[lug] James Gosling Takes Credit for Emacs?

[Rob Nagler]

Dhruva B. Reddy writes:
> In an interview about C#, James Gosling (the guy behind Java) takes credit
> for developing Emacs.  I thought this was RMS's brainchild.

RMS wrote emacs for DECs a long time before Gosling's emacs.  emacs
comes from the MACS project at MIT.  It was originaly written in
TECO--a forth like editing language.

When Gosling was at CMU, he wrote a version of emacs that ran on Unix.
It was cool, because ti was based on Mocklisp.  You could extend it
easily.  Gosmacs became quite popular.

RMS was upset.  MACS used Lisp for everything (remember macsyma?).  So
he rewrote emacs including a Lisp interpreter, a real one.  Mocklisp
died rapidly.

I'm a bit surprised at the wording in the article.  I worked with
Gosling a long time ago, and I wouldn't call him an egotist.  It may
have bee a reporter taking liberties.  Gosling was the motivator for
RMS' rage, so the "responsible" wording is almost acceptable.  It just
doesn't sit well considering the two personalities and career paths.

Interesting tidbit: Gosling was originally going to use a Lisp
interpreter for NeWS.  One wonders if he had, would NeWS still be
around?

Rob