Foundational Unix Papers, Books, and Videos

Last updated — Jun 05, 2025
First published — Sep 22, 2023
#unix #bsd #gnu #linux

Original Unix, BSD, GNU, and Linux books, papers, videos, and similar materials.

Article Collection

This article is part of the following series:

1. Unix

Table of Contents

Introduction

This article lists documents, books, and audio-video materials relevant for understanding Unix and all systems derived from it.

Original Unix documents are important for two reasons:

First, as expected, they are relevant for understanding the history and principles on which Unix, the Internet, and modern software is based.

Second, equally important, they are useful for understanding the unsurpassed combination of simplicity and power in Unix. Being familiar with it comes handy when using Unix-based systems, but it has broader effects, making one’s own solutions more powerful and elegant.

There are a lot of documents listed, sorted by category and date. You are not expected to read them all at once or in order:

If you want to learn about the Unix culture, feel free to start with some videos, for example the light-hearted 2019 BWK’s Interview with Ken Thompson and 2016 Interview with Brian W. Kernighan, followed by 1988 Bill Joy's Talk at IBM Yorktown, and then check out popular books.

If you want to learn about Unix itself, start with the foundations and one or two manuals, followed by for example some videos.

It is expected that you will refer back to this list repeatedly over time, focusing on your current subfields of interest.

Foundations

Important Unix papers and documents:

UNIX Programmer’s Manuals

Doug McIlroy organized “Unix Programmer’s Manuals” to be written, and editions of manual became the versions of Unix they were describing.

The manuals consisted of manpages and papers. They are user-oriented, i.e. they do not discuss Unix internals, OS design principles, or C programming.

The editions were:

Please note that above links point mostly to resources hosted at https://www.tuhs.org/. In chapter AT&T / Bell Labs Unix Releases a bit more contextual information on each edition can be found, along with alternative links pointing to https://gunkies.org/.

Books and materials related to Unix:

Videos

Unix videos and documentaries:

Video Collections

Magazines

Other Resources

Misc links and resources, mostly to collections of books, papers, and documents.

Modern Code

Article Collection

This article is part of the following series:

1. Unix

Automatic Links

The following links appear in the article:

