TRIPOS - Definition and Overview

TRIPOS is a computer operating system. It was developed in 1978 at the Computer Laboratory of Cambridge University by Martin Richards. It formed the basis for much of the code of early versions of the AmigaOS.

TRIPOS provided features such as pre-emptive multi-tasking (using a simple highest priority free-to-run scheduler), a hierarchical file system and multiple command line interpreters.

Most of TRIPOS was implemented in BCPL. The kernel and device drivers were implemented in assembly language.

TRIPOS was ported to a number of machines, including the Data General Nova 2, the Computer Automation LSI4, plus Motorola 68000 and Intel 8086- based hardware. It included support for the Cambridge Ring local area network. More recently, Martin Richards produced a port of TRIPOS to run under Linux, using BCPL Intcode.

Sources

• The TRIPOS Operating System, M. Richards, October 1988.
• Martin Richards Cintpos page (http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/users/mr/Tripos.html)
• A brief informal history of the Computer Laboratory (http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/UoCCL/misc/EDSAC99/history.html)
• In the beginning was CAOS (http://www.thule.no/haynie/caos.html)

For the name given to undergraduate degree subjects by Cambridge University, see Tripos