Is all these years of work lost forever?
On 1/6/17 11:10 PM, Stephen M. Jones wrote:no magical
Is all these years of work lost forever?
Yes, along with much of the other work done by other companies in the
past 50 years. Welcome to my world.
Once a computer is obsolete, there is no monetary value to the companies
that made them or the companies that used them, so it was discarded. In
fact, time has demonstrated that leaving behind a paper trail for lawyers
to use in discovery can be a bad thing.
What survives mostly comes out of peoples garages that actually cared about the machines either for nostalgia or maintenance for the few that were kept running. Be glad, for example, that Tim Litt cared enough about DEC LCG's tapes and disks that he had them donated to CHM when HP was going to throw them out, and why you have the disk packs today.
Beleive me, I've been looking for 30+ years for old software, and there is
archive of tapes that normal people can get to. Rumors exist of them in support of military computers, but I can't imagine even those will be around for anything from the 60s today. Outside of Tymshare, the only people I know of that ran their version of the monitor was Harvard and what I have found from that are a few newsletters and fragments from teletype printouts.talked
The only possibility is if someone inside Tymshare saved a tape, and I've
to a LOT of people about it. This was a long time ago, there weren't manypeople
working on it, and again, after they switched to PDP-10s there wasn't awhole
lot of motivation for them to be interested in the 940s any more.
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
/BAH
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was written
by another university, and there were only four sites in total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
Bob Eager <news0006@eager.cx> wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was written
by another university, and there were only four sites in total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
EMAS?
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was written
by another university, and there were only four sites in total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 21:42:59 +0000, Anonymous wrote:
Bob Eager <news0006@eager.cx> wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw >>>> away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was written
by another university, and there were only four sites in total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
EMAS?
Yes. Now who is this?
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 18:28:48 +0000, Bob Eager wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was written
by another university, and there were only four sites in total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
To clarify, reading this!
I was the only person to have kept the source code. The compiler (for a rare-ish language) will take a bit of bootstrapping.
Bob Eager <news0006@eager.cx> wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 18:28:48 +0000, Bob Eager wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't
throw away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was
written by another university, and there were only four sites in
total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
To clarify, reading this!
I was the only person to have kept the source code. The compiler (for a
rare-ish language) will take a bit of bootstrapping.
Are you doing the 2900 version?
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 23:31:15 +0000, Bill Findlay wrote:
Bob Eager <news0006@eager.cx> wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 21:42:59 +0000, Anonymous wrote:
Bob Eager <news0006@eager.cx> wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't
throw away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was
written by another university, and there were only four sites in
total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
EMAS?
Yes. Now who is this?
C'est moi.
Can you see my id in this message?
Yes, I can. I probably ought to remember the name, but I am sure my
memory is failing!
You guessed well. What clues were there?
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 23:36:12 +0000, Bill Findlay wrote:
Bob Eager <news0006@eager.cx> wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 18:28:48 +0000, Bob Eager wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't
throw away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was
written by another university, and there were only four sites in
total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
To clarify, reading this!
I was the only person to have kept the source code. The compiler (for a
rare-ish language) will take a bit of bootstrapping.
Are you doing the 2900 version?
Yes. I dont think the IBM sources are quite complete.
Bob Eager <news0006@eager.cx> wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 23:36:12 +0000, Bill Findlay wrote:
Bob Eager <news0006@eager.cx> wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 18:28:48 +0000, Bob Eager wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't
throw away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was
written by another university, and there were only four sites in
total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
To clarify, reading this!
I was the only person to have kept the source code. The compiler (for
a rare-ish language) will take a bit of bootstrapping.
Are you doing the 2900 version?
Yes. I dont think the IBM sources are quite complete.
Do you expect Fujitsu to be agreeable?
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was written
by another university, and there were only four sites in total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
On 1/8/17 7:42 AM, jmfbahciv wrote:releasing
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
/BAH
University archives have other problems, fundamentally paranoia about
any personal information about anyone still alive. Apparently, from what Iwas
told by our archivists, you lose your right to privacy when you die.which
Stanford, MIT, and CMU have PDP-10 related archives but other than SAILDART,
isn't part of Stanford special collections AFAIK, little is reallyavailable, or
even in a public catalog.
