[TUHS] Bell Office Automation System (OAS)?

[TUHS] Bell Office Automation System (OAS)?

[segaloco via TUHS]

Good day all, this may be COFF instead, but I'm not joined over there yet, might need some Warren help/approval.

In any case, received that 3B20S 4.1 manual in good shape, unpacked it, and out fell a little tri-fold titled "The Office Automation System (OAS) Editor-Formatter (ef) Reference Card" emblazoned with the usual Bell Laboratories, non-disclosure note abut the Bell System, and a nice little picture of a terminal I can't identify as well as the full manual for this OAS leaning against it: "The Office Automation System (OAS)" with a nice big Bell logo at the bottom of the spine.

The latter is likely a manual I spotted in a video once and couldn't make out the name/title at the time, thought I was seeing another long-lost UNIX manual.  I've never heard of this before, and Google isn't turning up much as Office Automation System appears to be a general industry term.

I seem to recall hearing about ef itself once or twice, some sort of pre-vi screen editor from Bell methinks?  Not super familiar with it though, I just seem to recall reading about that before somewhere.

Anywho, dealing with a move in the near future that is hopefully into a home I own, so pretty distracted from that scanning I keep talking about, but hopefully when I'm settled in in a few months I can setup a proper scan bench in my new place and really go to town on things.

- Matt G.

[TUHS] Re: Bell Office Automation System (OAS)?

[Andrew Hume]

when it matters, i was a part of the OAS team. i was technical lead, cathie brooks was our supervisor,
and i can’t really remember the other folks. i wrote ef. it was not my proudest programming achievement.
but denis ritchie helped me out by being a test user.

	andrew

> On Dec 8, 2022, at 12:24 PM, segaloco via TUHS <tuhs@tuhs.org> wrote:
> 
> Good day all, this may be COFF instead, but I'm not joined over there yet, might need some Warren help/approval.
> 
> In any case, received that 3B20S 4.1 manual in good shape, unpacked it, and out fell a little tri-fold titled "The Office Automation System (OAS) Editor-Formatter (ef) Reference Card" emblazoned with the usual Bell Laboratories, non-disclosure note abut the Bell System, and a nice little picture of a terminal I can't identify as well as the full manual for this OAS leaning against it: "The Office Automation System (OAS)" with a nice big Bell logo at the bottom of the spine.
> 
> The latter is likely a manual I spotted in a video once and couldn't make out the name/title at the time, thought I was seeing another long-lost UNIX manual.  I've never heard of this before, and Google isn't turning up much as Office Automation System appears to be a general industry term.
> 
> I seem to recall hearing about ef itself once or twice, some sort of pre-vi screen editor from Bell methinks?  Not super familiar with it though, I just seem to recall reading about that before somewhere.
> 
> Anywho, dealing with a move in the near future that is hopefully into a home I own, so pretty distracted from that scanning I keep talking about, but hopefully when I'm settled in in a few months I can setup a proper scan bench in my new place and really go to town on things.
> 
> - Matt G.

[TUHS] Re: Bell Office Automation System (OAS)?

[Ralph Corderoy]

Hi andrew,

> i wrote ef.

Was its name from ed → ee → ef or something else?

-- 
Cheers, Ralph.

[TUHS] Re: Bell Office Automation System (OAS)?

[Andrew Hume]

regrettably, i do not recall this.
as far as i could guess,i simply went with a short name
and most likely e stood for editor.

> On Dec 11, 2022, at 9:40 AM, Ralph Corderoy <ralph@inputplus.co.uk> wrote:
> 
> Hi andrew,
> 
>> i wrote ef.
> 
> Was its name from ed → ee → ef or something else?
> 
> -- 
> Cheers, Ralph.

[TUHS] Re: Bell Office Automation System (OAS)?

[segaloco via TUHS]

The quadfold itself lists "Editor-Formatter" as the expansion.

- Matt G.

------- Original Message -------
On Sunday, December 11th, 2022 at 10:38 PM, Andrew Hume <andrew@humeweb.com> wrote:


> regrettably, i do not recall this.
> as far as i could guess,i simply went with a short name
> and most likely e stood for editor.
> 
> > On Dec 11, 2022, at 9:40 AM, Ralph Corderoy ralph@inputplus.co.uk wrote:
> > 
> > Hi andrew,
> > 
> > > i wrote ef.
> > 
> > Was its name from ed → ee → ef or something else?
> > 
> > --
> > Cheers, Ralph.