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TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413402] Wed, 02 March 2022 16:32 Go to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Stephen M. Jones

On Saturday March 5th, 2022 SDF will kick off its TOPS-20 Boot Camp series
on https://twitch.tv/sdfpubnix at 1PM Pacific Time (9PM GMT). Registration
is open at https://twenex.org/?bootcamp which includes access to SDF's
XKL Toad-2 and is offered at no cost.

If you cannot attend an archive of the live stream (approximately
1 hour long) will be posted to the fediverse via SDF's Peertube instance,
https://toobnix.org

Looking forward to doing a "TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users", though any User
of any operating system background is certainly welcome, kid.
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413408 is a reply to message #413402] Thu, 03 March 2022 09:30 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
Messages: 4237
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Senior Member
"Stephen M. Jones" <smj@ma.sdf.org> writes:
> On Saturday March 5th, 2022 SDF will kick off its TOPS-20 Boot Camp series
> on https://twitch.tv/sdfpubnix at 1PM Pacific Time (9PM GMT). Registration
> is open at https://twenex.org/?bootcamp which includes access to SDF's
> XKL Toad-2 and is offered at no cost.
>
> If you cannot attend an archive of the live stream (approximately
> 1 hour long) will be posted to the fediverse via SDF's Peertube instance,
> https://toobnix.org
>
> Looking forward to doing a "TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users", though any User
> of any operating system background is certainly welcome, kid.
>

Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the PDP-10
vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a nostalgia or DEC politics
standpoint? My migration at the time was from a PDP-8 to PDP-11 to VAX-11.
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413409 is a reply to message #413408] Thu, 03 March 2022 11:38 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Ahem A Rivet's Shot is currently offline  Ahem A Rivet's Shot
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On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT
scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) wrote:

> Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the
> PDP-10 vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a

PDP-10 was a 36 bit mainframe that (usually) ran TOPS.
VAX-11/780 was a 32 bit mini that (usually) ran VMS.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413410 is a reply to message #413409] Thu, 03 March 2022 12:13 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
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Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> writes:
> On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT
> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) wrote:
>
>> Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the
>> PDP-10 vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a
>
> PDP-10 was a 36 bit mainframe that (usually) ran TOPS.
> VAX-11/780 was a 32 bit mini that (usually) ran VMS.
>

What were the advantages, if any, of one family over the other family?

I'm quite aware of the hardware specifications.

How does TOPS DCL compare with VMS DCL?
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413411 is a reply to message #413409] Thu, 03 March 2022 15:24 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Rich Alderson is currently offline  Rich Alderson
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Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> writes:

> On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT
> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) wrote:

>> Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the
>> PDP-10 vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a

> PDP-10 was a 36 bit mainframe that (usually) ran TOPS.
> VAX-11/780 was a 32 bit mini that (usually) ran VMS.

There is not such thing as "TOPS". There were 2 operating systems available
from DEC for the PDP-10 architecture, named "Tops-10" and "TOPS-20". (There
were others, such as MIT AI Lab's ITS, the Stanford AI Lab's WAITS, and BBN's
TENEX.)

Tops-10 was the older system, a direct development of the monitor developed for
the PDP-6. It featured a wide array of device types, including realtime
capabilities, and a very low level I/O model in which the programmer had to
know details of the device(s) for which she was writing (buffer sizes, how many
buffers to specify for best operation, etc.). System calls were created using
hardware instruction traps ("Unimplemented User Opcodes" or UUOs).

TOPS-20 was created for the third generation PDP-10, based on the research OS
TENEX from BBN (which was created to explore demand-paged virtual memory on the
first generation PDP-10). The only direct I/O access was to disks and tapes;
everything else was mediated through the PDP-11/40 front end processor (or
other PDP-11/34 processors for things like DECnet). There was only a single
system call instruction, JSYS "Jump to SYStem", with massive internal dispatch
tables to handle every contingency; I/O was handled by means of particular JSYS
calls, and internally handled by the page mapping hardware.

