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Bell Labs Unix Group Disbanded
wandazulu writes "Peter Salus over at UnixReview.com is reporting that AT&T Department 1127, responsible for creating and maintaining Unix, has been officially disbanded. The article provides an interesting "where are they now?" list of the original authors of Unix."
I think this is sad, and a little ominous. I worked at a telco years ago, and managed to fanagle a chat on the phone with Ritchie one time when a Bell worker was on site for some software installations. Cool.
Anyway, in my arguments to encourage research into trying new ways of doing things, I always used Bell Labs as my favorite example/reason why we should. Guess I won't have that anymore. Sigh.
What I fear most is the lack of research for research's sake. A lot of things we use today are a direct or indirect result of companies allowing a certain amount of "what if" thinking and activity to go on. Even better, some companies, like Bell Labs actually allocated specifically for that.
I don't think research in commercial context is really research at all and may even be counterproductive in creating new and better technology (if commercial research into products were for "quality", would there even be a Britney Spears?).
The last bastion I know of and trust is Google. They seem to be dedicated to the cause. But, they're young, they're new, and they haven't had to deal with stockholders in bad times yet.
From TFA:
"My take is that 1127 probably reached Schiavo status when Rob, Presotto, et al. fled west to Google.
That expression is a tad insensitive, don't you think?
"The article provides an interesting "where are they now?" list of the original authors of Unix."
They've joined Linco. Developing cutting-edge technology to put into a commodity OS. With Linus as Director.
What is cooking at Department # 1337.
In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is. - Yogi Berra
I worked at Bell Labs in Murray Hill from 1985 through 1989, and though I did not work in Dept 1127, I did get the amazing chance to see what Bell Labs was all about: the incredible, vibrant home to tremendously talented scientists from the UNIX gurus to the low temperature physics gods. As a young high school and then college student, aspiring to join their ranks full time, I was mesmerized by the environment where a 2pm coffee break could evolve into a deep discussion of networking theory and then reflect sincerely on the goings-on in the world. Bell Labs was a magical place, and hopefully, the seeds of similar pure research incubators are being sewn in today's tech powerhouses such as Google.
dude, they wrote UNIX. Buy a clue (or some Ritchie/Kernighan editions) and get back to installing your nightly windoze patches.
I had the good fortune of meeting the gentleman when I interviewed with Mathworks a couple of years ago. I was taken aback by his humility, and the poor guy was embarrassed when I requested his autograph :) He has a former license plate in his office that reads "YACCMAN".
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
Besides being totally tasteless (it was), the following quote does have the redeeming feature that it illustrates why you shouldn't be discouraged.
"My take is that 1127 probably reached Schiavo status when Rob, Presotto, et al. fled west to Google."
Although the unnamed employee goes on to say that it's a nail in the coffin of the "sort of research environment Bell Labs once represented," he neglects to mention that there is still tons of work that is being done in computing science-related research all over the nation and all over the world. Although it's fine to feel sentimental, let's not go over the top with saying that Google is the "last bastion" of anything. We see the demise of Bell Labs' Unix group as a big thing because it has a lot of history; now think how many tens or hundreds of places that someday will have a lot of history are out there right now; as yet unknown, but destined to be giants in the future.
The wiki at the Plan 9 website has activity as recently as August 14 of this year, so I'd say that it still has a pulse.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens.
Does the invention of the entire C programming language count?
We all know what to do, but we don't know how to get re-elected once we have done it
just for clarity, there hasn't been an AT&T department 1127 since 1996; when Lucent split off, 1127, along with the rest of Bell Labs, went with them. this is a Lucent re-org.
i speak for myself and those who like what i say.
Right. I mean Newton just invented calculus. Einstein really pushed it forward and did things with it. Not to knock Newton, since calculus is a really big deal. And his work with harmonic motion was great.
But the stuff you really think about and use, like time dialation, that was all Einstein. And Newtonion Mechanics is hardly state of the art.
Einstein, Heisenberg, and others must have looked back and thought; "What did you really contribute, Newton? You didn't even have the concept of light having a finite speed."
No one ever stood on the shoulders of giant before, right?
Right. But I can actually spell Newton, so he gets the credit.
I guess everyone thinks that Thompson and Ritchie were in the same department during the 1970s, but I do remember always knowing that they were not.
Note that by 1980 UNIX-related OS research at Bell Labs was nearly completed. Development of UNIX, which is where I worked, was very active and remained so for another 10+ years, but that's different from research. (Center 127 did research in many areas unrelated to UNIX.)
So, undoubtedly there was a recent reorg and some department went away, and maybe it was even 1127, but what that means, if anything (since Thompson, Kernighan, and others left a while ago), I have no idea.
Anyway, I think the gist of the article and most of the responses here is that it's sad that AT&T and Lucent are no longer combined and able to spend as lavishly on research as they once did. That part of this thread is true.
A few posts are from Bell Labs people who said it was a great place to work, and that's true, too.
No. If I have been able to see further, it is because I am surrounded by midgets.
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.