sun Micro Systems but that was a few years later.  I have
to believe W as moved to UNIX on the SUN Terminal and that would have been
what Chris Kent and folks started with for the microVax - but I do not know
for sure.




> - Clem just mentioned the 1981 Tektronix Magnolia system
>
1979/1980 actually -- Roger and I started that in summer of '79 and he
wrote that a year later when we go Tek money.  It was originall as 'g-job'
we were building for ourselves.  Our boss saw what were were doing and
Roger got $10K to do a proposal -- that document was the result.

I already had the basics of a compiler working by them (well sort of) and
the beginning of a Unix port on the test board. Jon Steinhart may be
remember some of this as they all visited us in the labs to see what we
were doing.

- Wikipedia says that X1 was 1984 and X11 was 1987; I’m not sure when it
> became Unix centered
> - Sun’s NeWS arrived only in 1989, I think?
>
> Outside of Unix, in the microcomputer world there was a lot of cheap(er)
> graphics hardware. Lot’s of stuff at 256 x 192 resolution, but up to 512 x
> 512 at the higher end. John Walker writes that the breakout product for
> Autodesk was Interact (the precursor to AutoCAD). Initially developed for
> S-100 bus systems it quickly moved to the PC. There was a lot of demand for
> CAD at a 5K price point that did not exist at a 50K price point.
>
Not completely true...  1-4K for BW was possible (expensive) but
available.  I  tend to believe that systems like E&S could do that. Many
raster systems went to 1K -- again is was about cost. I've forgotten the
resolution of the GDP2 but is was much higher -- it used a rather expensive
HP display.  The price of memory and price of the monitor tneded to
dominate. Also the processor was not cheap -- a GDP2 had a dedicated
PDP-11/20, but that was also try of things like GT40 and the
similar systems of the time.
ᐧ

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 16:04 ` [TUHS] " Larry McVoy
@ 2023-01-26 16:37   ` emanuel stiebler
  2023-01-26 16:51     ` segaloco via TUHS
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: emanuel stiebler @ 2023-01-26 16:37 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Larry McVoy, Paul Ruizendaal; +Cc: tuhs

On 2023-01-26 11:04, Larry McVoy wrote:
> [..] Straight X11 with a simple window
> manager gave me a lot of memory back.
> 
> I viewed that fancy stuff as stuff for people who didn't do real work.
> A bit of a snob, I was :-)

Xclock & many xterms, that what was on my desktop. Just replacing all 
the terminals, and to have one xterm with more lines for editing.


^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 16:37   ` emanuel stiebler
@ 2023-01-26 16:51     ` segaloco via TUHS
  0 siblings, 0 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: segaloco via TUHS @ 2023-01-26 16:51 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: emanuel stiebler; +Cc: Paul Ruizendaal, tuhs

Twm gets the job done for me too.  My only gripe is it doesn't support WM full screen hints that a lot of other WMs do so certain things don't full-screen properly, but others do.  In either case, not a huge problem, something if it mattered enough to me I'd just try to patch in.

- Matt G.

------- Original Message -------
On Thursday, January 26th, 2023 at 8:37 AM, emanuel stiebler <emu@e-bbes.com> wrote:


> On 2023-01-26 11:04, Larry McVoy wrote:
> 
> > [..] Straight X11 with a simple window
> > manager gave me a lot of memory back.
> > 
> > I viewed that fancy stuff as stuff for people who didn't do real work.
> > A bit of a snob, I was :-)
> 
> 
> Xclock & many xterms, that what was on my desktop. Just replacing all
> the terminals, and to have one xterm with more lines for editing.

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 15:58 [TUHS] Earliest UNIX Workstations? Paul Ruizendaal
  2023-01-26 16:04 ` [TUHS] " Larry McVoy
  2023-01-26 16:29 ` Clem Cole
@ 2023-01-26 16:51 ` Warner Losh
  2023-01-26 18:15   ` Lars Brinkhoff
  2023-01-26 18:14 ` Jon Steinhart
  2023-01-26 20:44 ` Rob Pike
  4 siblings, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: Warner Losh @ 2023-01-26 16:51 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Paul Ruizendaal; +Cc: tuhs

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On Thu, Jan 26, 2023 at 8:58 AM Paul Ruizendaal <pnr@planet.nl> wrote:

>
> As a result of the recent discussion on this list I’m trying to understand
> the timeline of graphical computing on Unix, first of all in my preferred
> time slot ’75 -’85.
>
> When it comes to Bell Labs I’m aware of the following:
>
> - around 1975 the Labs worked on the Glance-G vector graphics terminal.
> This was TSS-516 based with no Unix overlap I think.
> - around the same time the Labs seem to have used the 1973 Dec VT11 vector
> graphics terminal; at least the surviving LSX Unix source has a driver for
> it
> - in 1976 there was the Terak 8510; this ran primarily USCD pascal, but it
> also ran LSX and/or MX (but maybe only much later)
> - then it seems to jump 1981 and to the Blit.
> - in 1984 there was MGR that was done at Bellcore
>
> Outside of the labs (but on Unix), I have:
>
> - I am not sure what graphics software ran on the SUN-1, but it must have
> been something
>

If this is the sun microsystem sun-1, the leaked sources online suggest
that these initially ran a V7 port by Unisoft. This switched to a 4.2BSD
port maybe before it went to customers as SunOS 1.0 if other leaked sources
can be believed.

If this is the Standford Unix Networked (?) sun, then I don't know.


> - Clem just mentioned the 1981 Tektronix Magnolia system
> - Wikipedia says that X1 was 1984 and X11 was 1987; I’m not sure when it
> became Unix centered
>

I believe very early. It ran first on the VS100, and I believe that those
machines at project athena were running Unix, but I'm not sure of the cut
over from Stanford V. Another thread posted the X announcement which was in
June 1984. There was also a pointer to a blog about pictures of the W
window system. None exist, it seems. The windowing system pictured in the
glossy marketing sheets for the VS100 were for VMS and VMS Windowing
System. I'd put money against the first X running on VMS. :)

We had X10R3 running on Sun 3/50s in our lab, though more often they ran
SunView since it was faster and more familiar to the admins that ran the
machines. This was in 86 or 87 I believe.