The attempts to get 133-tenex from a SUMEX backup tape by the people doing the github PDP-10 project will be an interesting test case
https://github.com/PDP-10
mentioned in
http://web.stanford.edu/group/htgg/cgi-bin/mediawiki/index.php?title=Arcfiles.740418-760326.filtered
Last I heard, no one was willing to accept the SAILDART archive because ofthe
creators restrictions that it not be made public for something like 80years.
Al Kossow wrote:
On 1/8/17 7:42 AM, jmfbahciv wrote:releasing
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
/BAH
University archives have other problems, fundamentally paranoia about
any personal information about anyone still alive. Apparently, from what Iwas
told by our archivists, you lose your right to privacy when you die.which
Stanford, MIT, and CMU have PDP-10 related archives but other than SAILDART,
isn't part of Stanford special collections AFAIK, little is reallyavailable, or
even in a public catalog.
What could be personal w.r.t. OS sources? If UofM has the Tymshare sources, it would be in a box in a closet in the basement behind the boiler squirreled away by the student who had been in charge of the guarding the distribution tapes ;-) that's why I asked about a university.
http://web.stanford.edu/group/htgg/cgi-bin/mediawiki/index.php?title=Adventure
The attempts to get 133-tenex from a SUMEX backup tape by the people doing >> the github PDP-10 project will be an interesting test case
https://github.com/PDP-10
mentioned in
http://web.stanford.edu/group/htgg/cgi-bin/mediawiki/index.php?title=Arcfiles.740418-760326.filtered
the
Last I heard, no one was willing to accept the SAILDART archive because of
creators restrictions that it not be made public for something like 80years.
Every bit of it?!!!! Usually, data can be separated from executables
and source code.
/BAH
Bob Eager wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was written
by another university, and there were only four sites in total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
Have you copied the sources you have to some place else and someone else
just in case?
Sometimes, schools don't throw away things like companies do.
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes:
Sometimes, schools don't throw away things like companies do.
Barb, as soon as I was laid off from Stanford in November, 1991, every
single LOTS DEC-20 related magnetic tape went into a great big dumpster behind CERAS. That was 25 years of quarterly backups, along with
distribution tapes from DEC, SPSS, Software House (System/1022
database), etc. Things were lost which were never archived on any other Stanford DEC-20.
On Mon, 09 Jan 2017 13:42:42 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Bob Eager wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 15:42:55 +0000, jmfbahciv wrote:
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw >>>> away things like companies do.
My university stopped using an operating system in 1986. It was written
by another university, and there were only four sites in total.
I did some work on it, and had all the source code of course.
I later found out that I was the only person to have done so.
I am working on the emulator now...
Have you copied the sources you have to some place else and someone else
just in case?
Yes. There is a copy is the USA (I'm in the UK). There is a copy in a
secure Cloud location. There is a copy with a friend. There is a copy in
a secure storage ten miles away. And I have two copies here.
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes:single
Sometimes, schools don't throw away things like companies do.
Barb, as soon as I was laid off from Stanford in November, 1991, every
LOTS DEC-20 related magnetic tape went into a great big dumpster behindCERAS.
That was 25 years of quarterly backups, along with distribution tapes fromDEC,
SPSS, Software House (System/1022 database), etc. Things were lost whichwere
never archived on any other Stanford DEC-20.
On Mon, 9 Jan 2017, Rich Alderson wrote:
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes:How awful.
Sometimes, schools don't throw away things like companies do.
Barb, as soon as I was laid off from Stanford in November, 1991, every
single LOTS DEC-20 related magnetic tape went into a great big dumpster
behind CERAS. That was 25 years of quarterly backups, along with
distribution tapes from DEC, SPSS, Software House (System/1022
database), etc. Things were lost which were never archived on any other
Stanford DEC-20.
It makes it sound almost like they laid you off so they could get rid of
that stuff.
Rich Alderson wrote:
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes:Well, I did say "sometimes". There are people still alive who have a
Sometimes, schools don't throw away things like companies do.
Barb, as soon as I was laid off from Stanford in November, 1991, every >single
LOTS DEC-20 related magnetic tape went into a great big dumpster behind >CERAS.
