The Source History of Cat

Re:The Source History of Cat by LukeShu on Monday November 12, 2018 @08:26PM (#18437618)

In the earliest references, it was "concatenate". It wasn't until 7th edition UNIX (1979) that "catenate" was given.

References:

- 1971 draft (pre 1st edition) of the paper that would become the well-known 1974 CACM UNIX paper (earliest documentation on `cat` that I can find): https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Distributions/Research/McIlroy_... (tune in on page 28)

- 6th edition cat(1) man page (1975): http://man.cat-v.org/unix-6th/1/cat

- 7th edition cat(1) man page (1979): http://man.cat-v.org/unix_7th/1/cat

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:The Source History of Cat by swoopitypoop on Tuesday November 13, 2018 @03:52PM (#18444792)

Latin root word "catena", meaning "chain".

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:The Source History of Cat by loeg on Tuesday November 13, 2018 @09:22PM (#18446898)

Latin root "con-" ("com-") meaning "with," or "together." As in, "concatenate" means something like, "chain together."

[ Parent | on HN ]