> - Sun’s NeWS arrived only in 1989, I think?
>

No. It had to be late 1987 or 1988 because I ran that on the Sun 3/60 that
the Hydrology department that I worked for ran. I didn't run it often, mind
you, and the 'generic terminal emulator for any termcap entry' terminal was
cool, but it was just a notch too weird for a daily driver.

Warner


> Outside of Unix, in the microcomputer world there was a lot of cheap(er)
> graphics hardware. Lot’s of stuff at 256 x 192 resolution, but up to 512 x
> 512 at the higher end. John Walker writes that the breakout product for
> Autodesk was Interact (the precursor to AutoCAD). Initially developed for
> S-100 bus systems it quickly moved to the PC. There was a lot of demand for
> CAD at a 5K price point that did not exist at a 50K price point.
>
>
>
>
>
>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 15:58 [TUHS] Earliest UNIX Workstations? Paul Ruizendaal
                   ` (2 preceding siblings ...)
  2023-01-26 16:51 ` Warner Losh
@ 2023-01-26 18:14 ` Jon Steinhart
  2023-01-26 20:44 ` Rob Pike
  4 siblings, 0 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Jon Steinhart @ 2023-01-26 18:14 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs

Paul Ruizendaal writes:
> As a result of the recent discussion on this list I’m trying to understand the timeline of graphical computing on Unix, first of all in my preferred time slot ’75 -’85.
> 
> When it comes to Bell Labs I’m aware of the following:
> 
> - around 1975 the Labs worked on the Glance-G vector graphics terminal. This was TSS-516 based with no Unix overlap I think.
> - around the same time the Labs seem to have used the 1973 Dec VT11 vector graphics terminal; at least the surviving LSX Unix source has a driver for it
> - in 1976 there was the Terak 8510; this ran primarily USCD pascal, but it also ran LSX and/or MX (but maybe only much later)
> - then it seems to jump 1981 and to the Blit.
> - in 1984 there was MGR that was done at Bellcore
> 
> Outside of the labs (but on Unix), I have:
> 
> - I am not sure what graphics software ran on the SUN-1, but it must have been something
> - Clem just mentioned the 1981 Tektronix Magnolia system
> - Wikipedia says that X1 was 1984 and X11 was 1987; I’m not sure when it became Unix centered
> - Sun’s NeWS arrived only in 1989, I think?
> 
> Outside of Unix, in the microcomputer world there was a lot of cheap(er) graphics hardware. Lot’s of stuff at 256 x 192 resolution, but up to 512 x 512 at the higher end. John Walker writes that the breakout product for Autodesk was Interact (the precursor to AutoCAD). Initially developed for S-100 bus systems it quickly moved to the PC. There was a lot of demand for CAD at a 5K price point that did not exist at a 50K price point.

The timeline for the GLANCE-G is off by a few years.  It might
have been as early as 1969 but I don't remember when the transition
from GLANCE-C (characters only) to GLANCE-G (graphics) occurred.
I'm absolutely sure that the G existed in 1972 since I worked on it then.
The only UNIX overlap was when the Ring was adapted for the PDP-11 so
that Ken could have a GLANCE-G for chess.

I have a vague memory of other graphics work at the labs; I remember
being in someone's lab that had modified big Crown audio power amps
for current feedback to drive deflection coils, but no other details.

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 16:51 ` Warner Losh
@ 2023-01-26 18:15   ` Lars Brinkhoff
  2023-01-26 19:39     ` Bakul Shah
  2023-01-27 10:59     ` Lars Brinkhoff
  0 siblings, 2 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Lars Brinkhoff @ 2023-01-26 18:15 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Warner Losh; +Cc: Paul Ruizendaal, tuhs

Warner Losh wrote:
> If this is the Standford Unix Networked (?) sun, then I don't know.

Stanford University Network workstation.  I have seen some documents
about it on stacks.stanford.edu, but I don't remember about the
software.  In some versions, it's a more of a multi-head remote graphics
terminal, so maybe not Unix.

>  - Wikipedia says that X1 was 1984 and X11 was 1987; I’m not sure when it
>  became Unix centered
>
> I believe very early. It ran first on the VS100

Note that the VAXstation 100 is not a VAX, and not a standalone
computer.  It's a 68000-based graphics terminal that attaches to a VAX.
The VS100 has some firmware in ROM, and the host uploads additional
software.  There is such a software blob in X10R3.

> There was also a pointer to a blog about pictures of the W window
> system. None exist, it seems.

I have asked Asante, Reid, and Kent.  No luck so far.

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 18:15   ` Lars Brinkhoff
@ 2023-01-26 19:39     ` Bakul Shah
  2023-01-27 10:59     ` Lars Brinkhoff
  1 sibling, 0 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Bakul Shah @ 2023-01-26 19:39 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Lars Brinkhoff; +Cc: Paul Ruizendaal, tuhs

The V sources on bitsavers has a w command. But don't get excited!
It seems to be similar to unix's w, a variation on the who command.

I wonder if this mythical w is the same as V's VGTS as it seems to have
pretty much the same model. From
 https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/357332.357334

 The ideal interface must take into account four fundamental principles:

 (1) The interface to application programs should be independent of
     particular physical devices or intervening networks.

 (2) The user should be allowed to perform multiple tasks
     simultaneously.

 (3) The command interaction discipline should be consistent and
     natural.

 (4) Response to user interaction should be fast.

 The first principle has led to work in virtual terminals (VTs) and
 deviceindependent graphics packages, the second to work in window
 systems, and the third to work in what has recently been called user
 interface management systems, the most common examples of which are
 command languages. Without adhering to the fourth principle, however,
 much of the other work is moot. In a distributed environment, in
 particular, the supporting network protocols cannot incur inordinate
 overhead.

From concluding remarks:
 To summarize the major attributes of the VGTS:
 - Instead of describing how to draw a picture, the application
   describes what is to be drawn. The user then specifies where the
   picture should be displayed.
 - Objects have a hierarchical structure. Hence, the VGTS supports
   structured display files rather than segmented display files.
 - The VGTS is portable to a range of relatively high-performance
   devices.
 - Applications can be distributed over multiple machines.
 - A single user can access several different applications
   simultaneously.
 - It performs well!