That was 25 years of quarterly backups, along with distribution tapes from >DEC,
SPSS, Software House (System/1022 database), etc. Things were lost which >were
never archived on any other Stanford DEC-20.
desire to destroy anything related to the PDP-10.
Rich Alderson wrote:
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes:Well, I did say "sometimes". There are people still alive who have a
Sometimes, schools don't throw away things like companies do.
Barb, as soon as I was laid off from Stanford in November, 1991, every >single
LOTS DEC-20 related magnetic tape went into a great big dumpster behind >CERAS.
That was 25 years of quarterly backups, along with distribution tapes from >DEC,
SPSS, Software House (System/1022 database), etc. Things were lost which >were
never archived on any other Stanford DEC-20.
desire to destroy anything related to the PDP-10. In a weird way,
that implies the product line was a success.
Al Kossow wrote:
On 1/6/17 11:10 PM, Stephen M. Jones wrote:
Is all these years of work lost forever?
Yes, along with much of the other work done by other companies in the
past 50 years. Welcome to my world.
Once a computer is obsolete, there is no monetary value to the companies
that made them or the companies that used them, so it was discarded. In
fact, time has demonstrated that leaving behind a paper trail for lawyers
to use in discovery can be a bad thing.
What survives mostly comes out of peoples garages that actually cared about >> the machines either for nostalgia or maintenance for the few that were kept >> running. Be glad, for example, that Tim Litt cared enough about DEC LCG's
tapes and disks that he had them donated to CHM when HP was going to throw >> them out, and why you have the disk packs today.
Beleive me, I've been looking for 30+ years for old software, and there is >no magical
archive of tapes that normal people can get to. Rumors exist of them in
support of military computers, but I can't imagine even those will be around >> for anything from the 60s today. Outside of Tymshare, the only people I know >> of that ran their version of the monitor was Harvard and what I have found >> from that are a few newsletters and fragments from teletype printouts.
The only possibility is if someone inside Tymshare saved a tape, and I've >talked
to a LOT of people about it. This was a long time ago, there weren't many >people
working on it, and again, after they switched to PDP-10s there wasn't a >whole
lot of motivation for them to be interested in the 940s any more.
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
/BAH
In article <PM0005459714409CF2@aca4001a.ipt.aol.com>,about
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote:
Al Kossow wrote:
On 1/6/17 11:10 PM, Stephen M. Jones wrote:
Is all these years of work lost forever?
Yes, along with much of the other work done by other companies in the
past 50 years. Welcome to my world.
Once a computer is obsolete, there is no monetary value to the companies >>> that made them or the companies that used them, so it was discarded. In
fact, time has demonstrated that leaving behind a paper trail for lawyers >>> to use in discovery can be a bad thing.
What survives mostly comes out of peoples garages that actually cared
keptthe machines either for nostalgia or maintenance for the few that were
running. Be glad, for example, that Tim Litt cared enough about DEC LCG's >>> tapes and disks that he had them donated to CHM when HP was going to throw >>> them out, and why you have the disk packs today.
Beleive me, I've been looking for 30+ years for old software, and there is >>no magical
archive of tapes that normal people can get to. Rumors exist of them in
support of military computers, but I can't imagine even those will be around
for anything from the 60s today. Outside of Tymshare, the only people I know
of that ran their version of the monitor was Harvard and what I have found >>> from that are a few newsletters and fragments from teletype printouts.
The only possibility is if someone inside Tymshare saved a tape, and I've >>talked
to a LOT of people about it. This was a long time ago, there weren't many >>people
working on it, and again, after they switched to PDP-10s there wasn't a >>whole
lot of motivation for them to be interested in the 940s any more.
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw
away things like companies do.
/BAH
Having done almost 7 years of university sysadmin... Most of the old
stuff at Seton Hall University (in the IT dept) is long since gone.
I was there when they dumped their zSystem about 7 years ago...
Lots of dumpster fodder and then the recycler to pull the DASD and Tape subsystems.
