Why do some compilers use "a.out" as the default name for executables?

c unix history compiler-construction
Ville Laurikari picture Ville Laurikari · Aug 2, 2009 · Viewed 10.6k times · Source

Most UNIX C compilers link executables by default to a file called "a.out". Why? Is this a written standard or just de-facto standard behavior? What would break if these compilers would just produce an error message (or use a different default name) instead of producing "a.out"?

Answer

sud03r picture sud03r · Aug 2, 2009

a.out stands for assembler output.
I think that justifies why most compilers have this name as default. More info here.

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