VGTS code is in the V system sources at bitsavers.

> On Jan 26, 2023, at 10:15 AM, Lars Brinkhoff <lars@nocrew.org> wrote:
> 
> Warner Losh wrote:
>> If this is the Standford Unix Networked (?) sun, then I don't know.
> 
> Stanford University Network workstation.  I have seen some documents
> about it on stacks.stanford.edu, but I don't remember about the
> software.  In some versions, it's a more of a multi-head remote graphics
> terminal, so maybe not Unix.
> 
>> - Wikipedia says that X1 was 1984 and X11 was 1987; I’m not sure when it
>> became Unix centered
>> 
>> I believe very early. It ran first on the VS100
> 
> Note that the VAXstation 100 is not a VAX, and not a standalone
> computer.  It's a 68000-based graphics terminal that attaches to a VAX.
> The VS100 has some firmware in ROM, and the host uploads additional
> software.  There is such a software blob in X10R3.
> 
>> There was also a pointer to a blog about pictures of the W window
>> system. None exist, it seems.
> 
> I have asked Asante, Reid, and Kent.  No luck so far.


^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 15:58 [TUHS] Earliest UNIX Workstations? Paul Ruizendaal
                   ` (3 preceding siblings ...)
  2023-01-26 18:14 ` Jon Steinhart
@ 2023-01-26 20:44 ` Rob Pike
  4 siblings, 0 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Rob Pike @ 2023-01-26 20:44 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Paul Ruizendaal; +Cc: tuhs

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There was also all the work with the Three Rivers Graphic Wonder on the
PDP-11/45 at the University of Toronto Dynamic Graphics Project from 1974
onwards, as well as various film plotters, Versatec, Tennenhouse's frame
buffer, and so on.

-rob


On Fri, Jan 27, 2023 at 2:58 AM Paul Ruizendaal <pnr@planet.nl> wrote:

>
> As a result of the recent discussion on this list I’m trying to understand
> the timeline of graphical computing on Unix, first of all in my preferred
> time slot ’75 -’85.
>
> When it comes to Bell Labs I’m aware of the following:
>
> - around 1975 the Labs worked on the Glance-G vector graphics terminal.
> This was TSS-516 based with no Unix overlap I think.
> - around the same time the Labs seem to have used the 1973 Dec VT11 vector
> graphics terminal; at least the surviving LSX Unix source has a driver for
> it
> - in 1976 there was the Terak 8510; this ran primarily USCD pascal, but it
> also ran LSX and/or MX (but maybe only much later)
> - then it seems to jump 1981 and to the Blit.
> - in 1984 there was MGR that was done at Bellcore
>
> Outside of the labs (but on Unix), I have:
>
> - I am not sure what graphics software ran on the SUN-1, but it must have
> been something
> - Clem just mentioned the 1981 Tektronix Magnolia system
> - Wikipedia says that X1 was 1984 and X11 was 1987; I’m not sure when it
> became Unix centered
> - Sun’s NeWS arrived only in 1989, I think?
>
> Outside of Unix, in the microcomputer world there was a lot of cheap(er)
> graphics hardware. Lot’s of stuff at 256 x 192 resolution, but up to 512 x
> 512 at the higher end. John Walker writes that the breakout product for
> Autodesk was Interact (the precursor to AutoCAD). Initially developed for
> S-100 bus systems it quickly moved to the PC. There was a lot of demand for
> CAD at a 5K price point that did not exist at a 50K price point.
>
>
>
>
>
>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 16:29 ` Clem Cole
@ 2023-01-26 22:17   ` Paul Ruizendaal
  2023-01-26 22:45     ` Bakul Shah
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: Paul Ruizendaal @ 2023-01-26 22:17 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs; +Cc: Bakul Shah


> On 26 Jan 2023, at 17:29, Clem Cole <clemc@ccc.com> wrote:
> 
>> Outside of Unix, in the microcomputer world there was a lot of cheap(er) graphics hardware. Lot’s of stuff at 256 x 192 resolution, but up to 512 x 512 at the higher end. John Walker writes that the breakout product for Autodesk was Interact (the precursor to AutoCAD). Initially developed for S-100 bus systems it quickly moved to the PC. There was a lot of demand for CAD at a 5K price point that did not exist at a 50K price point.
> Not completely true...  1-4K for BW was possible (expensive) but available.  I  tend to believe that systems like E&S could do that. Many raster systems went to 1K -- again is was about cost. I've forgotten the resolution of the GDP2 but is was much higher -- it used a rather expensive HP display.  The price of memory and price of the monitor tneded to dominate. Also the processor was not cheap -- a GDP2 had a dedicated PDP-11/20, but that was also try of things like GT40 and the similar systems of the time.

I meant early micro/home computers. I think John Walker was comparing the typical late 70’s CAD (drawing) system, i.e a mini computer, a few graphics terminals and CAD software versus Interact running on a S-100 system with a high end graphics card, a digitiser board and a terminal. See for instance here:
https://www.3dcadworld.com/autocads-ancestor/

> - I am not sure what graphics software ran on the SUN-1, but it must have been something
> Again - W was the windowing system for the Sun board, running on the V kernel.  It was original envisioned as a very smart terminal to bigger systems.  Remember it did not have an MMU to start with.  Andy added and MMU and then eventually changed it to a 68010.  VLSI Tech was born and eventual became Sun Micro Systems but that was a few years later.  I have to believe W as moved to UNIX on the SUN Terminal and that would have been what Chris Kent and folks started with for the microVax - but I do not know for sure.



> Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2023 09:51:59 -0700
> From: Warner Losh <imp@bsdimp.com>

> 
>> - I am not sure what graphics software ran on the SUN-1, but it must have been something
> 
> If this is the sun microsystem sun-1, the leaked sources online suggest that these initially ran a V7 port by Unisoft. This switched to a 4.2BSD port maybe before it went to customers as SunOS 1.0 if other leaked sources can be believed.

I never really distinguished between the Stanford "SUN" and the Sun Microsystems "Sun-1”, oops. Taking Clem’s comment into account I could see that the SUN ran the V kernel and the W graphics system, and that the Sun-1 was using an early form of X.


