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It looked like an operating system, almost
The initial implementation "was totally rewritten in a form that looked like an operating system," Thompson said, "with tools that were sort of known, you know, assembler, editor, shell." The system, he said, "...if not maintaining itself, was right on the verge of maintaining itself, totally severing the GECOS connection."
He was referring to the fact that up to this point, all the programs were written using GECOS and transferred to the PDP-7 by paper tape. But once an assembler was completed, the system was able to support itself.
As Ritchie summed up the effort, "Although it was not until well into 1970 that Brian Kernighan suggested the name 'UNIX,' in a somewhat treacherous pun on 'Multics,' the operating system we know today was born."
Next: Porting UNIX for its first commercial application
![[ UNIX building blocks ]](images/86-300838-EM.jpeg)