Roff
{{lowercase|title=roff}} {{for|the American town|Roff, Oklahoma}}
roff was the first
Unix text-formatting computer program, also the most important application run on the first machine specifically purchased to run UNIX, and a predecessor of the
nroff and
troff document processing systems on Unix.It was a Unix version of the
runoff text-formatting program from
Multics, which was a descendant of
RUNOFF for
CTSS (the first computerized text-formatting application).The first UNIX version was a transliteration of the
BCPL version of
runoff into
PDP-7 assembly, for the prototype UNIX on the PDP-7, circa
1970. When the first
PDP-11 was acquired for UNIX in late 1970 (a PDP-11/20), the justification cited to management for the funding required was that it was to be used as a
word processing system, and so
roff was quickly transliterated again, into PDP-11 assembly, in
1971.
Dennis Ritchie notes that the ability to rapidly modify
roff (because it was locally written software) to provide special features needed by the
Bell Labs Patent department was an important factor in leading to the adoption of UNIX by the Patent department to fill their word processing needs. This in turn gave UNIX enough credibility inside Bell Labs to secure the funding to purchase one of the first PDP-11/45's produced; it was on that machine that UNIX evolved into the system that later took the
computer science world by storm.
See also
Sources
- D. M. Ritchie, The Evolution of the UNIX Time-sharing System (AT&T Bell Laboratories Technical Journal, Vol. 63, No. 8, October 1984)
External links
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RoffRoffRoff
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