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Interlisp

The original OS of the Xerox Lisp Machines has some interesting ideas that are very similar to what I thought about. Mainly related to avoiding the File-based and file organization problems.

It was able to keep track of what was modified and what was new and update the files with the new definitions. They called this the “resident mode”. You can read more about this and other interlisp goodies in these two documents.

There’s been a recent effort by the Medley Interlisp organization to port the original Interlisp into modern OSs, with people from the original design involved. I’ll write more about Interlisp in future posts.

You can check Interlisp out on their website. You can check the conversation where Interlisp was brought to my attention here.

Similar to pharo In the hacker news discussion there are also some references to Interlisp. Make sure to check those as well :)

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