ITS started as an experiment on the PDP-6, and used the same model for I/O as
the DEC monitor, although the details and implementations were sui generis.

WAITS grew out of DEC's PDP-6 monitor, with updates to the PDP-10 version until
1972, at which time the two went their separate ways. WAITS used the same I/O
model as the DEC monitor, although hardware I/O instructions were available to
user mode programs without privilege escalation (for use with specialized
hardware like robot arms).

--
Rich Alderson news@alderson.users.panix.com
Audendum est, et veritas investiganda; quam etiamsi non assequamur,
omnino tamen proprius, quam nunc sumus, ad eam perveniemus.
--Galen
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413412 is a reply to message #413410] Thu, 03 March 2022 15:33 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Rich Alderson is currently offline  Rich Alderson
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scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) writes:

> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> writes:
>> On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT
>> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) wrote:

>>> Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the
>>> PDP-10 vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a

>> PDP-10 was a 36 bit mainframe that (usually) ran TOPS.
>> VAX-11/780 was a 32 bit mini that (usually) ran VMS.

> What were the advantages, if any, of one family over the other family?

VMS ran on supported hardware after 1983.

The PDP-10 operating systems were mainframe oriented ab origine, unlike VMS.

> I'm quite aware of the hardware specifications.

> How does TOPS DCL compare with VMS DCL?

Again, there ain't no "TOPS".

Tops-10 offered a facility called "MIC" which allowed for programmed execution
of programs, but programs had to be written to handle whatever command line
arguments they might expect.

TOPS-20 offered an unrelated facility also called "MIC", which was less capable
than the Tops-10 facility of the same name. In addition, later versions of
TOPS-20 offered "PCL" ("Programmable Command Language"), with a very different
syntax than MIC, which originated at CMU but provided as an unsupported feature
by DEC.

The facilities offered by both OSes are unrelated to "DCL" as understood by VMS
and other PDP-11 oeprating systems.

--
Rich Alderson news@alderson.users.panix.com
Audendum est, et veritas investiganda; quam etiamsi non assequamur,
omnino tamen proprius, quam nunc sumus, ad eam perveniemus.
--Galen
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413413 is a reply to message #413411] Thu, 03 March 2022 16:06 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Ahem A Rivet's Shot is currently offline  Ahem A Rivet's Shot
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On 03 Mar 2022 15:24:16 -0500
Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> wrote:

> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> writes:
>
>> On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT
>> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) wrote:
>
>>> Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the
>>> PDP-10 vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a
>
>> PDP-10 was a 36 bit mainframe that (usually) ran TOPS.
>> VAX-11/780 was a 32 bit mini that (usually) ran VMS.
>
> There is not such thing as "TOPS". There were 2 operating systems
> available from DEC for the PDP-10 architecture, named "Tops-10" and
> "TOPS-20". (There were others, such as MIT AI Lab's ITS, the Stanford AI
> Lab's WAITS, and BBN's TENEX.)

Yes I was using TOPS as a shorthand for "TOPS-10 or TOPS-20".

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413414 is a reply to message #413412] Thu, 03 March 2022 16:55 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
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Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:
> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) writes:
>
>> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> writes:
>>> On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT
>>> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) wrote:
>
>>>> Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the
>>>> PDP-10 vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a
>
>>> PDP-10 was a 36 bit mainframe that (usually) ran TOPS.
>>> VAX-11/780 was a 32 bit mini that (usually) ran VMS.
>
>> What were the advantages, if any, of one family over the other family?
>
> VMS ran on supported hardware after 1983.

I was using VMS 1979-1983.

>
> The PDP-10 operating systems were mainframe oriented ab origine, unlike VMS.

VMS wasn't designed as a batch system, so far as I'm aware, although
it could certainly serve as such.

>
>> I'm quite aware of the hardware specifications.
>
>> How does TOPS DCL compare with VMS DCL?
>
> Again, there ain't no "TOPS".

Correction noted. Let's abstract from the jargon and talk more
generically about the user interface. Pros and Cons of MIC/PCL
vs. DCL.

