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From: Tim Rentsch <tr.17687@z991.linuxsc.com>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: A thought of C
Date: Thu, 23 Apr 2026 06:46:35 -0700
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Keith Thompson <Keith.S.Thompson+u@gmail.com> writes:

> Tim Rentsch <tr.17687@z991.linuxsc.com> writes:
> [...]
>
>> Between 1972 and 1978 Unix was not available to the general public,
>> and I think for all practical purposes neither was C.  Also AFAIAA
>> there was no recognized defining document for C during that time.
>> IIRC there were some papers written about C before 1978, but nothing
>> like a real language manual.  So the answer seems to be either that
>> the question doesn't make sense or that everything is "undefined
>> behavior" because there is no language manual that defines it.
>
> [...]
>
> For the C history buffs, here are a few early papers on C:
>
> C Reference Manual, Jan 15 1974, Dennis Ritchie
> https://www.nokia.com/bell-labs/about/dennis-m-ritchie/cman74.pdf
>
> C Reference Manual, 1975, Dennis Ritchie
> https://www.nokia.com/bell-labs/about/dennis-m-ritchie/cman.pdf
>
> Programming in C - A Tutorial, 1975(?), Brian Kernighan
> https://www.nokia.com/bell-labs/about/dennis-m-ritchie/ctut.pdf
>
> The Development of the C Language, 1994, Dennis Ritchie
> https://www.nokia.com/bell-labs/about/dennis-m-ritchie/chist.pdf
>
> Dennis Ritchie's home page
> https://www.nokia.com/bell-labs/about/dennis-m-ritchie/
> has a number of other papers on early Unix, BCPL, B, and C.

Thank you for the links.  At some point I think I skimmed one of
the cman papers but I had forgotten about it.