FAQ 1: Why did you create arXiv if journals already existed? Has it developed as
you had expected?
Answer: Conventional journals did not start coming online until the mid to late
1990s. I originally envisioned it as an expedient hack, a quick-and-dirty email-transponder written in csh to provide short-term access to electronic versions of preprints until the existing paper distribution system could catch up, within about three months.
So it was in csh on NeXT. Tim Berners-Lee also developed the web on NeXT!
FAQ 1: Why did you create arXiv if journals already existed? Has it developed as you had expected?
Answer: Conventional journals did not start coming online until the mid to late 1990s. I originally envisioned it as an expedient hack, a quick-and-dirty email-transponder written in csh to provide short-term access to electronic versions of preprints until the existing paper distribution system could catch up, within about three months.
So it was in csh on NeXT. Tim Berners-Lee also developed the web on NeXT!