Mailing Lists: Apple Mailing Lists
Image of Mac OS face in stamp
 
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: Release note inaccuracies?

> I'm sure somebody
> here will correct me, but I think UNIX is an acronym for Unified
> Network of Indexed eXchange thus capitalized.

Can't let *that* slide. :-)

From the Jargon File entry
(http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/html/entry/Unix.html):

Unix [(In the authors' words, "A weak pun on Multics"; very early on it was
`UNICS']

[...]

Some people are confused over whether this word is appropriately `UNIX' or
`Unix'; both forms are common, and used interchangeably. Dennis Ritchie says
that the `UNIX' spelling originally happened in CACM's 1974 paper "The UNIX
Time-Sharing System" because "we had a new typesetter and troff had just been
invented and we were intoxicated by being able to produce small caps."
Later, dmr tried to get the spelling changed to `Unix' in a couple of Bell
Labs papers, on the grounds that the word is not acronymic. He failed, and
eventually (his words) "wimped out" on the issue. So, while the trademark
today is `UNIX', both capitalizations are grounded in ancient usage; the
Jargon File uses `Unix' in deference to dmr's wishes.


-Carl Lindberg



Visit the Apple Store online or at retail locations.
1-800-MY-APPLE

Contact Apple | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2007 Apple Inc. All rights reserved.