The Simple and COOL History of C#

When .NET Framework was in its cradle the class libraries were created with the Simple Managed C (SMC) managed code compiler. In 1999 a group, led by Anders Hejlsberg, was formed to create a C-like Object Oriented Language that was dubbed COOL. The name was changed to C# for trademark reasons in 2000, by then the class libraries and the ASP.NET run-time had been rewritten with the new C# language.

It didn’t come as a shock to anyone when the creator of the Java language, James Gosling, insisted that C# was a copy of Java with security, reliability and productivity removed. Anders Hejlsberg retorted with that the C# design resembles C++ more than Java.

When C# 2.0 was released in 2005 the two languages went down two very different paths when implementing generics; in C# generics are implemented as first-class generic objects where as in Java generics are more like a language syntax feature.

In 2008 when C# 3.0 was released LINQ extensions was...