Unix Programmer's Manual Third Edition [pdf] (1973)

(dspinellis.github.io)

97 points | by rbanffy 7 hours ago ago

12 comments

  • tejohnso 5 hours ago

    > the number of UNIX installations has grown to 16, with more expected.

    What a time.

    • userbinator 3 hours ago

      A time when computers were very expensive.

      • kragen 2 hours ago

        But Unix could run on a cheap PDP-11, within the budget of many departments.

        • nine_k an hour ago

          Take a look at the PDP-11 price list from 1973: https://iamvirtual.ca/collection/systems/minis/PDP11-10/PDP1...

          Does not look very cheap to me. Please note that $1 of 1973 is approximately $7 of 2024, so prices of usable configurations quickly reach the $100k to $200k territory, with a few grand of monthly upkeep.

          • bityard an hour ago

            Enterprise gear today can pretty quickly and easily add up to seven digits per rack. At a previous job, I personally handled a specialized network processing card that retailed for over a quarter million dollars.

            The PDP-11 seems like a bargain for what was fairly close to cutting edge technology at the time.

  • ape4 2 hours ago

    I love how the "Index" (starting on page 18 of the PDF) doesn't send the reader to page numbers

  • scrybdopylon 3 hours ago

    It's 30 pages of intro and then -allthemanpages-.

    I remember a 10-foot-long book at my college for Michigan Terminal System (MTS) because we didn't have UNIX running on the mainframe... i can't remember what UNIX ran on now, it was 1984-1988 at RPI. Anybody remember what UNIX ran on? It wasn't the VAX on the Vorhees building altar.

  • nothrowaways 5 hours ago

    Third edition in 1973

    • nineteen999 2 hours ago

      Around the time that UNIX was being rewritten in C.

  • pstric 4 hours ago

    Would this OS have any chance of getting certified as a genuine Unix today?

  • rjurney 2 hours ago

    Downloaded for future RAG / LLM retrieval :)