GCOS field

[Mark A. Charette]

In article <4400001 at mrevox.UUCP>, pim at mrevox.UUCP writes:
> Someone just the other day saw the GCOS(GECOS) field
> being prompted for and remarked that he hadn't seen
> that name for a while. He said that it stood for:
> 
> General Electric Computer Operating System
> 
> or
> 
> General Electric Comprehensive Operating System
> 
> It seems far fetched, but interesting.
> 
> Paul MacMurdo
> 
> pim at mrevox.bellcore.com
> ...!bcr!mrevox!pim

Not so farfetched. GCOS did stand for General Electric Comprehensive
Operating System, but changed to General Comprehensive Operating System
after Honeywell bought the GE computer division. Multics ran on the
Honeywells, and we all know (or can guess) at the evolution after that.

BTW, I first started my programming career on a Honeywell 6060 Level 6
running GCOS 3. Since then, having worked on a few mainframes in between,
seeing a file system done right was refreshing when I started working with
Unix.

One little question - anyone ever remember seeing the 'B' language on
Honeywell mainframes? I worked with it without a manual for a while when I
was playing on the Honeywell. I think it was from the U. of Waterloo (as
were a fair percentage of the other utilities on the Funnywell).




-- 
Mark Charette             "People only like me when I'm dumb!", he said. 
Electronic Data Systems   "I like you a lot." was the reply.
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