> Bakul Shah bakul at iitbombay.org 
> Fri Jan 27 05:39:30 AEST 2023
> 
> I wonder if this mythical w is the same as V's VGTS as it seems to have
> pretty much the same model.
> From https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/357332.357334


That is an interesting thought and paper.

The paper says:

"As noted in Section 3, the VGTS is only one component of the user interface software. The other components are the view manager, the exec server, and the executives. Together, the view manager and exec server constitute the user interface management.”

In this context an “executive” seems to be similar to a shell, the exec server appears to manage client connections and the view manager seems to be similar to a window manager in X. Maybe this whole was (later?) referred to as “W”?

This was the post announcing X:

From: rws@mit-bold (Robert W. Scheifler)
To: window@athena
Subject: window system X
Date: 19 Jun 1984 0907-EDT (Tuesday)

I've spent the last couple weeks writing a window
system for the VS100. I stole a fair amount of code
from W, surrounded it with an asynchronous rather
than a synchronous interface, and called it X. Overall
performance appears to be about twice that of W. The
code seems fairly solid at this point, although there are
still some deficiencies to be fixed up. 

We at LCS have stopped using W, and are now
actively building applications on X. Anyone else using
W should seriously consider switching. This is not the
ultimate window system, but I believe it is a good
starting point for experimentation. Right at the moment
there is a CLU (and an Argus) interface to X; a C
interface is in the works. The three existing
applications are a text editor (TED), an Argus I/O
interface, and a primitive window manager. There is
no documentation yet; anyone crazy enough to
volunteer? I may get around to it eventually. 

Anyone interested in seeing a demo can drop by
NE43-531, although you may want to call 3-1945
first. Anyone who wants the code can come by with a
tape. Anyone interested in hacking deficiencies, feel
free to get in touch.




^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 22:17   ` Paul Ruizendaal
@ 2023-01-26 22:45     ` Bakul Shah
  2023-01-27  0:19       ` Paul Ruizendaal
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: Bakul Shah @ 2023-01-26 22:45 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Paul Ruizendaal; +Cc: tuhs

On Jan 26, 2023, at 2:17 PM, Paul Ruizendaal <pnr@planet.nl> wrote:
> 
>> 
>> Bakul Shah bakul at iitbombay.org 
>> Fri Jan 27 05:39:30 AEST 2023
>> 
>> I wonder if this mythical w is the same as V's VGTS as it seems to have
>> pretty much the same model.
>> From https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/357332.357334
> 
> 
> That is an interesting thought and paper.
> 
> The paper says:
> 
> "As noted in Section 3, the VGTS is only one component of the user interface software. The other components are the view manager, the exec server, and the executives. Together, the view manager and exec server constitute the user interface management.”
> 
> In this context an “executive” seems to be similar to a shell, the exec server appears to manage client connections and the view manager seems to be similar to a window manager in X. Maybe this whole was (later?) referred to as “W”?

For the curious the sources are available at http://www.bitsavers.org/bits/Stanford/VSystem_1983.zip

It just seems weird that
a) for a research OS such as V there were more than one such effort but
b) there are no papers about W or any mention of it in V related papers.
c) there is source code for VGTS as well as at least one paper about it.
d) VGTS seems to have had similar goals as X windows.
e) there seemed to be multiple applications written using VGTS.

I didn't spend much time searching so may have missed things. I have
asked a friend who had Cheriton as research advisor in '80s but most
likely it won't yield anything.


^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 22:45     ` Bakul Shah
@ 2023-01-27  0:19       ` Paul Ruizendaal
  2023-01-27 17:16         ` Paul Ruizendaal via TUHS
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: Paul Ruizendaal @ 2023-01-27  0:19 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs; +Cc: Bakul Shah


> On 26 Jan 2023, at 23:45, Bakul Shah <bakul@iitbombay.org> wrote:
> 
> On Jan 26, 2023, at 2:17 PM, Paul Ruizendaal <pnr@planet.nl> wrote:
>> 
>>> 
>>> Bakul Shah bakul at iitbombay.org 
>>> Fri Jan 27 05:39:30 AEST 2023
>>> 
>>> I wonder if this mythical w is the same as V's VGTS as it seems to have
>>> pretty much the same model.
>>> From https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/357332.357334

And the answer is “no”:

From https://apps.hci.rwth-aachen.de/borchers-old/cs377a/materials/p79-scheifler.pdf :

"The name X derives from the lineage of the system. At Stanford University, Paul Asente and Brian Reid had begun work on the W window system [3] as an alternative to VGTS [13, 22] for the V system [5]. Both VGTS and W allow network-transparent access to the display, using the synchronous V communication mechanism. Both systems provide “text” windows for ASCII terminal emulation. VGTS provides graphics windows driven by fairly high-level object definitions from a structured display file; W provides graphics windows based on a simple display-list mechanism, with limited functionality. We acquired a UNIX- based version of W for the VSlOO (with synchronous communication over TCP [24] produced by Asente and Chris Kent at Digital’s Western Research Laboratory. From just a few days of experimentation, it was clear that a network- transparent hierarchical window system was desirable, but that restricting the system to any fixed set of application-specific modes was completely inadequate. It was also clear that, although synchronous communication was perhaps acceptable in the V system (owing to very fast networking primitives), it was completely inadequate in most other operating environments. X is our “reaction” to W.”

The reference [3] is "ASENTE, P. W reference manual. Internal document, Dept. Computer Science, Stanford Univ., Calif., 1984.”

The version of X discussed in the paper was apparently part of the 4.3BSD distribution tapes:

"The use of X has grown far beyond anything we had imagined. Digital has incorporated X into a commercial product, and other manufacturers are following suit. With the appearance of such products and the release of complete X sources on the Berkeley 4.3 UNIX distribution tapes, it is no longer feasible to track all X use and development.”

And I was wrong with:

> I never really distinguished between the Stanford "SUN" and the Sun Microsystems "Sun-1”, oops. Taking Clem’s comment into account I could see that the SUN ran the V kernel and the W graphics system, and that the Sun-1 was using an early form of X.