Note that I spent most of the 80's writing mainframe operating
systems for Burroughs, so I've both batch and TS experience.
You've used one of the Burroughs boxen at the LCM, yourself.

>
> The facilities offered by both OSes are unrelated to "DCL" as understood by VMS
> and other PDP-11 oeprating systems.

Generically, then. How does the interactive user experience differ
between the Decsystem-10/20 and the VAX-11/780. I've read quite a few
PDP-10 advocates claiming superiority, but I've never seen any
data to back it up other than "I prefer this to that" or "I'm pissed
because DEC management killed Jupiter".
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413415 is a reply to message #413412] Thu, 03 March 2022 19:46 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Bob Eager

On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 15:33:04 -0500, Rich Alderson wrote:

> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) writes:
>
>> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> writes:
>>> On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal)
>>> wrote:
>
>>>> Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the
>>>> PDP-10 vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a
>
>>> PDP-10 was a 36 bit mainframe that (usually) ran TOPS.
>>> VAX-11/780 was a 32 bit mini that (usually) ran VMS.
>
>> What were the advantages, if any, of one family over the other family?
>
> VMS ran on supported hardware after 1983.

It is also true to say that it ran on supported hardware in 1977.


--
Using UNIX since v6 (1975)...

Use the BIG mirror service in the UK:
http://www.mirrorservice.org
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413427 is a reply to message #413415] Fri, 04 March 2022 13:49 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Stephen M. Jones

I would like to apologize for confusing VMS users with my joke/reference.
Though Rich has provided some excellent background into the development of
TOPS-20. He was there and still is.

The "TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users" was in reference to the parody
in "Alice's PDP-10" which has a passage that goes a little like this:

....
And I put down my keyboard, and I switched buffers, and there ...
in the other buffer... centered in the other buffer... away from
everything else in the buffer... in parentheses, capital letters,
in reverse video, read the following words:

"Kid, have you taken the ``VMS for TOPS-20 managers'' course yet?"

I walked over to the man and I said "Mister, you got a lot of damned
gall asking me if I've taken the ``VMS for TOPS-20 managers'' course
yet. I mean... I mean... I mean, I'm sitting here on the bench, I'm
sitting here on the LCG SIG bench, 'cause you want to know if I'm
braindamaged enough trade my PDP-10 for partial credit on a system
that doesn't even handle filename completion after being a litterbug."

He looked at me and said "Kid, the front office don't like your kind,
so we're going to put you on our VAX/VMS mailing list." And friends,
somewhere down in the NE43 receiving room is a large trash barrel with
a big sign on it that says "VAX/VMS documents".
....

Hence the title of the SDF event: "TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users". And
it's really not just for VMS Users, but anyone interested in TOPS-20. There
will likely be more comparisons with Linux (a wildly popular operating system)
rather than with VMS (a mildly popular operating system).

You can hack anything that you want, with TECO and DDT.

References: https://www.hactrn.net/sra/alice/alices.pdp10
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413428 is a reply to message #413408] Fri, 04 March 2022 14:06 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Peter Flass is currently offline  Peter Flass
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Scott Lurndal <scott@slp53.sl.home> wrote:
> "Stephen M. Jones" <smj@ma.sdf.org> writes:
>> On Saturday March 5th, 2022 SDF will kick off its TOPS-20 Boot Camp series
>> on https://twitch.tv/sdfpubnix at 1PM Pacific Time (9PM GMT). Registration
>> is open at https://twenex.org/?bootcamp which includes access to SDF's
>> XKL Toad-2 and is offered at no cost.
>>
>> If you cannot attend an archive of the live stream (approximately
>> 1 hour long) will be posted to the fediverse via SDF's Peertube instance,
>> https://toobnix.org
>>
>> Looking forward to doing a "TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users", though any User
>> of any operating system background is certainly welcome, kid.
>>
>
> Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the PDP-10
> vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a nostalgia or DEC politics
> standpoint? My migration at the time was from a PDP-8 to PDP-11 to VAX-11.
>

I’ve used both, although my -10 knowledge is 50 years old and not as
in-depth as I’d like. I’d say that the PDP-10 was more RISCy, and a
programmer’s dream to program in MACRO.

