1.2.3 UNIX
At the beginning of the minicomputer period, the C programming language and UNIX operating system were developed together at AT&T and distributed through noncommercial channels The history of UNIX code dates back to 1969, when it was first developed. It is a long history and an involved one, since the code has had several corporate owners and has forked and even been reunited on more than one occasion. Fortunately, most of the people who have been involved with UNIX throughout that history, including the original authors, Ken Thompson and Dennie Ritchie, are still available. So the history and the code are well documented and understood. Those of us who do not under- stand every line and its derivation can be confident that there are people who do and can prove it. Unfortunately, this has been necessary from time to time. UNIX and its derivatives are too valuable not to be fought over, and there have been several legal actions conducted on the subject of own- ership of UNIX trademarks and copyrights, UNIX was written in C and constructed as a set of small programs that worked well together. By 1974, the UNIX system, including the C lan- guage and tools, had been ported to several platforms. AT&T was not at Chapter 1