Incompatible Timesharing System

Incompatible Timesharing System
DeveloperMIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and Project MAC
Written inAssembly language
Working stateActive
Initial releaseJuly 1967; 57 years ago (1967-07)[1]
Repositorygithub.com/PDP-10/its
Available inEnglish
PlatformsDigital PDP-6, PDP-10
Default
user interface		Command-line interface (DDT)
LicenseGPL-3.0-or-later[2]

Incompatible Timesharing System (ITS) is a time-sharing operating system developed principally by the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, with help from Project MAC. The name is the jocular complement of the MIT Compatible Time-Sharing System (CTSS).

ITS, and the software developed on it, were technically and culturally influential far beyond their core user community. Remote "guest" or "tourist" access was easily available via the early ARPANET, allowing many interested parties to informally try out features of the operating system and application programs. The wide-open ITS philosophy and collaborative online community were a major influence on the hacker culture, as described in Steven Levy's book Hackers,[3] and were the direct forerunners of the free and open-source software, open-design, and Wiki movements.

  1. ^ Project MAC Progress Report IV (PDF). 1967. p. 18. Archived from the original (PDF) on March 8, 2016.
  2. ^ "README". MIT CSAIL. n.d. Retrieved November 10, 2022.
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference LevyWL was invoked but never defined (see the help page).