[gumby]

> At the time, the choice was C or assembly language for embedded/operating systems. There was no other choice in the 1970's. In fact, it wasn't even an option for most of the 1970's.

Unix was written in C because Thompson and Ritchie had been working on Multics, which was written in PL/1 in the 1960s. So the idea of an OS written in a high level language was hardly obscure and had nothing to do with C. It’s hard to say that C was much of an option in the 1970s anyway as k&r wasn’t even published until 1978.

There was a lovely (and also annoying) Cambrian explosion of languages and OSs in the 70s and even into the mid 80s or later. Computer companies often wrote their own languages and OSs, which made porting difficult (but porting wasn’t hugely common).

[AnimalMuppet]

> Unix was written in C because Thompson and Ritchie had been working on Multics, which was written in PL/1 in the 1960s. So the idea of an OS written in a high level language was hardly obscure and had nothing to do with C.

OK, but at the time they started working on Unix, Multics had not yet been delivered. Nor was it clear that it would ever be delivered. So the idea that an OS could be successfully written in a high-level language was not yet proven.

[unused0]

The Burroughs system for the B5000 was written in Algol and preceded Multics.

[gumby]

Thanks, excellent example! I had no known that one.

[gumby]

I think you’re trying to split hairs for some reason I can’t figure out.

In any case your assertion is not correct: Multics was operational around campus in 1969.

[devoutsalsa]

I’ve never played with Rust, but could Rust have been viable on early 70s hardware? Had Rust existed, could Unix have been originally written in Rust?

[jacquesm]

I will answer 'Yes' to this the moment we have a viable mainstream OS written in Rust. There are people working towards this so with some luck we will be able to see what the brave new world of a whole system running production software built in Rust looks like.