Unfortunately, as a history geek turned sysadmin... it kills me when it happens. Right now there's an interesting discussion on the TUHS
(The Unix Heritage Society) mailing list on features and history
of the System V release 4 kernel and system -- and what parts were BSD
or SunOS or AT&T SysV Rel2/3 based...
Pretty cool to read. Some of the original developers have been in the discussions correcting misconceptions. Amazing how reality is never
captured for history.
In article <PM000545BDBEEB1754@aca42475.ipt.aol.com>,
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote:
Rich Alderson wrote:
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes:Well, I did say "sometimes". There are people still alive who have a >>desire to destroy anything related to the PDP-10. In a weird way,
Sometimes, schools don't throw away things like companies do.
Barb, as soon as I was laid off from Stanford in November, 1991, every >>single
LOTS DEC-20 related magnetic tape went into a great big dumpster behind >>CERAS.
That was 25 years of quarterly backups, along with distribution tapes from >>DEC,
SPSS, Software House (System/1022 database), etc. Things were lost which >>were
never archived on any other Stanford DEC-20.
that implies the product line was a success.
Considering that only around 6000 pdp6/10s were ever made, and probably
never more than around 4000 was in production at any one time plus the
fact that a modern Linux machine runs emulators 10-20 x the KL10B
speed implies that there is probably more pdp10 cycles being executed
today than in its heyday ca 1980.
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes:
Rich Alderson wrote:
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes:Well, I did say "sometimes". There are people still alive who have a >>desire to destroy anything related to the PDP-10.
Sometimes, schools don't throw away things like companies do.
Barb, as soon as I was laid off from Stanford in November, 1991, every >>single
LOTS DEC-20 related magnetic tape went into a great big dumpster behind >>CERAS.
That was 25 years of quarterly backups, along with distribution tapes from >>DEC,
SPSS, Software House (System/1022 database), etc. Things were lost which >>were
never archived on any other Stanford DEC-20.
Can you back that statement up in any way?
Morten Reistad wrote:
In article <PM000545BDBEEB1754@aca42475.ipt.aol.com>,
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote:
Rich Alderson wrote:
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes:Well, I did say "sometimes". There are people still alive who have a >>>desire to destroy anything related to the PDP-10. In a weird way,
Sometimes, schools don't throw away things like companies do.
Barb, as soon as I was laid off from Stanford in November, 1991, every >>>single
LOTS DEC-20 related magnetic tape went into a great big dumpster behind >>>CERAS.
That was 25 years of quarterly backups, along with distribution tapes from >>>DEC,
SPSS, Software House (System/1022 database), etc. Things were lost which >>>were
never archived on any other Stanford DEC-20.
that implies the product line was a success.
Considering that only around 6000 pdp6/10s were ever made, and probably
never more than around 4000 was in production at any one time plus the
fact that a modern Linux machine runs emulators 10-20 x the KL10B
speed implies that there is probably more pdp10 cycles being executed
today than in its heyday ca 1980.
Well, you would only need one or two people to do that ;-).
William Pechter wrote:
In article <PM0005459714409CF2@aca4001a.ipt.aol.com>,
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote:
Al Kossow wrote:
On 1/6/17 11:10 PM, Stephen M. Jones wrote:
Is all these years of work lost forever?
Yes, along with much of the other work done by other companies in the
past 50 years. Welcome to my world.
Once a computer is obsolete, there is no monetary value to the companies >>>> that made them or the companies that used them, so it was discarded. In >>>> fact, time has demonstrated that leaving behind a paper trail for lawyers >>>> to use in discovery can be a bad thing.
What survives mostly comes out of peoples garages that actually cared >about
the machines either for nostalgia or maintenance for the few that were >kept
running. Be glad, for example, that Tim Litt cared enough about DEC LCG's >>>> tapes and disks that he had them donated to CHM when HP was going to throw >>>> them out, and why you have the disk packs today.
Beleive me, I've been looking for 30+ years for old software, and there is >>>no magical
archive of tapes that normal people can get to. Rumors exist of them in >>>> support of military computers, but I can't imagine even those will be >around
for anything from the 60s today. Outside of Tymshare, the only people I >know
of that ran their version of the monitor was Harvard and what I have found >>>> from that are a few newsletters and fragments from teletype printouts. >>>>
The only possibility is if someone inside Tymshare saved a tape, and I've >>>talked
to a LOT of people about it. This was a long time ago, there weren't many >>>people
working on it, and again, after they switched to PDP-10s there wasn't a >>>whole
lot of motivation for them to be interested in the 940s any more.
