<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body dir="auto"><div dir="ltr"></div><div dir="ltr">Depends on what you mean by “invent”. </div><div dir="ltr"><br></div><div dir="ltr">CTSS had the concept of process but never used the term. It also had little support for inter-process communication and all the other tools we associate with it. ITS, which was the competing operating system from. Marvin Minski’s lab had a more sophisticated environment but even that was fairly crude. The modified ITS done by Berkeley apparently used the term process but I have not seen the manual. MCP, which was influenced by Multitcs used the term and had the full process control environment. </div><div dir="ltr"><br></div><div dir="ltr">As others have noted, Stretch, even the 1401 and the AF had the idea of processes to handle some aspects of IO but they really weren’t mature. You can even argue that the Sage system, which was really a collection of small programs stitched together with a minimal monitor had processes but that really misses the point. The modernness concept of processes matured in the early 1960s. MIT was a key center for this work but not the only center. </div><div dir="ltr"><br>On Dec 29, 2018, at 9:57 PM, Paul McJones <<a href="mailto:paul@mcjones.org">paul@mcjones.org</a>> wrote:<br><br></div><blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">IBM’s Stretch project was considering multiprogramming in the late 1950s, but for example Ted Codd’s 1960 paper:<div class=""><br class=""></div><blockquote style="margin: 0 0 0 40px; border: none; padding: 0px;" class=""><div class="">E. F. Codd. 1960. Multiprogram scheduling: parts 1 and 2. introduction and theory. Commun. ACM 3, 6 (June 1960), 347-350. DOI=<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/367297.367317" class="">http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/367297.367317</a></div></blockquote><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">focussed on the problem of resource optimiztion rather than on the programming abstraction.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Early timesharing work such as CTSS tended to present the idea of a virtualized physical computer, but didn’t necessarily provide a programming interface for creating, destroying, controlling, and communicating with processes. I believe these ideas were “simmering” in the minds of a number of people during the late 1950s and early 1960s.</div><div class=""><br class=""><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><br class=""><div><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On Dec 29, 2018, at 8:39 PM, Laurent Bloch <<a href="mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org" class="">lb@laurentbloch.org</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">Thank you for your answer, Paul. When we think about processes, of</span><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">course the names of Dijkstra and Hoare come to the mind, but I believe</span><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">they had precursors, before semaphores and communicating sequential</span><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">processes. And 1965 seems a bit too late for the birth of the process.</span><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">Le samedi 29 décembre 2018 Paul McJones a écrit ceci :</span><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><blockquote type="cite" style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class="">Laurent,<br class=""><br class="">Edsger Dijkstra’s “Cooperating Sequential Processes" (EWD123) was written in 1965 (<a href="http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/ewd01xx/EWD123.PDF" class="">http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/ewd01xx/EWD123.PDF</a>). His original paper on semaphores (EWD35) was written in Dutch several years before that (<a href="http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD00xx/EWD35.html" class="">http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD00xx/EWD35.html</a>).<br class=""><br class="">By 1965, the term process was becoming fairly well-known in operating systems circles. For example, in a paper presented in 1965, Jack Dennis wrote:<br class=""><br class="">Processes. We consider that the system hardware comprises one or more processors, which we can identify as being distinct from the main memory, the file storage devices and the input/output devices. Each processor is capable of executing algorithms that are specified by sequences of instructions. A process is a locus of control within an instruction sequence. That is, a process is that abstract entity which moves through the instructions of a procedure as the procedure is executed by a processor.<br class=""><br class="">This is from: Jack B. Dennis and Earl C. Van Horn. 1966. Programming semantics for multiprogrammed computations. Commun. ACM 9, 3 (March 1966), 143-155. DOI=<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/365230.365252" class="">http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/365230.365252</a><br class=""><br class=""><br class="">Paul<br class=""><br class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="">On Dec 29, 2018, at 8:09 PM, Laurent Bloch <<a href="mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org" class="">lb@laurentbloch.org</a>> wrote:<br class=""><br class="">Le dimanche 30 décembre 2018 Grider, Gary Alan a écrit ceci :<br class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="">Hasn’t there been great debate about when the first "stored program" was accomplished? Some said on Maniac by Metropolis but others disagree I think. <br class=""></blockquote><br class="">I would say that the concept of a process may appear when there are more than one program, potentially ready to execute, and in competition to access the processor.<br class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="">If that is what you are looking for I am pretty sure it was well before CTSS or Multics. I think CTSS and Multics were in pursuit of time sharing (or multiple stored programs).<br class="">I think the first implementation of process pipes might have been Demos but that was way after CTSS days.<br class=""><br class="">Gary<br class=""><br class="">On 12/29/18, 8:37 PM, "Members on behalf of Laurent Bloch" <<a href="mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org" class="">members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org</a> on behalf of <a href="mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org" class="">lb@laurentbloch.org</a>> wrote:<br class=""><br class=""> Le samedi 29 décembre 2018 McMillan, William W a écrit ceci :<br class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="">"..., my question was about computer processes, i.e. programs in execution ..."<br class=""><br class="">Laurent, do you mean process in the sense of a computer program loaded (at least partially) into primary memory, described by a process control block, and managed by an operating system? <br class=""></blockquote><br class=""> Yes, it is precisely the kind of entity I am asking about. I would say it appears with CTSS or Multics, but I am not sure. Once I read the name of the creator of the concept, but I did not write it down and I forgot, hence my question.