Multics was intrinsically a challenging prospect, and it soon ran into problems. In retrospect, it was partly a victim of the second system effect: after a success (like CTSS), it’s tempting to try to create a new system that fixes all the remaining problems with the original while adding everybody’s favorite new features too. The result is often a system that’s too complicated, a consequence of taking on too many different things at the same time, and that