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw >>>away things like companies do.
/BAH
Having done almost 7 years of university sysadmin... Most of the old
stuff at Seton Hall University (in the IT dept) is long since gone.
I was there when they dumped their zSystem about 7 years ago...
Lots of dumpster fodder and then the recycler to pull the DASD and Tape
subsystems.
Ouch. The stuff I'm thinking about wouldn't have been in a known
storage closet. It could also be part of a grad student's (at that time) >work or hoard. That kind of thing.
Unfortunately, as a history geek turned sysadmin... it kills me when it
happens. Right now there's an interesting discussion on the TUHS
(The Unix Heritage Society) mailing list on features and history
of the System V release 4 kernel and system -- and what parts were BSD
or SunOS or AT&T SysV Rel2/3 based...
Pretty cool to read. Some of the original developers have been in the
discussions correcting misconceptions. Amazing how reality is never
captured for history.
The Unix SMP JMF did has been lost, too. That was System V based
and managed out of the NJ office.
I can understnad how alot of history is lost having to do with
a development cycle. The design and architecture and problem
solving discussion aren't recorded, especially in a manufacturing
production environment; there's no time to dot i's when a FCS
piece of hardware is waiting for the software to be written, debugged
and tested. Only the memories of the original developers can be
mined for reasons certain things were done at that time.
If you take a close look at some of the statements I've made which
caused hundreds of disagreeing replies, most of the facts of the
history isn't mentioned because the discussions never progress
to generate more remembrances. Discussions are required to tweak
out long-forgotten memories.
/BAH
Unfortunately, as a history geek turned sysadmin... it kills me when it >happens. Right now there's an interesting discussion on the TUHS
(The Unix Heritage Society) mailing list on features and history
of the System V release 4 kernel and system -- and what parts were BSD
or SunOS or AT&T SysV Rel2/3 based...
Pretty cool to read. Some of the original developers have been in the >discussions correcting misconceptions. Amazing how reality is never
captured for history.
I can understnad how alot of history is lost having to do with
a development cycle. The design and architecture and problem
solving discussion aren't recorded,
How much have they discussed the Amadeus (single-system image distributed unix) work based on Unixware/Chorus?
Has the SMP not been imported into AT&T Unix or did they use it internal only...
Unfortunately, I was nominally based out of Somerset, then Piscatiway
and Princeton, and started out installing Vaxes in Holmdel in '81.
I was at Fort Monmouth mostly hung out in Holmdel office, without the
ability to go from the DEC office to the Holmdel computer room without escort.
Never did see those DEC Vaxes run SysV until I managed a gig running
SysV on an 11/750 at Fort Monmouth.
In article <PM000545D24B15485F@aca41679.ipt.aol.com>,
Never did see those DEC Vaxes run SysV until I managed a gig running
SysV on an 11/750 at Fort Monmouth.
pechter@pechter.dyndns.org (William Pechter) writes:
Unfortunately, as a history geek turned sysadmin... it kills me when it >>happens. Right now there's an interesting discussion on the TUHS
(The Unix Heritage Society) mailing list on features and history
of the System V release 4 kernel and system -- and what parts were BSD
or SunOS or AT&T SysV Rel2/3 based...
Sources for many of those are here: >http://mirrors.pdp-11.ru/_vax/unix-src[torrents.ru]/
Pretty cool to read. Some of the original developers have been in the >>discussions correcting misconceptions. Amazing how reality is never >>captured for history.
How much have they discussed the Amadeus (single-system image distributed >unix) work based on Unixware/Chorus?
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes:
I can understnad how alot of history is lost having to do with
a development cycle. The design and architecture and problem
solving discussion aren't recorded,
Not necessarily true - I have full archives of this information
for two different commercial operating systems which are destined
for the CHM someday.
