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From: fair-tuhs@netbsd.org (Erik E. Fair)
Subject: [TUHS] Unix emacs at Bell Labs and elsewhere
Date: Wed, 05 Apr 2017 23:57:20 -0700	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <10619.1491461840@cesium.clock.org> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <5F2D4901-9FEC-4CF8-9D08-AA4342C1F465@superglobalmegacorp.com>

Jason,
	There was a Unix-based emacs from the Labs, back in the day: Warren Montgomery's emacs.

	https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/comp.emacs/f7L4OYbJT5U

It was installed on the UCB Cory Hall PDP-11/70 running 2.8 BSD when I gained access (an account) to it in January 1981. I used Montgomery emacs as my transition aid to Unix because TECO-based EMACS was the first screen-oriented editor I had learned to use on the CERAS DECsystem-20/60 running TOPS-20, during a 1978 summer school session at Stanford.

I switched to vi relatively rapidly that winter - it faster, and I disliked having one finger on the "control" key all day long. However, I've never forgotten a series of emacs key bindings, and that's been ... useful in a wide range of circumstances where I've encountered other systems put together by people from that "culture" (e.g. Cisco IOS). I also claim to have made an informed choice of text editor: I use vi and prefer it, despite having learned emacs first.

Perhaps someone else here can speak to how widely Montgomery emacs was used at Bell Labs or elsewhere.

	Erik Fair


  parent reply	other threads:[~2017-04-06  6:57 UTC|newest]

Thread overview: 31+ messages / expand[flat|nested]  mbox.gz  Atom feed  top
2017-04-06  2:15 [TUHS] I just noticed all the cfont aka C++ in research Jason Stevens
2017-04-06  2:20 ` Noel Hunt
2017-04-06  2:21   ` Jason Stevens
2017-04-06  6:57 ` Erik E. Fair [this message]
2021-02-06  2:57 [TUHS] Typing tutors Will Senn
2021-02-06 16:55 ` Clem Cole
2021-02-06 17:22   ` Ron Natalie
2021-02-06 17:29     ` Clem Cole
2021-02-06 17:33     ` Mary Ann Horton
2021-02-06 17:47       ` Ron Natalie
2021-02-06 18:06         ` Clem Cole
2021-02-06 22:38       ` Dave Horsfall
2021-02-06 22:47         ` Niklas Karlsson
2021-02-07  0:25           ` John Cowan
2021-02-08 22:20             ` Dave Horsfall
2021-02-08 22:58               ` David Barto
2021-02-08 23:01               ` Clem Cole
2021-02-07 17:43         ` Mary Ann Horton
2021-02-07 19:28           ` Dan Cross
2021-02-07 21:32           ` Nemo Nusquam
2021-02-07 23:17             ` Henry Bent
2021-02-07 23:55               ` Steve Nickolas
2021-02-08  0:56                 ` Henry Bent
2021-02-08  5:15                   ` Erik E. Fair
2021-02-08  5:33                     ` Steve Nickolas
2021-02-08 15:54                       ` Will Senn
2021-02-08  5:29             ` Doug McIntyre
2021-02-08 20:41               ` Andrew Newman
2021-02-06 18:56     ` David Barto
2021-02-08 21:50       ` Dave Horsfall
2021-02-09 16:29         ` Mary Ann Horton

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