Path: csiph.com!eternal-september.org!feeder.eternal-september.org!reader01.eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Anne & Lynn Wheeler Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Who introduced named files? Date: Sat, 13 Jun 2020 15:18:45 -1000 Organization: Wheeler&Wheeler Lines: 50 Message-ID: <87bllmv40a.fsf@localhost> References: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Injection-Info: reader02.eternal-september.org; posting-host="38e97ee9eb9e910f4207b321cc0896e0"; logging-data="8369"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org"; posting-account="U2FsdGVkX1+4NngzfKu/Di9HcWotNYMG1oIjnzSBjv0=" User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/26.3 (gnu/linux) Cancel-Lock: sha1:srvpV1v8ec7i3D+6eFNsuHUL9y8= sha1:oHLbTlbYz8BUpdvBc/jVIIgC2Yo= Xref: csiph.com alt.folklore.computers:211939 Thomas Koenig writes: > I've been looking around a bit, but I cannot find which operating > system introduced named files. > > OS/360 certainly had them, as did EXEC II. I would think that > peole started using them as soon as discs with random access made > their appearance - does anybody know more? at least as soon as there was "system" storage devices where items for different people & programs were stored ... as opposed to dedicated storage devices (cards, tapes, etc) for specific program execution (needed to select the data as opposed to select the device). 7094/CTSS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compatible_Time-Sharing_System The Compatible Time-Sharing System (CTSS) was one of the first time-sharing operating systems; it was developed at the MIT Computation Center. CTSS was first demonstrated on MIT's IBM 709 in November 1961; service to MIT users began in the summer of 1963 and was operated until 1973.[1] During part of this time, MIT's influential Project MAC also ran a CTSS service, but the system did not spread beyond these two sites. some of the 7094/CTSS people went to 5th to do multics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multics others went to IBM science center to do virtual machines, online applications, performance, work profile and capacity planning, invented GML in 1969 (morphs into international SGML after decade and after another decade mophs into HTML at CERN). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_CP/CMS Experimental Time-Sharing System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compatible_Time-Sharing_System#Experimental_Time-Sharing_System John Backus said in the 1954 summer session at MIT that "By time sharing, a big computer could be used as several small ones; there would need to be a reading station for each user".[2] Computers at that time, like IBM 704, were not powerful enough to implement such system, but at the end of 1958, MIT's Computation Center nevertheless added a typewriter input to its 704 with the intent that a programmer or operator could "obtain additional answers from the machine on a time-sharing basis with other programs using the machine simultaneously".[3] CTSS filesystem implementation (CP40/CMS & CP67/CMS inherited some similarities) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compatible_Time-Sharing_System#File_system -- virtualization experience starting Jan1968, online at home since Mar1970