23 Jul
2022
23 Jul
'22
5:01 p.m.
On Sat, Jul 23, 2022, 3:56 AM segaloco via TUHS <tuhs(a)tuhs.org> wrote:
[snip]
So all in all, num was an attempt that petered out, but # stayed in ex.
System III and 4.4BSD-Lite ed derivatives implement n, and nl was
introduced in System III for the AT&T line and slowly cropped up
elsewhere. System V picked up ex in 1982, allowing nl, ed with n, and ex
with # in the AT&T line. GNU had one out of the gate when POSIX hit. BSDs
were late to the party with regards to both ed with n as well as nl, with
nl only being adopted after the last Berkeley releases and subsequent
fracturing.
It may be worth noting that BSD had `cat -n` in 4BSD by October, 1980:
https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=4BSD/usr/man/man1/cat.1
That may explain the relatively late incorporation of `nl` in, at least,
the BSD lineage.
- Dan C.