12 Jan
2022
12 Jan
'22
12:50 a.m.
On Tuesday, January 11th, 2022 at 10:36 AM, Dan Cross <crossd(a)gmail.com> wrote:
The question is, to what extent did differences in
coastal cultures influence things like design aesthetics? I think it's is accurate to
characterize early BTL Unix by it's minimalism, and others have echoed this (cf.
Richard Gabriel in the "Worse is Better" papers). But similarly, BSD has always
felt like a larger system -- didn't Lions go as far as to quip about the succinctness
of 6th Edition being "fixed" by 4BSD?
I've usually attributed BSD's larger size to the enthusiasm of students who
delight in adding nifty little toys and tools and options. Although "the Unix
Philosophy" gets invoked in hushed tones today, there was presumably fewer fingers
being wagged at the Berkeley kids for daring to experiment (except when they filled up the
disk).
john