Path: csiph.com!x330-a1.tempe.blueboxinc.net!newsfeed.hal-mli.net!feeder1.hal-mli.net!border3.nntp.dca.giganews.com!border1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!border4.nntp.dca.giganews.com!border2.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!news1.optus.net.au!optus!newsfeeder.syd.optusnet.com.au!news.optusnet.com.au!not-for-mail From: paramucho@hotmail.com (paramucho) Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp11,comp.sys.dec,vmsnet.pdp-11 Subject: Re: Y3K for PDP-11 Operating Systems Date: Tue, 24 May 2011 12:02:52 GMT Reply-To: paramucho@hotmail.com Message-ID: <4ddb94f7.4125430@news.optusnet.com.au> References: <4d99c3b6$0$23756$14726298@news.sunsite.dk> <4dc1e27c.40366475@news.tpgi.com.au> <93vbcaF3luU1@mid.individual.net> X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.451 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Lines: 55 NNTP-Posting-Host: 59.154.42.141 X-Trace: 1306238574 3033 59.154.42.141 Xref: x330-a1.tempe.blueboxinc.net comp.sys.dec:469 On Mon, 23 May 2011 15:52:52 -0700, Johnny Billquist wrote: >> Probably depends on just what you build. A direct clone of any of them >> that only ran on PDP-11 hardware would be of little if any value. Now, >> a clone that ran on other hardware and allowed modernization of the OS, >> that would be another question. Possibly no interest there either but >> there is always potential. But, again, it really depends on the if the >> OSes do get released and what license they get saddled with. VMS is that, in a way (as was NT for that matter). S&H remimplemented their DEC-style TSX-plus system for Intel CPUs (TSX32) and have found a niche market in the robust systems area. One could say that the two prodominant traditions today are the DEC-based WINDOWS stream and the Unix-based Linux/Chrome/Mac stream. >In a way, a reimplementation of the PDP-11 OSes might be interesting. I've been slowly modernising my PDP-11 "reimplementation(s)" of RT-11. These are based on systems my company developed commercially in Europe in the 1980s. The current single-user kit, RUST/SJ, is basically rewritten RT-11, minus MACRO, LINK and LIBR and plus many other things. The binary kit is freely available at: http://rust.wikispaces.com/ The multi-user implementation, RUST/XM, is more-or-less ready for distribution, I just have to find the time. The multi-user implementation has some ability to run simple RSX apps. Some support for Unix apps has been developed but never packaged. I'll eventually upload all the sources. The main issue there is getting rid of all the gunk which clutters the directories. Like some other software houses in the period we developed in-house languages (for the wont of anything better). I've been slowly rewriting the stuff in the most obscure of the languages along with writing replacements for the RT-11 drivers and system apps that we didn't supply on the earlier kits. I'm sure there are still some PDP-11s doing meaningful work out there, but those still using PDP-11s would certainly have had to become self-reliant in the past two decades. I don't see any capacity for PDP-11s to capture new customers. I think of PDP-11 systems more as valuable vintage systems that deserve being kept polished and in working order. I think that involves a bit more than just having a period kit available with some cryptic instructions about how to boot the system. Ian