RIP Dennis Ritchie

[rglovejoy]

Rob Pike reported this sad news: https://plus.google.com/u/2/101960720994009339267/posts/ENuEDDYfvKP?hl=en

[KnightExemplar]

One of the most influential men of the Computer World. You can't so much touch a computer without touching something in the C Programming language. Not exactly on the same cultural or celebrity status as Steve Jobs, but his work has probably touched far more people than even Steve Jobs.

(Windows, Linux, AND Mac use the C Programming Language). Let alone all of the programming languages that have spawned FROM C (Java, C++, C#, Objective C). And all of the languages written in C. As an original author of the Unix OS, his research has influenced Mac OSX, the various BSD variants of Unix, and Linux.

One of the pioneers of modern computing.

[cerbie]

On one hand, sad news. On the other, you can't say he won't be remembered, or question that he did anything truly worthwhile in his life.

Most real computer work done since the mid 80s was directly benefited by C, be it by more robust and stable platforms to work on, quality portability without needing an interpreter, even if porting wasn't always graceful, and/or as a means of writing high performance applications before the likes of C++, Java, .NET (C->C++->Java->C#), etc., when Fortran and the like weren't good options. Today, the only language that might work out better than C for system programming might be C++, and then only with a sizable coding standards document, practically reducing it to a type safe C.

Beyond that, it has been a solid base from which to develop new application programming languages, since both C, and derivatives of it, have well known properties, including general performance of interpreted and compiled code, ease or difficulty of optimized compilation, ease or difficulty of creating libraries to use various hardware and software systems, gotchas when it comes to language semantics as they occur in real code, and so on.

It's not just coming up with one idea, either. It's sticking with it to keep its implementation good for many years, and still not losing sight of the fact that his most well-known work is a small part of the big picture, and that it was in the best interests of all that it be the best of that small part it could be, rather than taking over all things a system may need to accomplish. I will go on to say something that many a zealot may be offended by: much of what made Unix and C was not strictly novel. What has made it* special, and able to survive and evolve, was that its originators and early users had somewhat clear vision, and were willing to stick to that vision long enough for their work to get a real foothold before the standards committees could try to butcher it, keep said butchering in check, yet at the same time, keep platform specific oddities from overwhelming commonalities, before standards can be fully agreed upon. This is not a balancing act for for mere mortals, can't be done with an iron fist, and DMR managed to pull it off long enough for C to become its own living language...the kind that lives in a sturdy brick house, uses coupons, and tells kids with their classes and lambdas to, "get off my lawn!"

* so much of the design decisions of C reflect the needs of the original Unix OS, and the few neat features of the PDP-11, that I'm considering the original implementation of both as a tightly coupled unit, rather than an language used to write some arbitrary software, orthogonal to each other, which has become the reality of it, over time.

[KnightExemplar]

I mean, he was programming computers when the concept of a shell was a novel idea. (Back when computer programs needed to be loaded manually... by hand). I mean, the modern concept of a "file" was developed in Multics and Unix.

I think this quote of Dennis Ritchie really shows just how influential he is.

The notion of ``record'' seems to be an obsolete remnant of the days of the 80-column card. A file should consist of a sequence of bytes.

Yup. He and his group decided that files should be a bunch of bytes.

[PM 2Ring]

He will be remembered, even in that distant future era when C, Unix and Unix-like operating systems are no longer in use.

"I felt a great disturbance in the Matrix, as if millions of null pointers were suddenly de-referenced. I fear something terrible has happened."

[sourmìlk]

He will be remembered, even in that distant future era when C, Unix and Unix-like operating systems are no longer in use.

This will never happen.
Then many of my skills will be obsolete.

[thret]

RIP dmr. Perhaps the closest thing programming has to Jesus? He changed everything forever and we all carry a debt of gratitude for his pioneering work.

K&R is always worth re-reading too, great book.

[Tirian]

RIP dmr. Perhaps the closest thing programming has to Jesus? He changed everything forever and we all carry a debt of gratitude for his pioneering work.

And, perhaps like Jesus, we won't miss the opportunity to kick dirt in C when proclaiming that our modern languages are superior when they're often no better than extensions of C.

And, as folk have long said about his other masterwork, "Those who do not understand Unix are doomed to reimplement it, poorly."

Rest in peace.

[Nath]

Dang. I wonder what computing would look like today without dmr.

[cerbie]

The notion of ``record'' seems to be an obsolete remnant of the days of the 80-column card. A file should consist of a sequence of bytes.

