UNIX memoir, in first person - Ken Thompson

[@vasiovasio]

As a MacOS user, Ken Thompson, Thank you for Everything! ☺☺☺

[@TheEvertw]

UNIX has been one of mankind's greatest achievements. But what strikes me about these people is that they had these wonderful ideas, things they wanted to do, AND THEN ACTUALLY DID THEM! In amazingly little time as well! Which is even more amazing when you realize that in order to do the things they wanted, they had to build the Operating System first! But then, they purposefully didn't start building a complete OS like we know it today, they built the bare minimum that would serve their needs, and when their needs changed, they would improve the OS to also serve those.

[@ncmathsadist]

I have been using UNIX since 1987. It is a great achieement.

[@ottomaier7127]

Some of my heroes... 🙂

[@AlgoNudger]

Thanks.

[@MarkWitucke]

There's a special room in heaven with a sign above the door that says "Dennis and Ken"

[@RishavManiSharma]

Den & Ken

[@_Holy_Lance_]

Thank you Mr Thompson.

[@lachicadesistemas]

Bravo 🎉❤ un grande Ken

[@Bedfford]

I'm just bowing and listening

[@eternaldoorman5228]

Muy interesante, mille gracias!

[@beardymonger]

GOAT

[@minsapint8007]

Individuals who wrote compilers and interpreters and operating systems - total gods of computing.

[@starc0w]

Great!

[@EddieScottable]

where can I get that nerd t-shirt?

[@rogerdeutsch5883]

7:23 "Multics is a big project and it was over-designed and under-implemented..." Explains 80% of IT projets. The other 20% are over-implemented and under-designed. 🤓Also, do not miss the special visitor at 7:58! The visitor is only there for about 4 seconds. 😁

[@waltertanner7982]

well, parts of Multics were implemented on a smaller machine, namely the PR1ME Computers of Bill Poduska, a former collegue of Ken , working on the Sw of the Apollo program.

[@babakabdollahi4123]

It's there a second part?

[@ah244895]

Definitely should be studied but people wanted to understand the history of computers

[@RBLevin]

Would be better to see the unedited video without all the slick chapter titles.

[@hiYouareaclown]

I'd like to hear his opinion on systemd and whether it violates unix philosophy

[@swwei]

The most important thing is that you understand the characteristics of the two， init and systemd.

[@ncondeg]

It's a crapy thing for sure, and it clearly violates Un*x philosophy

[@TheEvertw]

I would also be interested, but I think he will simply list the alternative designs that would do the same thing Systemd does, and give pros and cons for each. He might even give a preference, but I don't think so.

[@JanBruunAndersen]

In my opinion systemd is necessary with today's use of Unix/GNU/Linux machines. Unlike the days of the PDP-11, where a systems administrator would build a kernel tailored to that machine and it's peripherals, and then the machine would boot and run for days, we now have machines where peripherals are plugged in and removed, whole machines being put into hibernation mode, powered up and connected to 2 new displays of different dimensions, etc. It is a much more dynamic world and something more than in it and initd is needed to orchestra all that.

[@TheEvertw]

​@@JanBruunAndersen Sure, but the debate is whether the design of systemd is the best for that purpose. Systemd is a monolith doing several functions that could have been separated out, but some of those functions are inherently closely connected. Critics of systemd don't like monoliths, proponents want something that works well and is easy to maintain. Before systemd, all of the things systemd does were already possible but a bit too fragile in the minds of (some) distro maintainers who had to glue several systems together and ensure they kept working.