1. For Fun and Profit: A History of the Free and Open Source Software Revolution - For-Fun-and-Profit-A-History-of-the-Free-and-Open-Source-Software-Revolution.pdf
2. Life With UNIX - Life_with_Unix_v2.pdf
3. Odd Comments and Strange Doings in Unix
4. Software Tools - Software-Tools.pdf
5. The Daemon, the GNU & the Penguin - http://www.groklaw.net/staticpages/index.php?page=20051013231901859
6. ZIP File With the Book and Code - https://archive.org/details/CommentarySixthEditionUNIX
7. The UNIX Programming Environment - https://archive.org/details/UNIXProgrammingEnvironment
8. A Quarter Century of Unix - https://archive.org/details/aquartercenturyofunixpeterh.salus_201910
9. The Cathedral and the Bazaar - https://archive.org/details/cathedral-bazaar
10. Computer Chronicles - https://archive.org/details/computerchronicles
11. Software Tools in Pascal - https://archive.org/details/softwaretoolsinp00kern
12. Elements of Programming Style - https://archive.org/details/the-elements-of-programming-style-second-edition/
13. UNIX REVIEW - https://archive.org/details/unixreview?sort=date
14. Unix Programmer's Manual, 8th Edition - https://archive.org/details/unixtimesharingsystemprogrammersmanualeighthedition
15. Unix World - https://archive.org/search?query=creator%3A%22Unix+World%22&sort=-date
16. Bastard Operator From Hell (BOFH) - https://bofh.bjash.com/
17. AT&T / Bell Labs Unix Releases - https://crystallabs.io/unix-bsd-gnu-linux-history/#att--bell-labs-unix-releases
18. A Commentary on the Sixth Edition Unix Operating System - https://cs3210.cc.gatech.edu/r/unix6.pdf
19. Reflections on Software Research - https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/1283920.1283939
20. The UNIX Time-Sharing System - https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/361011.361061
21. Review of "Software Tools" - https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/1110841.1110847
22. Alternative Link - https://dspinellis.github.io/oral-history-of-unix/index.html
23. Wikipedia Page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bastard_Operator_From_Hell
24. Wikipedia Page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_Chronicles
25. Doug McIlroy - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doug_McIlroy
26. Wikipedia Page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackers:_Heroes_of_the_Computer_Revolution
27. SeL4 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L4_microkernel_family#High_assurance:_seL4
28. Wikipedia Page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lions%27_Commentary_on_UNIX_6th_Edition,_with_Source_Code
29. List of Episodes - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Computer_Chronicles_episodes
30. Microkernel - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microkernel
31. Wikipedia Page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_C_Programming_Language
32. Wikipedia Page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cuckoo%27s_Egg_(book)
33. Wikipedia Page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elements_of_Programming_Style
34. Wikipedia Page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hacker_Crackdown
35. Wikipedia Page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Unix_Programming_Environment
36. Xv6 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xv6
37. The C Programming Language - https://github.com/AzatAI/cs_books/blob/master/The.C.Programming.Language.2nd.Edition.pdf
38. Unix History Repository - https://github.com/dspinellis/unix-history-repo
39. The Design of the Unix Operating System - https://github.com/jyfc/ebook/blob/master/03_operating_system/the_design_of_the_unix_operating_system.pdf
40. UNIX Implementation - https://github.com/manjunath5496/Ken-Thompson-papers/blob/master/ken(6).pdf
41. Hello World (Plan 9 and UTF-16) - https://github.com/manjunath5496/Ken-Thompson-papers/blob/master/ken(9).pdf
42. Ken Thompson's Papers - https://github.com/manjunath5496/Ken-Thompson-papers/tree/master
43. UX/RT - https://gitlab.com/uxrt/uxrt-toplevel
44. https://gunkies.org/
45. Lions Operating System (LionsOS) - https://lionsos.org/
46. Program Design in the UNIX System Environment - https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/nmh-workers/2012-11/pdfGsAjwogf3t.pdf
47. Linux Weekly News (LWN.net) - https://lwn.net/
48. Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution - https://oceanofpdf.com/authors/steven-levy/pdf-epub-hackers-heroes-of-the-computer-revolution-download/
49. Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project - https://producingoss.com/en/producingoss.html
50. Unix Programmer's Manual, 7th Edition - https://s3.amazonaws.com/plan9-bell-labs/7thEdMan/index.html
51. Unix Programmer's Manual, 10th Edition - https://web.archive.org/web/20150611142736/http://www.cs.bell-labs.com/10thEdMan/index.html
52. Alternative Download at TUHS - https://wiki.tuhs.org/lib/exe/fetch.php?media=publications:qcu.pdf
53. Advanced Unix Programming - https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0131411543
54. Advanced Unix Programming - https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01FIZKNYE
55. Dennis M. Ritchie's Homepage at Bell Labs - https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/
56. The UNIX Time-Sharing System - https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/cacm.pdf
57. The Development of the C Language - https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/chist.html
58. C Reference Manual - https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/cman.pdf
59. Proposing a Unix Portability Experiment - https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/firstport.html
60. The Evolution of the Unix Time-Sharing System - https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/hist.html
61. Five Little Languages and How They Grew: Talk at HOPL - https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/hopl.html
62. Portability of C Programs and the UNIX System - https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/portpap.pdf
63. The UNIX Time-Sharing System - A Retrospective - https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/retro.pdf
64. Interprocess Communication in the Ninth Edition Unix System - https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/spe.pdf
65. A Stream Input-Output System - https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/st.pdf
66. A Research UNIX Reader: Annotated Excerpts From the Programmer's Manual, 1971-1986 - https://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~doug/reader.pdf
67. Afterword - https://www.mit.edu/hacker/afterword.html
68. The Hacker Crackdown: Law and Disorder on the Electronic Frontier - https://www.mit.edu/hacker/hacker.html
69. O'Reilly Open Books - https://www.oreilly.com/openbook/
70. Free as in Freedom: Richard Stallman's Crusade for Free Software - https://www.oreilly.com/openbook/freedom/
71. Open Sources: Voices From the Open Source Revolution, 1st Edition - https://www.oreilly.com/openbook/opensources/book/
72. Understanding Open Source and Free Software Licensing - https://www.oreilly.com/openbook/osfreesoft/book/
73. Diomidis Spinellis - https://www.spinellis.gr/
74. https://www.tuhs.org/
75. Unix Programmer's Manual, 2nd Edition - https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Distributions/Research/Dennis_v2/v2man.pdf
76. Unix Programmer's Manual, 3rd Edition - https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Distributions/Research/Dennis_v3/
77. Unix Programmer's Manual, 4th Edition - https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Distributions/Research/Dennis_v4/
78. Unix Programmer's Manual, 5th Edition - https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Distributions/Research/Dennis_v5/
79. Unix Programmer's Manual, 6th Edition - https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Distributions/Research/Dennis_v6/
80. UNIX PROGRAM DESCRIPTION - https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Distributions/USDL/unix_program_description_jan_1976.pdf
81. An Oral History of Unix - https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Documentation/OralHistory/
82. History of UNIX - https://www.tuhs.org/Mirror/Hauben/unix-Contents.html
83. ;Login: - https://www.usenix.org/publications/loginonline
84. UNIX Videos From AT&T Tech Channel - https://www.youtube.com/@ATTTechChannel/search?query=unix
85. Alternative YouTube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/@ComputerChroniclesYT/videos
86. Computer History Museum's Oral Histories - https://www.youtube.com/@ComputerHistory/search?query=unix%20oral%20history
87. BWK's Interview With Ken Thompson - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EY6q5dv_B-o
88. Interview With Jon 'Maddog' Hall - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZMA3Ge144U
89. A Chronicle of the Unix Wars - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ffh3DRFzRL0
90. X Window System Design Principles - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdmNHM9BKY0
91. The History of X Window System (X11) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-N-fgKWYGU
92. VCF East 10 Interview With Brian W. Kernighan - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUWt_StXKsY
93. Warner Losh's FOSDEM Talk5-14 on the Forgotten History of Early Unix - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuzeagzQwRs
94. The UNIX System: Making Computers Easier to Use - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvDZLjaCJuw
95. The History of Unix; Rob Pike's Experience - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2NI6t2r_Hs
96. A Political History of X - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cj02_UeUnGQ
97. Origins of the C Programming Language - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=de2Hsvxaf8M
98. Video of V0 Unix Running on a PDP-7 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvaPaWyiuLA
99. An Interview With Ken Thompson, With an Intro by B. W. Kernighan - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKNaCzdn6sY
100. Bill Joy's Talk at IBM Yorktown - https://youtu.be/EmC5yoE_7PY
101. A UNIX TM Operating System for the DEC VAX-11/780 Computer - unix-32v-reconstructed-draft1.pdf