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Burroughs B5000 Dead

Burroughs B5000
KindMachine
Introduced1961
Discontinued1968
StatusDead
ManufacturerBurroughs
ClassMainframe
PlatformStack architecture
Sourcebitsavers.org ↗

A machine designed for high-level languages — stack architecture, tagged memory, and an OS (MCP) written in ALGOL when that was heresy. Its line persists today as Unisys ClearPath.

Created by Burroughs Corporation
Hosted Burroughs MCP

Robert Barton's team designed the B5000 around ALGOL — hardware stack, tagged descriptors, no assembler at first (the OS was written in ALGOL). MCP was the first OS written in a high-level language and the first with virtual memory in production.

The architecture was too elegant to die: B5500, B6500, and today's Unisys ClearPath MCP are its direct line — the oldest continuously architected computer family in existence.

→ Read the full article on the ALB Wiki

Sources

  1. bitsavers.org/pdf/burroughs/
  2. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burroughs_Large_Systems