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From: Toby Thain <toby@telegraphics.com.au>
To: Tyler Adams <coppero1237@gmail.com>,
	The Eunuchs Hysterical Society <tuhs@tuhs.org>
Subject: Re: [TUHS] History of popularity of C
Date: Thu, 21 May 2020 12:10:35 -0400	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <8a2e9b1b-8890-a783-5b53-c8480c070f2e@telegraphics.com.au> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <CAEuQd1B8gH-Lu22HKj9pn6JVXNVVYscAnL4TSVDY03k2ORy2qw@mail.gmail.com>

On 2020-05-21 11:27 AM, Tyler Adams wrote:
> Does anybody have any good resources on the history of the popularity of
> C? I'm looking for data to resolve a claim that C is so prolific and
> influential because it's so easy to write a C compiler.
> 
> Tyler

Based on recollections of C from mid-1980s until today, this claim
doesn't make sense for several reasons. Sorry, this is all anecdata or
recollection, not cited data:

- inexpensive compiler availability was not very good until ~1990 or
later, but C had been taking off like wildfire for 10 years before that

- developing good compilers is certainly not "easy" - and there were a
lot of mediocre vendor compilers despite (duplicated) investment

- by the time gcc was mature (by some definition, but probably before
1990) - something that happened largely as a reaction to the vendor
compiler situation - it was a large and complicated codebase even by
standards of the time

- hobby/novelty/small/educational compilers are a relatively new thing
and arrived long after the C adoption curve was complete. The earliest
well known example I can think of is lcc (1994) but most are much newer.

...and probably quite a few other points.

--T


  reply	other threads:[~2020-05-21 16:17 UTC|newest]

Thread overview: 105+ messages / expand[flat|nested]  mbox.gz  Atom feed  top
2020-05-21 15:27 Tyler Adams
2020-05-21 16:10 ` Toby Thain [this message]
2020-05-21 16:30   ` Larry McVoy
2020-05-21 17:22     ` John Foust
2020-05-21 20:17       ` Toby Thain
2020-05-21 16:43   ` Tony Finch
2020-05-21 17:35     ` arnold
2020-05-21 19:16       ` CHARLES KESTER
2020-05-21 20:33         ` Thomas Paulsen
2020-05-21 20:09       ` Toby Thain
2020-05-21 20:12       ` Tony Finch
2020-05-22  8:28       ` David Arnold
2020-05-21 20:07     ` Toby Thain
2020-05-21 20:56   ` Clem Cole
2020-05-21 23:45     ` Toby Thain
2020-05-21 23:57       ` Richard Salz
2020-05-22  0:17         ` Toby Thain
2020-05-22  4:10         ` John Gilmore
2020-05-22 14:11           ` Larry McVoy
2020-05-22 14:34             ` Richard Salz
2020-05-22 14:17           ` Larry McVoy
2020-05-22  7:42         ` arnold
2020-05-22 23:50   ` Greg A. Woods
2020-05-23  7:28     ` Andy Kosela
2020-05-23 17:08     ` Clem Cole
2020-05-23 17:22       ` Richard Salz
2020-05-23 18:42       ` Derek Fawcus
2020-05-23 19:28       ` Michael Kjörling
2020-05-26  4:21       ` Dave Horsfall
2020-05-26  4:32         ` Ed Carp
2020-05-26  8:21           ` Rob Pike
2020-05-26 14:44             ` Clem Cole
2020-05-26 14:32         ` Clem Cole
2020-05-26 19:50           ` Greg A. Woods
2020-05-26 21:48             ` Thomas Paulsen
2020-05-26 22:36               ` Greg A. Woods
2020-05-27 14:37                 ` Ronald Natalie
2020-05-27 15:09                   ` Clem Cole
2020-05-27 16:11                   ` Thomas Paulsen
2020-05-27 19:49                     ` Greg A. Woods
2020-05-27 20:13                       ` Larry McVoy
2020-05-27 20:23                         ` Richard Salz
2020-05-27 21:00                       ` Nevin Liber
2020-05-27 23:17                         ` Greg A. Woods
2020-06-05 20:57                           ` Dave Horsfall
2020-06-05 21:40                             ` Nemo Nusquam
2020-06-05 21:47                             ` Richard Salz
2020-06-05 22:01                               ` Bakul Shah
2020-06-06 20:49                   ` Ed Carp
2020-06-06 21:08                     ` Thomas Paulsen
2020-06-06 21:13                       ` Larry McVoy
2020-06-06 22:27                       ` Ed Carp
2020-06-06 23:14                         ` Tyler Adams
2020-06-07  5:57                         ` arnold
2020-06-07  9:22                           ` Andy Kosela
2020-06-07  9:39                             ` Ed Carp
2020-06-07 10:02                             ` Brantley Coile
2020-06-07 11:30                             ` Thomas Paulsen
2020-06-07 15:26                             ` Clem Cole
2020-06-07 15:52                               ` Larry McVoy
2020-06-08  1:02                                 ` Adam Thornton
2020-06-08  8:04                                   ` Thomas Paulsen
2020-06-07 17:26                               ` Bakul Shah
2020-06-07 17:35                               ` Bakul Shah
2020-06-07 18:50                               ` Nemo Nusquam
2020-06-07 21:15                                 ` Chris Torek
2020-06-07 22:16                                   ` Dan Cross
2020-06-07 22:56                                     ` Chris Torek
2020-06-07 23:14                                       ` [TUHS] Comparative languages Warren Toomey
2020-06-08  0:24                                       ` [TUHS] History of popularity of C Bram Wyllie
2020-06-08  5:48                                   ` Lars Brinkhoff
2020-06-06 23:31                     ` Bakul Shah
2020-06-07  0:12                       ` Greg A. Woods
2020-06-07 11:04                     ` emanuel stiebler
2020-06-07 11:33                       ` Thomas Paulsen
2020-05-26 15:19         ` Toby Thain
2020-05-26 16:00         ` Thomas Paulsen
2020-05-26 16:21           ` Christopher Browne
2020-05-26 19:29             ` Thomas Paulsen
2020-05-26 19:55             ` Dan Cross
2020-05-26 20:00               ` Jon Steinhart
2020-05-21 16:18 ` Jim Capp
2020-05-21 18:58 ` A. P. Garcia
2020-05-21 19:02 ` Clem Cole
2020-05-21 18:28 Noel Chiappa
2020-05-21 18:44 ` Thomas Paulsen
2020-05-21 19:06   ` Paul Winalski
2020-05-21 20:27     ` Thomas Paulsen
2020-05-22  8:52 ` Tom Ivar Helbekkmo via TUHS
2020-05-22  9:51   ` Tyler Adams
2020-05-22 11:09     ` arnold
2020-05-22 11:15       ` Tyler Adams
2020-05-22 18:40         ` John Gilmore
2020-05-22 19:01           ` Toby Thain
2020-05-22 19:35             ` Larry McVoy
2020-05-22 19:31           ` Larry McVoy
2020-05-22 20:19           ` Michael Kjörling
2020-05-22 14:59       ` Toby Thain
2020-05-22 11:58     ` A. P. Garcia
2020-06-06 21:49 Doug McIlroy
2020-06-06 21:55 ` Warner Losh
2020-06-08 13:56 ` Derek Fawcus
2020-06-08 15:20   ` Richard Salz
2020-06-08 15:30 ` Dan Cross
2020-06-08 16:32 ` Tony Finch

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