<br class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="">Or is the topic more broad than that?<br class=""><br class="">Bill<br class=""><br class="">________________________________________<br class="">From: Members [<a href="mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org" class="">members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org</a>] on behalf of Laurent Bloch [<a href="mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org" class="">lb@laurentbloch.org</a>]<br class="">Sent: Saturday, December 29, 2018 6:03 PM<br class="">To: James Cortada<br class="">Cc: SIGCIS<br class="">Subject: Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Invention of the concept of process<br class=""><br class="">Le samedi 29 décembre 2018 James Cortada a écrit ceci :<br class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="">It might help to give us some context for your question. For example, if<br class="">interested in process in business, then it emerges in the late 19th century<br class="">and in the second half of the 20th becomes process management, TQM etc. If<br class="">in science, then it is language substituted for what otherwise we all think<br class="">of as the scientific method. Even earlier the notions of methods and<br class="">techniques are embodiments of the idea of process. Hence, my request for<br class="">context. <br class=""></blockquote><br class="">Well, my question was about computer processes, i.e. programs in execution in a computer, sometimes also called tasks.<br class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="">On Sat, Dec 29, 2018 at 4:56 PM Laurent Bloch <<a href="mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org" class="">lb@laurentbloch.org</a>> wrote:<br class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="">Hi,<br class=""><br class="">Surely many of you know the answer: who invented the concept of process,<br class="">and when?<br class=""><br class="">Thank you for your answers. Have a nice Sunday!<br class=""><br class="">--<br class="">Laurent Bloch - <a href="https://laurentbloch.net" class="">https://laurentbloch.net</a> - <a href="mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org" class="">lb@laurentbloch.org</a><br class="">Si vous trouvez que l'éducation coûte cher, essayez l'ignorance !<br class="">(A. Lincoln)<br class="">_______________________________________________<br class="">This email is relayed from members at <a href="http://sigcis.org" class="">sigcis.org</a>, the email discussion<br class="">list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member<br class="">posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list<br class="">archives are at <a href="http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/" class="">http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/</a> and<br class="">you can change your subscription options at<br class=""><a href="http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org" class="">http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org</a> <br class=""></blockquote><br class=""><br class=""><br class="">--<br class="">James W. Cortada<br class="">Senior Research Fellow<br class="">Charles Babbage Institute<br class="">University of Minnesota<br class=""><a href="mailto:jcortada@umn.edu" class="">jcortada@umn.edu</a><br class="">608-274-6382 <br class=""></blockquote><br class=""><br class="">--<br class="">Laurent Bloch - <a href="https://laurentbloch.net" class="">https://laurentbloch.net</a> - <a href="mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org" class="">lb@laurentbloch.org</a><br class="">Si vous trouvez que l'éducation coûte cher, essayez l'ignorance !<br class="">(A. Lincoln) <br class=""></blockquote><br class=""><br class=""> --<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class=""> Laurent Bloch - <a href="https://laurentbloch.net" class="">https://laurentbloch.net</a> - <a href="mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org" class="">lb@laurentbloch.org</a><br class=""> Si vous trouvez que l'éducation coûte cher, essayez l'ignorance !<br class=""> (A. Lincoln)<br class=""><br class=""><br class=""></blockquote><br class=""><br class="">--<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">Laurent Bloch -<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="https://laurentbloch.net/" class="">https://laurentbloch.net</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><<a href="https://laurentbloch.net/" class="">https://laurentbloch.net/</a>> -<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org" class="">lb@laurentbloch.org</a><<a href="mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org" class="">mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org</a>><br class="">Si vous trouvez que l'éducation coûte cher, essayez l'ignorance !<br class="">(A. Lincoln)<br class="">_______________________________________________<br class="">This email is relayed from members at<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://sigcis.org/" class="">sigcis.org</a>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/" class="">http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>and you can change your subscription options at<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org" class="">http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> <br class=""></blockquote><br class=""></blockquote><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">--<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">Laurent Bloch -<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span><a href="https://laurentbloch.net/" style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;" class="">https://laurentbloch.net</a><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; float: none; display: inline !important;" class=""><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>-<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span><a href="mailto:lb@laurentbloch.org" style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;" class="">lb@laurentbloch.org</a><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">Si vous trouvez que l'éducation coûte cher, essayez l'ignorance !</span><br style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">(A. Lincoln)</span></div></blockquote></div><br class=""></div></div></div></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><span>_______________________________________________</span><br><span>This email is relayed from members at <a href="http://sigcis.org">sigcis.org</a>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at <a href="http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/">http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/</a> and you can change your subscription options at <a href="http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org">http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org</a></span></div></blockquote></body></html>