--
Pete
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413429 is a reply to message #413414] Fri, 04 March 2022 14:06 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Peter Flass is currently offline  Peter Flass
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Scott Lurndal <scott@slp53.sl.home> wrote:
> Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:
>> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) writes:
>>
>>> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> writes:
>>>> On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT
>>>> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) wrote:
>>
>>>> > Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the
>>>> > PDP-10 vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a
>>
>>>> PDP-10 was a 36 bit mainframe that (usually) ran TOPS.
>>>> VAX-11/780 was a 32 bit mini that (usually) ran VMS.
>>
>>> What were the advantages, if any, of one family over the other family?
>>
>> VMS ran on supported hardware after 1983.
>
> I was using VMS 1979-1983.
>
>>
>> The PDP-10 operating systems were mainframe oriented ab origine, unlike VMS.
>
> VMS wasn't designed as a batch system, so far as I'm aware, although
> it could certainly serve as such.
>
>>
>>> I'm quite aware of the hardware specifications.
>>
>>> How does TOPS DCL compare with VMS DCL?
>>
>> Again, there ain't no "TOPS".
>
> Correction noted. Let's abstract from the jargon and talk more
> generically about the user interface. Pros and Cons of MIC/PCL
> vs. DCL.
>
> Note that I spent most of the 80's writing mainframe operating
> systems for Burroughs, so I've both batch and TS experience.
> You've used one of the Burroughs boxen at the LCM, yourself.
>
>>
>> The facilities offered by both OSes are unrelated to "DCL" as understood by VMS
>> and other PDP-11 oeprating systems.
>
> Generically, then. How does the interactive user experience differ
> between the Decsystem-10/20 and the VAX-11/780. I've read quite a few
> PDP-10 advocates claiming superiority, but I've never seen any
> data to back it up other than "I prefer this to that" or "I'm pissed
> because DEC management killed Jupiter".
>
>

It would have to be hard to tell, since the VAX hardware was a lot faster
than the PDP-10. I enjoyed working with both systems.

--
Pete
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413430 is a reply to message #413427] Fri, 04 March 2022 15:55 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: drb

> You can hack anything that you want, with TECO and DDT.

Excepting, of course, Alice.

De
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413433 is a reply to message #413429] Fri, 04 March 2022 16:23 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Paul Rubin

Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> writes:
> It would have to be hard to tell, since the VAX hardware was a lot faster
> than the PDP-10. I enjoyed working with both systems.

For the first N years, VAXes were much slower than the faster 10's.
Faster VAXes appeared later, and eventually overtook the 10 mostly due
to improved chip technology. The main VAX for a long time was the
original 11/780 (introduced 1977) which was the canonical 1 MIP machine.
A KL-10 (introduced 1975) was maybe 3x that, about equivalent(?) to the
VAX 8600 that that came out in 1984.

I don't know about today, but legend has it that a few 11/780's were
kept operational for decades after that model's obsolescence, to serve
as benchmark hosts for MIPs rating of newer cpus.
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413435 is a reply to message #413430] Fri, 04 March 2022 17:14 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
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drb@ihatespam.msu.edu (Dennis Boone) writes:
>> You can hack anything that you want, with TECO and DDT.
>
> Excepting, of course, Alice.

Thanks Arlo.
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413437 is a reply to message #413435] Fri, 04 March 2022 17:17 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Bob Eager

On Fri, 04 Mar 2022 22:14:54 +0000, Scott Lurndal wrote:

> drb@ihatespam.msu.edu (Dennis Boone) writes:
>>> You can hack anything that you want, with TECO and DDT.
>>
>> Excepting, of course, Alice.
>
> Thanks Arlo.

I have the album and the movie.



--
Using UNIX since v6 (1975)...