In article <PM000545D24B15485F@aca41679.ipt.aol.com>,lawyers
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote:
William Pechter wrote:
In article <PM0005459714409CF2@aca4001a.ipt.aol.com>,
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote:
Al Kossow wrote:
On 1/6/17 11:10 PM, Stephen M. Jones wrote:
Is all these years of work lost forever?
Yes, along with much of the other work done by other companies in the >>>>> past 50 years. Welcome to my world.
Once a computer is obsolete, there is no monetary value to the companies >>>>> that made them or the companies that used them, so it was discarded. In >>>>> fact, time has demonstrated that leaving behind a paper trail for
LCG'sto use in discovery can be a bad thing.
What survives mostly comes out of peoples garages that actually cared >>about
the machines either for nostalgia or maintenance for the few that were >>kept
running. Be glad, for example, that Tim Litt cared enough about DEC
I'vetapes and disks that he had them donated to CHM when HP was going to throwno magical
them out, and why you have the disk packs today.
Beleive me, I've been looking for 30+ years for old software, and there is
archive of tapes that normal people can get to. Rumors exist of them in >>>>> support of military computers, but I can't imagine even those will be >>around
for anything from the 60s today. Outside of Tymshare, the only people I >>know
of that ran their version of the monitor was Harvard and what I have found
from that are a few newsletters and fragments from teletype printouts. >>>>>
The only possibility is if someone inside Tymshare saved a tape, and
manytalked
to a LOT of people about it. This was a long time ago, there weren't
people
working on it, and again, after they switched to PDP-10s there wasn't a >>>>whole
lot of motivation for them to be interested in the 940s any more.
Wouldn't U of Michigan have had tapes? Sometimes, schools don't throw >>>>away things like companies do.
/BAH
Having done almost 7 years of university sysadmin... Most of the old
stuff at Seton Hall University (in the IT dept) is long since gone.
I was there when they dumped their zSystem about 7 years ago...
Lots of dumpster fodder and then the recycler to pull the DASD and Tape
subsystems.
Ouch. The stuff I'm thinking about wouldn't have been in a known
storage closet. It could also be part of a grad student's (at that time) >>work or hoard. That kind of thing.
Unfortunately, as a history geek turned sysadmin... it kills me when it
happens. Right now there's an interesting discussion on the TUHS
(The Unix Heritage Society) mailing list on features and history
of the System V release 4 kernel and system -- and what parts were BSD
or SunOS or AT&T SysV Rel2/3 based...
Pretty cool to read. Some of the original developers have been in the
discussions correcting misconceptions. Amazing how reality is never
captured for history.
The Unix SMP JMF did has been lost, too. That was System V based
and managed out of the NJ office.
I can understnad how alot of history is lost having to do with
a development cycle. The design and architecture and problem
solving discussion aren't recorded, especially in a manufacturing >>production environment; there's no time to dot i's when a FCS
piece of hardware is waiting for the software to be written, debugged
and tested. Only the memories of the original developers can be
mined for reasons certain things were done at that time.
If you take a close look at some of the statements I've made which
caused hundreds of disagreeing replies, most of the facts of the
history isn't mentioned because the discussions never progress
to generate more remembrances. Discussions are required to tweak
out long-forgotten memories.
/BAH
Has the SMP not been imported into AT&T Unix or did they use it internal only...
Unfortunately, I was nominally based out of Somerset, then Piscatiway
and Princeton, and started out installing Vaxes in Holmdel in '81.
I was at Fort Monmouth mostly hung out in Holmdel office, without the
ability to go from the DEC office to the Holmdel computer room without escort.
Never did see those DEC Vaxes run SysV until I managed a gig running
SysV on an 11/750 at Fort Monmouth.
I was at Fort Monmouth mostly hung out in Holmdel office, without the
ability to go from the DEC office to the Holmdel computer room without
escort.
Never did see those DEC Vaxes run SysV until I managed a gig running
SysV on an 11/750 at Fort Monmouth.
Did you see any other Unixes running on an -11 or VAX?
/BAH
The company head was Daniel Sinnott Sr. who also founded Interdata in
1966 (which later became part of Perkin-Elmer Data Systems and then
spun off to Concurrent Computer).