Whilst the part about SUN may be correct, the Sun-1 was apparently using MGR and SunWindows/SunView -- at least according to the interesting blog post here (discussed on TUHS a few months ago):

https://oldvcr.blogspot.com/2022/10/if-one-guis-not-enough-for-your-sparc.html




^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-26 18:15   ` Lars Brinkhoff
  2023-01-26 19:39     ` Bakul Shah
@ 2023-01-27 10:59     ` Lars Brinkhoff
  1 sibling, 0 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Lars Brinkhoff @ 2023-01-27 10:59 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Warner Losh; +Cc: Paul Ruizendaal, tuhs

> Stanford University Network workstation.  I have seen some documents
> about it on stacks.stanford.edu, but I don't remember about the
> software.  In some versions, it's a more of a multi-head remote graphics
> terminal, so maybe not Unix.

In the 1980 document, it's described as a single 68000 serving up to 16
seats.  "only the basic Pup Telnet protocols need be implemented on the
workstation's MC68OOO processor.  The SUN terminals could then be
programmed to emulate currently available terminals, such as Datamedias,
Telerays, Tektronix 4014 graphics terminals, or III displays."
https://stacks.stanford.edu/file/druid:gg867qx3134/gg867qx3134.pdf

But by 1982 it looks much like a classic workstation.  "The SUN Memory
Management Unit has been designed to support a multitasking operating
system such as Bell Lab’s UNIX."
http://i.stanford.edu/pub/cstr/reports/csl/tr/82/229/CSL-TR-82-229.pdf

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-27  0:19       ` Paul Ruizendaal
@ 2023-01-27 17:16         ` Paul Ruizendaal via TUHS
  2023-01-27 17:36           ` Warner Losh
  2023-01-27 17:43           ` josh
  0 siblings, 2 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Paul Ruizendaal via TUHS @ 2023-01-27 17:16 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1052 bytes --]


> On Jan 27, 2023, at 1:19 AM, Paul Ruizendaal <pnr@planet.nl> wrote:
> 
> The version of X discussed in the paper was apparently part of the 4.3BSD distribution tapes:
> 
> "The use of X has grown far beyond anything we had imagined. Digital has incorporated X into a commercial product, and other manufacturers are following suit. With the appearance of such products and the release of complete X sources on the Berkeley 4.3 UNIX distribution tapes, it is no longer feasible to track all X use and development.”
> 

This X is not on the TUHS Unix tree website, nor on the CSRG disks. It turns out that there is a directory “src/new” that is not included there. It is here:

http://www.retro11.de/ouxr/43bsd/usr/src/new/ <http://www.retro11.de/ouxr/43bsd/usr/src/new/>

The version of X included with 4.3BSD was X10. I assume this is the oldest surviving X Window source code.

Of course the source code for the Blit has survived, as has the source code of MGR. The source code for Sunwindows and NeWS is presumably lost?




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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-27 17:16         ` Paul Ruizendaal via TUHS
@ 2023-01-27 17:36           ` Warner Losh
  2023-01-27 17:37             ` Warner Losh
  2023-01-27 17:43           ` josh
  1 sibling, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: Warner Losh @ 2023-01-27 17:36 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Paul Ruizendaal; +Cc: tuhs

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 2265 bytes --]

On Fri, Jan 27, 2023 at 10:16 AM Paul Ruizendaal via TUHS <tuhs@tuhs.org>
wrote:

>
> On Jan 27, 2023, at 1:19 AM, Paul Ruizendaal <pnr@planet.nl> wrote:
>
> The version of X discussed in the paper was apparently part of the 4.3BSD
> distribution tapes:
>
> "The use of X has grown far beyond anything we had imagined. Digital has
> incorporated X into a commercial product, and other manufacturers are
> following suit. With the appearance of such products and the release of
> complete X sources on the Berkeley 4.3 UNIX distribution tapes, it is no
> longer feasible to track all X use and development.”
>
>
> This X is not on the TUHS Unix tree website, nor on the CSRG disks. It
> turns out that there is a directory “src/new” that is not included there.
> It is here:
>
> http://www.retro11.de/ouxr/43bsd/usr/src/new/
>
> The version of X included with 4.3BSD was X10. I assume this is the oldest
> surviving X Window source code.
>

There's X10R3 and X10R4 at https://www.x.org/archive/X10R3/ and
https://www.x.org/archive/X10R4/. On the FTP site, there's sym links for
R1, R2, R3, R4, R5, R6, R6.1, R6.3, R6.4, R6.5.1, R6.6 and R6.8 in the pub
directory as well, but they are dead links and correspond to the X11
releases that are also there, not X1, etc.

The X10R3 is from Feb 2, 1986. X10R4 is from December 2, 1986. The
retro11.de files are from June 1986, so
are no later than X10R4, and most likely either X10R3 or an internal
snapshot (I've not downloaded them both
to run a diff to see which).

Google searches for X9, X8, etc aren't at all helpful.

Of course the source code for the Blit has survived, as has the source code
> of MGR. The source code for Sunwindows and NeWS is presumably lost?
>

When I was a Solbroune, we started the OI toolkit with pdb, swm, uib, etc
because Sun refused to license the source code to SunView. Although I had
easy access to SunOS (which I wish I'd saved a copy of now), the SunView
code was never in the building. It was relatively easy to get SunOS sources
for a fee, but much harder for SunView. So I'm less than completely hopeful
here. And NeWS was a fringe thing with a significantly shorter product
life, so I'm even less hopeful there.

