Why is it Charlie?

Geezer

Geezer

Why is it Charlie root?

Why not Roger root, or anything else? Yes, I understand the 'root' bit, but why Charlie?

Is it historical? Did someone put it in on a whim, and it stuck? Would the whole operating system fail if it were another name?
 
Oh. Well it could have been Babe Ruth root then.

Not being a fan of baseball or rounders or whatever it is, I cannot see the relevance.

Surely, during the install, we should be asked for our own favourite sport, and the name for root is derived from that.
 
It's one of those historic things where nobody really knows where it came from. I've heard different stories, but nobody has been able to confirm any of them.
 
Geezer said:
Would the whole operating system fail if it were another name?
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To answer this, no it won't. It's in the free form name of the GECOS field, so nothing should depend on the information in it. But you might get issues with mail filters that specifically look for that name in mail sent from root.
 
SirDice said:
Even earlier versions didn't have a GECOS field yet. Haven't found the exact point ...
Click to expand...

It appears to have been introduced by Maurits Cornelis Escher <https://mcescher.com/>

And here is the Gecko Field:

gecko.jpg
 
Geezer said:
Oh. Well it could have been Babe Ruth root then.

Not being a fan of baseball or rounders or whatever it is, I cannot see the relevance.

Surely, during the install, we should be asked for our own favourite sport, and the name for root is derived from that.
Click to expand...
That wouldn't work. Then it would be the "ruth" account.
 
I still remember when UNIX usernames and email handles were an 8-character hash derived from that very GECOS field... practice fell out of favor around 2004, when hash collisions in such applications became too common to ignore.
 
SirDice said:
Early BSD versions had the name "Ernie Co-vax" for root. Even earlier versions didn't have a GECOS field yet. Haven't found the exact point where this changed to "Charlie &" yet.
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It had certainly changed to "Charlie &" by BSD-4.2. You can find /etc/passwd file in the root dump file in http://ftp.math.utah.edu/pub/mirrors/minnie.tuhs.org/UA_Distributions/UCB/4.2BSD/

Geezer said:
Not being a fan of baseball or rounders or whatever it is, I cannot see the relevance.
Click to expand...
Just a silly joke.
 
I have never seen it on AT&T versions of Unix V6 through System V.

So, I'm pretty sure it happened at Berkeley.

The Unix Tree records the following in /etc/passwd:
Code: 
4 BSD:    root::0:10:Ernie Co-vax,508JE,0204:/:/bin/csh
4.1c BSD: root::0:10:Charlie,458E,7750:/:/bin/csh
4.2 BSD:  root::0:10:Charlie &:/:/bin/csh
So I'm guessing that Ernie and Charlie were real people, with room numbers.

But by 4.2 BSD, "Charlie" had transformed into generic for "Charlie ROOT".
 
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