In trying to find said quote:

http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cac ... H31xEnYWGw

DNS fails on me for the real link, but the quick view works, as does getting the file from Google via the quick view page. Also, it's an interesting read, given its age.

[WikedX]

I really hope he gets a nice comic on XKCD.

Seriously as a Linux user, and a CompSci major, I'm scared to even think about how different things would be without C and without UNIX.

[tetsujin]

Not like I ever met the guy, but it's kind of sad to see someone go who played such an important part in things I like...

[cjmcjmcjmcjm]

Wow… two computer icons dead within a week. Sad day.

[thret]

Rob Pike's thoughts: https://plus.google.com/u/0/10196072099 ... 3mmANQZDtY

[jdmulloy]

I really hope he gets a nice comic on XKCD.

Seriously as a Linux user, and a CompSci major, I'm scared to even think about how different things would be without C and without UNIX.

Especially with the Eternal Flame comic for Steve Jobs. While I think the MSM coverage of Jobs was ridiculous I have no problem with XKCD 961. However I think that doing a comic for Jobs and not Ritchie would be very disrespectful and insulting. I'm pretty sure that Randal is enough of a UNIX geek to appreciate Ritchie and that he will make a comic for him.

[Menacing Spike]

Dennis was also half of the team that created Unix (the other half being Ken Thompson

I... what? UNIX was the work of two people? C too?
Those guys are, like, gods.

[CorruptUser]

I say the next iteration of C# should at least contain an easter egg or something for him. Python 3.0 has an easter egg for XKCD (hint; try to get it to give you anti-gravity), so why not C?

[Deep_Thought]

Dennis Ritchie really did influence the course of computing, and I'm sad at his passing.

K&R is always worth re-reading too, great book.

Too true. It is one of the most clear and concise reference books I have ever encountered (Unlike Stroustrup).

I say the next iteration of C# should at least contain an easter egg or something for him. Python 3.0 has an easter egg for XKCD (hint; try to get it to give you anti-gravity), so why not C?

Python would also be a suitable place for an easter egg, given that the language is clearly influenced by C and the main interpreter is written in C.

[Dark567]

I say the next iteration of C# should at least contain an easter egg or something for him.

I suspect if this happened Ritchie would roll over in his grave. He wasn't exactly a big fan of Microsoft or non-standard languages.

[Copper Bezel]

Especially with the Eternal Flame comic for Steve Jobs. While I think the MSM coverage of Jobs was ridiculous I have no problem with XKCD 961. However I think that doing a comic for Jobs and not Ritchie would be very disrespectful and insulting. I'm pretty sure that Randal is enough of a UNIX geek to appreciate Ritchie and that he will make a comic for him.

Yeah, but I think Ritchie is a bit too obscure for even XKCD's audience. I honestly didn't know his name until the news. I mean, I'm not a developer or in computer science, but I'm well aware of how influential Unix and C have been, and it simply never occurred to me that there were any "names" connected to the projects.

[Dauric]

Especially with the Eternal Flame comic for Steve Jobs. While I think the MSM coverage of Jobs was ridiculous I have no problem with XKCD 961. However I think that doing a comic for Jobs and not Ritchie would be very disrespectful and insulting. I'm pretty sure that Randal is enough of a UNIX geek to appreciate Ritchie and that he will make a comic for him.

Yeah, but I think Ritchie is a bit too obscure for even XKCD's audience. I honestly didn't know his name until the news. I mean, I'm not a developer or in computer science, but I'm well aware of how influential Unix and C have been, and it simply never occurred to me that there were any "names" connected to the projects.

When has obscurity ever stopped Randal before? While it's not a regular occurrence, I do find myself looking stuff up to get his jokes from time to time. In a way I actually prefer it that way, makes me learn something.

[cjmcjmcjmcjm]

Especially with the Eternal Flame comic for Steve Jobs. While I think the MSM coverage of Jobs was ridiculous I have no problem with XKCD 961. However I think that doing a comic for Jobs and not Ritchie would be very disrespectful and insulting. I'm pretty sure that Randal is enough of a UNIX geek to appreciate Ritchie and that he will make a comic for him.

Yeah, but I think Ritchie is a bit too obscure for even XKCD's audience. I honestly didn't know his name until the news. I mean, I'm not a developer or in computer science, but I'm well aware of how influential Unix and C have been, and it simply never occurred to me that there were any "names" connected to the projects.

When has obscurity ever stopped Randal before? While it's not a regular occurrence, I do find myself looking stuff up to get his jokes from time to time. In a way I actually prefer it that way, makes me learn something.

True art is incomprehensible.