Warner

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-27 17:36           ` Warner Losh
@ 2023-01-27 17:37             ` Warner Losh
  2023-01-27 17:45               ` Rich Salz
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: Warner Losh @ 2023-01-27 17:37 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Paul Ruizendaal; +Cc: tuhs

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 2510 bytes --]

On Fri, Jan 27, 2023 at 10:36 AM Warner Losh <imp@bsdimp.com> wrote:

>
>
> On Fri, Jan 27, 2023 at 10:16 AM Paul Ruizendaal via TUHS <tuhs@tuhs.org>
> wrote:
>
>>
>> On Jan 27, 2023, at 1:19 AM, Paul Ruizendaal <pnr@planet.nl> wrote:
>>
>> The version of X discussed in the paper was apparently part of the 4.3BSD
>> distribution tapes:
>>
>> "The use of X has grown far beyond anything we had imagined. Digital has
>> incorporated X into a commercial product, and other manufacturers are
>> following suit. With the appearance of such products and the release of
>> complete X sources on the Berkeley 4.3 UNIX distribution tapes, it is no
>> longer feasible to track all X use and development.”
>>
>>
>> This X is not on the TUHS Unix tree website, nor on the CSRG disks. It
>> turns out that there is a directory “src/new” that is not included there.
>> It is here:
>>
>> http://www.retro11.de/ouxr/43bsd/usr/src/new/
>>
>> The version of X included with 4.3BSD was X10. I assume this is the
>> oldest surviving X Window source code.
>>
>
> There's X10R3 and X10R4 at https://www.x.org/archive/X10R3/ and
> https://www.x.org/archive/X10R4/. On the FTP site, there's sym links for
> R1, R2, R3, R4, R5, R6, R6.1, R6.3, R6.4, R6.5.1, R6.6 and R6.8 in the pub
> directory as well, but they are dead links and correspond to the X11
> releases that are also there, not X1, etc.
>
> The X10R3 is from Feb 2, 1986. X10R4 is from December 2, 1986. The
> retro11.de files are from June 1986, so
> are no later than X10R4, and most likely either X10R3 or an internal
> snapshot (I've not downloaded them both
> to run a diff to see which).
>
> Google searches for X9, X8, etc aren't at all helpful.
>

Also interesting to note is that X10 had clu bindings in the
CLUlib directory...


> Of course the source code for the Blit has survived, as has the source
>> code of MGR. The source code for Sunwindows and NeWS is presumably lost?
>>
>
> When I was a Solbroune, we started the OI toolkit with pdb, swm, uib, etc
> because Sun refused to license the source code to SunView. Although I had
> easy access to SunOS (which I wish I'd saved a copy of now), the SunView
> code was never in the building. It was relatively easy to get SunOS sources
> for a fee, but much harder for SunView. So I'm less than completely hopeful
> here. And NeWS was a fringe thing with a significantly shorter product
> life, so I'm even less hopeful there.
>
> Warner
>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-27 17:16         ` Paul Ruizendaal via TUHS
  2023-01-27 17:36           ` Warner Losh
@ 2023-01-27 17:43           ` josh
  1 sibling, 0 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: josh @ 2023-01-27 17:43 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Paul Ruizendaal; +Cc: tuhs

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 381 bytes --]

On Friday, January 27, 2023, Paul Ruizendaal via TUHS <tuhs@tuhs.org> wrote:

>
> Of course the source code for the Blit has survived, as has the source
> code of MGR. The source code for Sunwindows and NeWS is presumably lost?
>

Arnold Robbins linked to this repository in a previous thread, it seems to
have some NeWS-related source:

https://github.com/IanDarwin/OpenLookCDROM

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-27 17:37             ` Warner Losh
@ 2023-01-27 17:45               ` Rich Salz
  2023-01-27 17:54                 ` Warner Losh
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: Rich Salz @ 2023-01-27 17:45 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Warner Losh; +Cc: Paul Ruizendaal, tuhs

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 323 bytes --]

> Also interesting to note is that X10 had clu bindings in the
CLUlib directory...

I'd like to know what the first versions of X were written in; the notice
talks about CLU bindings exist and C coming soon. The app-side seems
reasonable, but what was the display engine written in?  (I took the CLU
class around 1980.)

>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-27 17:45               ` Rich Salz
@ 2023-01-27 17:54                 ` Warner Losh
  2023-01-28  9:14                   ` Lars Brinkhoff
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: Warner Losh @ 2023-01-27 17:54 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Rich Salz; +Cc: Paul Ruizendaal, tuhs

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 575 bytes --]

On Fri, Jan 27, 2023 at 10:45 AM Rich Salz <rich.salz@gmail.com> wrote:

>
> > Also interesting to note is that X10 had clu bindings in the
> CLUlib directory...
>
> I'd like to know what the first versions of X were written in; the notice
> talks about CLU bindings exist and C coming soon. The app-side seems
> reasonable, but what was the display engine written in?  (I took the CLU
> class around 1980.)
>

I wrote  ~500-1000 lines of CLU in a computer language survey course in
1986...

Without the earlier versions' source, it's hard to answer this question...

Warner

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-27 17:54                 ` Warner Losh
@ 2023-01-28  9:14                   ` Lars Brinkhoff
  2023-01-28 11:05                     ` Paul Ruizendaal
  2023-01-29  6:48                     ` Lars Brinkhoff
  0 siblings, 2 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Lars Brinkhoff @ 2023-01-28  9:14 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Warner Losh; +Cc: Paul Ruizendaal, tuhs

Warner Losh wrote:
> Rich Salz wrote:
>> I'd like to know what the first versions of X were written in
>
> Without the earlier versions' source, it's hard to answer this question...

V source code exists, right?  It seems likely W would have been written
in the same language as W.  And that early X would also be the same.
Another source of information would be to ask Bob Scheifler and Jim
Gettys.

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-28  9:14                   ` Lars Brinkhoff
@ 2023-01-28 11:05                     ` Paul Ruizendaal
  2023-01-28 15:38                       ` Warner Losh
  2023-01-28 18:50                       ` Lars Brinkhoff
  2023-01-29  6:48                     ` Lars Brinkhoff
  1 sibling, 2 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Paul Ruizendaal @ 2023-01-28 11:05 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs


> On 28 Jan 2023, at 10:14, Lars Brinkhoff <lars@nocrew.org> wrote:
> 
> Warner Losh wrote:
>> Rich Salz wrote:
>>> I'd like to know what the first versions of X were written in
>> 
>> Without the earlier versions' source, it's hard to answer this question...
> 
> V source code exists, right?  It seems likely W would have been written
> in the same language as W.  And that early X would also be the same.
> Another source of information would be to ask Bob Scheifler and Jim
> Gettys.

Whilst that is a reasonable assumption, I’m not sure it is true in this case. Bob Scheifler writes in 1986:

"We acquired a UNIX-based version of W for the VSlOO (with synchronous communication over TCP [24] produced by Asente and Chris Kent at Digital’s Western Research Laboratory.”