In article <PM000545E614318755@aca4184f.ipt.aol.com>,art-i.html
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote:
<snip>
Bill Pechter wrote:
I was at Fort Monmouth mostly hung out in Holmdel office, without the
ability to go from the DEC office to the Holmdel computer room without
escort.
Never did see those DEC Vaxes run SysV until I managed a gig running
SysV on an 11/750 at Fort Monmouth.
Did you see any other Unixes running on an -11 or VAX?
/BAH
Hell yeah... Lots of Ultrix on Vax, SysIII/SysV and internal versions
on both PDP11's and Vaxes at AT&T, NJ Bell, etc.
Fort Monmouth had a couple of BSD 4.x boxes and I think one Ultrix 11/780.
The folks at Exxon office systems were BSD/Ultrix guys developing software for the Z8000 Zeus systems. This went bye-bye about 84 or so...
They just moved into a new building in Princeton after having a Vax on the ground floor of an office park near the Princeton Airport when they
got axed.
The development moved to Princeton from California. This division was
the combination of Qwip Fax, QYX smart typewriters and Vydec Word Processing and they used Zilog's Z8000 chip business (bought by Exxon) and OEM'd Qume printers.
http://precision-blogging.blogspot.com/2010/11/exxon-office-system-shrinks-p
http://oztypewriter.blogspot.com/2016/03/reviving-remington-rand-typewriter-wars.html
http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?st=1&c=617mounted
Interesting to see some of the things I've seen.
Syntrex was a word processor company run by the former Interdata heads
which sprung up and sold high end office word processing systems (often
to big legal offices).
They had winchester 14 inch disk platter servers (looked like sideways
RA80/81 Head-Disk-Assmbly stuff with some kind of SMD interface...and
Development was on a modified Unix version -- something like V7 on RP04's
RP06's on 11/70's. The CPU for the word processors were 8086's IIRC.
Their Unix was hacked up to do the OS Root partition across two or three RP04's or RP06's to interleave disk accesses. They used Olivetti
mechanisms for their smart typewriter based printers.
A lot of ex-Bell Unix folks who really understood software worked the site
on Industrial Way West in Eatontown.
Impressive redundant hardware in the day IIRC. Software was very Unix oriented.
The company head was Daniel Sinnott Sr. who also founded Interdata
in 1966 (which later became part of Perkin-Elmer Data Systems and then
spun off to Concurrent Computer).
http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?21317-Syntrex http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?c=491&st=1
Don't know if anyone finds this interesting...
pechter@pechter.dyndns.org (William Pechter) writes:Code
The company head was Daniel Sinnott Sr. who also founded Interdata in
1966 (which later became part of Perkin-Elmer Data Systems and then
spun off to Concurrent Computer).
re:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2017.html#20 {wtf} Tymshare SuperBasic Source
guys from cambridge science center came out http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#545tech
jan 1968 to install cp67 at the univ. I did a lot of enhancements for
cp67 as undergraduate at the univ ... including added tty terminal
support. I tried to make the ibm terminal controller do some stuff that
it couldn't quite do. somewhat as a result, the univ. starts a clone controller project ... interdate/3 programmed to emulate ibm controller
and build hardware channel interface board. This then evolves into interdata/4 for the channel interface with multiple interdata/3s
handling line/port scanner function. Interdata starts marketing it into
ibm market ... and four of us get written up as responsible for (some
part of) clone controller market. It continued to be sold under
perkin/elmer name (after buying interdata). some past posts http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#360pcm
I run into one of the boxes at large mid-atlantic datacenter around turn
of the century handling majority of dialup point-of-sale terminal transactions for the east coast.
It amazes me how all our lives were entwined by the bit streams we
generated with our work...and we never knew...
jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes:Code
It amazes me how all our lives were entwined by the bit streams we
generated with our work...and we never knew...
re:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2017.html#20 {wtf} Tymshare SuperBasic Source
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2017.html#23 {wtf} Tymshare SuperBasic SourceCode
maybe a little closer to (your) home(?) ... michican terminal system
(running on 360/67)
http://www.eecis.udel.edu/~mills/gallery/gallery8.html
does a similar (clone) controller project using PDP8 http://www.eecis.udel.edu/~mills/gallery/gallery7.html
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