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Developed UNIX along with Dennis Ritchie
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Development of Unix
Kenneth Thompson and Dennis Ritchie developed UNIX while working at Bell Labs. UNIX a multi-user, multi-tasking operating system. Later UNIX was edited by several hackers to improve or change the system. Including the Berkeley Software Distribution of Unix which Ken Thompson helped develop while on Sabbatical from Bell Labs. -
Developed B language
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Developed ed, a line editor for UNIX
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Kenneth Thompson and Dennis Ritchie converted UNIX to C language
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Thompson and Ritchie given National Academy Award for UNIX
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Period: to
Ken Thompson and Joe Condon build Belle
Belle was a Chess programmed computer -
Period: to
Plan 9 developed at Bell Labs
During the 1980's Thompson worked on Plan 9 for Bell Labs. Plan 9, an Operating System to make multiple computers operate as a single unit -
Belle Plays Chess
In 1983 Belle was the first machine to reach Master Level in Chess -
Turing Award
Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie win the Turing Award for their development of UNIX -
Richard W. Hamming Medal
Thompson and Ritchie are awarded the Richard W. Hamming Medal for their development of UNIX -
Plan 9 Released
Plan 9 released to Universities as a Free OS and UNIX successor -
Development of UTF-8
Thompson and Ritchie developed UTF-8, a variable-length character encoding for communicating -
Plan 9 Release for Commercial use
Plan 9 was released for commercial use in 1995, drawing is Glenda the Plan 9 mascot drawn by Renee French -
Induction into Computer History Museum
For their work on UNIX and their contribution to computers Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie are inducted as Fellows into the Computer History Museum -
Tsutomu Kanai Award
Both Thompson and Ritchie were award the first Tsutomu Kanai Award for their work on UNIX -
National Medal of Technology
Dennis Ritchie and Ken Thompson are awarded the National Medal of Technology and presented the award by President Bill Clinton -
Plan 9 goes Open Source
In 2000 Plan 9 was released as an Open Source Operating System -
Retirement
Ken Thompson retired from Bell Labs -
Working for Google
Ken Thompson was convinced by Google to come out of retirement and work with them to develop Go Programming Language -
Japan Prize for Information and Communication
Ken Thompson along with Dennis Ritchie are awarded the Japan Prize for Information and Communication for their development of UNIX, while working at Google