It does not say “C based”, but it is quite possible that the Unix port also meant moving to C.

Also, the work started in June 1984 and had gone to version 10, release 3 by February 1986. That is 12 versions in 20 months. Most likely X1-X10R2 are all snapshots done in rapid succession. The change notes for X10R3 read as describing a work still in progress:

http://www.retro11.de/ouxr/43bsd/usr/src/new/X/CHANGES

That “work-in-progress” feel also shows in the Xterm README:

"Xterm is in a reasonably usable state.  We are sick and tired of working
on it, but there are clearly major areas of improvement possible.  Do
not look to us to do more than integration work on other people's
improvement.  About 50% of it is the oldest existing code in the package
and needing major rewrite.  Our thanks to Bob McNamara for the 50% which
is solid."

The README for the X server itself (written in August 1985 it seems, http://www.retro11.de/ouxr/43bsd/usr/src/new/X/X/README) says:

"The server has been completely rewritten several times now, and I am reasonably
happy with it.  I have fine-tuned it specifically for the current (sub-optimal)
VAX compiler.  For other machines, faster code may be obtained in some cases
by changing sizes (e.g., to avoid indexing shifts on the 68000) or register
declarations.  Attempts to parameterize along these lines have only been made
for the byte-swapping code.”

So there were several rewrites from Summer 1984 till Summer 1985. In case the first version was in CLU, it would seem that the change-over to C happened in the very first months of the code base’s lifespan.

The next paragraph as to the state of the code base at this time is revealing:

Unfortunately, a great many invariants are not written down.  Hopefully you
will spend a few weeks understanding the code before you muck with it.  If
something seems easy to add or change, you probably forgot something important.
Almost everything depends on everything else.  It is almost impossible to
devise rigorous test cases.  Innocuous looking changes can have large
performance effects, so watch out.  If you muck with fundamental window
components, a good cross-check is to see how quickly you can manipulate a
window with, say, 100 non-adjacent subwindows.

After reading the above, Jon Steinhart’s post from 5 years ago about X is all the more interesting: https://minnie.tuhs.org/pipermail/tuhs/2017-September/012089.html




^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-28 11:05                     ` Paul Ruizendaal
@ 2023-01-28 15:38                       ` Warner Losh
  2023-01-28 18:50                       ` Lars Brinkhoff
  1 sibling, 0 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Warner Losh @ 2023-01-28 15:38 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Paul Ruizendaal; +Cc: The Eunuchs Hysterical Society

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 4131 bytes --]

On Sat, Jan 28, 2023, 4:05 AM Paul Ruizendaal <pnr@planet.nl> wrote:

>
> > On 28 Jan 2023, at 10:14, Lars Brinkhoff <lars@nocrew.org> wrote:
> >
> > Warner Losh wrote:
> >> Rich Salz wrote:
> >>> I'd like to know what the first versions of X were written in
> >>
> >> Without the earlier versions' source, it's hard to answer this
> question...
> >
> > V source code exists, right?  It seems likely W would have been written
> > in the same language as W.  And that early X would also be the same.
> > Another source of information would be to ask Bob Scheifler and Jim
> > Gettys.
>
> Whilst that is a reasonable assumption, I’m not sure it is true in this
> case. Bob Scheifler writes in 1986:
>
> "We acquired a UNIX-based version of W for the VSlOO (with synchronous
> communication over TCP [24] produced by Asente and Chris Kent at Digital’s
> Western Research Laboratory.”
>
> It does not say “C based”, but it is quite possible that the Unix port
> also meant moving to C.
>
> Also, the work started in June 1984 and had gone to version 10, release 3
> by February 1986. That is 12 versions in 20 months. Most likely X1-X10R2
> are all snapshots done in rapid succession.


X11 is the 11th version of the wire protocol. They bumped that number each
time there was a protocol change. It's not clear that all the early
versions were distributed beyond the local network. The Xlib book stated
something along these lines, but I can't find my copy to quote it or
refresh my recollection.


The change notes for X10R3 read as describing a work still in progress:
>
> http://www.retro11.de/ouxr/43bsd/usr/src/new/X/CHANGES
>
> That “work-in-progress” feel also shows in the Xterm README:
>
> "Xterm is in a reasonably usable state.  We are sick and tired of working
> on it, but there are clearly major areas of improvement possible.  Do
> not look to us to do more than integration work on other people's
> improvement.  About 50% of it is the oldest existing code in the package
> and needing major rewrite.  Our thanks to Bob McNamara for the 50% which
> is solid."
>

Rolling releases were quite common. They went out of style for a while, but
are back in vouge with CI....

The README for the X server itself (written in August 1985 it seems,
> http://www.retro11.de/ouxr/43bsd/usr/src/new/X/X/README) says:
>
> "The server has been completely rewritten several times now, and I am
> reasonably
> happy with it.  I have fine-tuned it specifically for the current
> (sub-optimal)
> VAX compiler.  For other machines, faster code may be obtained in some
> cases
> by changing sizes (e.g., to avoid indexing shifts on the 68000) or register
> declarations.  Attempts to parameterize along these lines have only been
> made
> for the byte-swapping code.”
>
> So there were several rewrites from Summer 1984 till Summer 1985. In case
> the first version was in CLU, it would seem that the change-over to C
> happened in the very first months of the code base’s lifespan.
>

Most likely the CLU library bindings in X10R3 are a hold over from other
software other departments were still using given the fast pace here...

The next paragraph as to the state of the code base at this time is
> revealing:
>
> Unfortunately, a great many invariants are not written down.  Hopefully you
> will spend a few weeks understanding the code before you muck with it.  If
> something seems easy to add or change, you probably forgot something
> important.
> Almost everything depends on everything else.  It is almost impossible to
> devise rigorous test cases.  Innocuous looking changes can have large
> performance effects, so watch out.  If you muck with fundamental window
> components, a good cross-check is to see how quickly you can manipulate a
> window with, say, 100 non-adjacent subwindows.
>
> After reading the above, Jon Steinhart’s post from 5 years ago about X is
> all the more interesting:
> https://minnie.tuhs.org/pipermail/tuhs/2017-September/012089.html


I'd forgotten about that...

