question for the retrocomputing buffs out there: from what version of SunOS or Solaris was the C compiler removed, and when did it come out?
(imho a lot of today's rugpull economy was first done by the Unix vendors of the 1980s and 1990s)
Oct 20, 2026, 9:54 PM@ireneista @dmarti p sure it was in a early solaris version. it was still there in 4.1.x (but may’ve been licensed product you were supposed to have *bought* but it was there). i’ve never needed a separate disc for a C compiler on sunos 4. i’d need to check when it was removed from later sunos 5/solaris versions
i can probably check later tonight
@gewt @ireneista @dmarti
They kept the basic C compiler needed to build the kernel for quite a while; I'm not sure when that went away. I don't think they made any claims that you weren't entitled to use it. IIRC, the unbundled compiler was a fancier, more sophisticated one, with a lot of additional tools.
@brouhaha @gewt @ireneista @dmarti Gone after SunOS 4.1.4/Solaris 1.1.2
II think HP-UX kept the compiler for kernel builds much longer, but IIRC, it was pre-C89?
@frobozz @gewt @ireneista @dmarti
Yes. HP-UX still came with cc at least as late as 11i v1. I don't have anything that runs 11i v2 or v3, but I imagine that they kept it until the bitter end.
Oct 21, 2026, 8:35 AM@brouhaha @frobozz @gewt @ireneista @dmarti IIRC, the unbundling happened around the same time: starting with HP-UX 10.20, the ANSI C compiler was extra. The bundled K&R compiler was only for rebuilding the kernel.
This confirms it:
https://web-docs.gsi.de/~kraemer/COLLECTION/HPUX/hpux_cs_utah_edu_hppd_ansi.html