Warner

>
>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-28 11:05                     ` Paul Ruizendaal
  2023-01-28 15:38                       ` Warner Losh
@ 2023-01-28 18:50                       ` Lars Brinkhoff
  1 sibling, 0 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Lars Brinkhoff @ 2023-01-28 18:50 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Paul Ruizendaal; +Cc: tuhs

Paul Ruizendaal wrote:
>> V source code exists, right?  It seems likely W would have been
>> written in the same language as [V].  And that early X would also be
>> the same.  Another source of information would be to ask Bob
>> Scheifler and Jim Gettys.
>
> Whilst that is a reasonable assumption, I’m not sure it is true in
> this case. Bob Scheifler writes in 1986:
>
> "We acquired a UNIX-based version of W for the [VS1OO] (with
> synchronous communication over TCP [24] produced by Asente and Chris
> Kent at Digital’s Western Research Laboratory.”
>
> It does not say “C based”, but it is quite possible that the Unix port
> also meant moving to C.

I checked V, and it's written in C.

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-28  9:14                   ` Lars Brinkhoff
  2023-01-28 11:05                     ` Paul Ruizendaal
@ 2023-01-29  6:48                     ` Lars Brinkhoff
  2023-01-29 20:39                       ` Paul Ruizendaal
  1 sibling, 1 reply; 27+ messages in thread
From: Lars Brinkhoff @ 2023-01-29  6:48 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Warner Losh; +Cc: Paul Ruizendaal, tuhs

>>> I'd like to know what the first versions of X were written in
>> Without the earlier versions' source, it's hard to answer this question...
>
> V source code exists, right?  It seems likely W would have been written
> in the same language as W.  And that early X would also be the same.
> Another source of information would be to ask Bob Scheifler and Jim
> Gettys.

I asked Bob, and he says W was written in C.

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Re: Earliest UNIX Workstations?
  2023-01-29  6:48                     ` Lars Brinkhoff
@ 2023-01-29 20:39                       ` Paul Ruizendaal
  0 siblings, 0 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Paul Ruizendaal @ 2023-01-29 20:39 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Lars Brinkhoff; +Cc: tuhs


> On 29 Jan 2023, at 07:48, Lars Brinkhoff <lars@nocrew.org> wrote:
> 
>>>> I'd like to know what the first versions of X were written in
>>> Without the earlier versions' source, it's hard to answer this question...
>> 
>> V source code exists, right?  It seems likely W would have been written
>> in the same language as W.  And that early X would also be the same.
>> Another source of information would be to ask Bob Scheifler and Jim
>> Gettys.
> 
> I asked Bob, and he says W was written in C.

Thank you!

In the meantime I have also found the thesis of William Nowicki, the author of VGTS:

https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA166935.pdf

It has a timeline for VGTS in its appendix C. In short, development begins in 1982 as a carve out of the display routines of a VLSI design package. It seems to have become usable in 1983 and development continued into 1984 (Nowicki graduated in March 1985).

This places the development of W in 1983 (before that VGTS did not exist, and by early ’84 a Unix version existed).

This https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA231239.pdf document from 1990 claims:

"The X Window System has a very alphabetical lineage. The family originated at Stanford University as the VGTS, or V system, a primitive networked graphics windowing system. Then Digital Electronic Corporation desired a more advanced version of V and worked with Stanford University to develop W. Because of the needs of a networking and windowing project sponsored by IBM at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT acquired the W system and greatly improved its networking capabilities.”

The above seems not quite accurate: besides the V / VGTS mixup, Scheifer writes that W was more a simplification rather than an extension of VGTS:

"VGTS provides graphics windows driven by fairly high-level object definitions from a structured display file; W provides graphics windows based on a simple display-list mechanism, with limited functionality. We acquired a UNIX-based version of W for the VSlOO (with synchronous communication over TCP produced by [Paul] Asente and Chris Kent at Digital’s Western Research Laboratory.”

However, the links with DEC that these paragraphs make are interesting. There is this blog post from Bryan Lunduke (https://lunduke.substack.com/p/w-the-window-system-before-x-that) makes a link between the W window system and DEC’s 1984 "VAXstation Display System Software”. It is possible that these two pieces of software are in fact closely related.






^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

* [TUHS] Earliest UNIX Workstations?
@ 2023-01-26  0:31 Joseph Holsten
  0 siblings, 0 replies; 27+ messages in thread
From: Joseph Holsten @ 2023-01-26  0:31 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 27+ messages in thread

end of thread, other threads:[~2023-01-29 20:40 UTC | newest]

Thread overview: 27+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed)
-- links below jump to the message on this page --
2023-01-26 15:58 [TUHS] Earliest UNIX Workstations? Paul Ruizendaal
2023-01-26 16:04 ` [TUHS] " Larry McVoy
2023-01-26 16:37   ` emanuel stiebler
2023-01-26 16:51     ` segaloco via TUHS
2023-01-26 16:29 ` Clem Cole
2023-01-26 22:17   ` Paul Ruizendaal
2023-01-26 22:45     ` Bakul Shah
2023-01-27  0:19       ` Paul Ruizendaal
2023-01-27 17:16         ` Paul Ruizendaal via TUHS
2023-01-27 17:36           ` Warner Losh
2023-01-27 17:37             ` Warner Losh
2023-01-27 17:45               ` Rich Salz
2023-01-27 17:54                 ` Warner Losh
2023-01-28  9:14                   ` Lars Brinkhoff
2023-01-28 11:05                     ` Paul Ruizendaal
2023-01-28 15:38                       ` Warner Losh
2023-01-28 18:50                       ` Lars Brinkhoff
2023-01-29  6:48                     ` Lars Brinkhoff
2023-01-29 20:39                       ` Paul Ruizendaal
2023-01-27 17:43           ` josh
2023-01-26 16:51 ` Warner Losh
2023-01-26 18:15   ` Lars Brinkhoff
2023-01-26 19:39     ` Bakul Shah
2023-01-27 10:59     ` Lars Brinkhoff
2023-01-26 18:14 ` Jon Steinhart
2023-01-26 20:44 ` Rob Pike
  -- strict thread matches above, loose matches on Subject: below --
2023-01-26  0:31 [TUHS] " Joseph Holsten

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