Use the BIG mirror service in the UK:
http://www.mirrorservice.org
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413443 is a reply to message #413415] Fri, 04 March 2022 22:46 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Rich Alderson is currently offline  Rich Alderson
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Bob Eager <news0009@eager.cx> writes:

> On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 15:33:04 -0500, Rich Alderson wrote:

>> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) writes:

>>> What were the advantages, if any, of one family over the other family?

>> VMS ran on supported hardware after 1983.

> It is also true to say that it ran on supported hardware in 1977.

The 4th generation of the PDP-10 line was canceled in May, 1983, although the
customer base was large enough (financially speaking) to force Digital to
provide hardware support until 1988 and software support until 1993, but there
were no more sales by Digital of PDP-10 hardware to new customers after May
1983.

So an advantage of the VAX and VMS over the PDP-10 systems was support after
1983. Got it?

--
Rich Alderson news@alderson.users.panix.com
Audendum est, et veritas investiganda; quam etiamsi non assequamur,
omnino tamen proprius, quam nunc sumus, ad eam perveniemus.
--Galen
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413444 is a reply to message #413413] Fri, 04 March 2022 22:47 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Rich Alderson is currently offline  Rich Alderson
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Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> writes:

> On 03 Mar 2022 15:24:16 -0500
> Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> wrote:

>> There is not such thing as "TOPS". There were 2 operating systems
>> available from DEC for the PDP-10 architecture, named "Tops-10" and
>> "TOPS-20". (There were others, such as MIT AI Lab's ITS, the Stanford AI
>> Lab's WAITS, and BBN's TENEX.)

> Yes I was using TOPS as a shorthand for "TOPS-10 or TOPS-20".

A bad habit, since the two operating systems shared exactly zero features and
exactly zero code.

--
Rich Alderson news@alderson.users.panix.com
Audendum est, et veritas investiganda; quam etiamsi non assequamur,
omnino tamen proprius, quam nunc sumus, ad eam perveniemus.
--Galen
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413454 is a reply to message #413437] Sat, 05 March 2022 23:35 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: David Lesher

Bob Eager <news0009@eager.cx> writes:

> On Fri, 04 Mar 2022 22:14:54 +0000, Scott Lurndal wrote:

>> drb@ihatespam.msu.edu (Dennis Boone) writes:
>>>> You can hack anything that you want, with TECO and DDT.
>>>
>>> Excepting, of course, Alice.
>>
>> Thanks Arlo.

> I have the album and the movie.

What about the 8x10 glossy photographs with circles and arrows...?

--
A host is a host from coast to coast...............wb8foz@panix.com
& no one will talk to a host that's close..........................
Unless the host (that isn't close).........................pob 1433
is busy, hung or dead....................................20915-1433
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413455 is a reply to message #413437] Sun, 06 March 2022 00:40 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Ahem A Rivet's Shot is currently offline  Ahem A Rivet's Shot
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On 4 Mar 2022 22:17:58 GMT
Bob Eager <news0009@eager.cx> wrote:

> I have the album and the movie.

How about the anniversary recordings ? I have the thirtieth which
has some fun Nixon references.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413456 is a reply to message #413412] Sun, 06 March 2022 11:21 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Johnny Billquist

I am of course, late to the game. And the bootcamp have already
happened. So people might already know the answers and comments I'm
about to give, but anyway...

On 2022-03-03 21:33, Rich Alderson wrote:
> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) writes:
>
>> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> writes:
>>> On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT
>>> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) wrote:
>
>>>> Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the
>>>> PDP-10 vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a
>
>>> PDP-10 was a 36 bit mainframe that (usually) ran TOPS.
>>> VAX-11/780 was a 32 bit mini that (usually) ran VMS.
>
>> What were the advantages, if any, of one family over the other family?
>
> VMS ran on supported hardware after 1983.

True. Or perhaps you should have said "developed after 1983". Not sure
if I'd classify that as an advantage when trying to do some kind of
comparison between the systems, though.

> The PDP-10 operating systems were mainframe oriented ab origine, unlike VMS.

Not entirely sure what you mean by that, Rich.
As you noted, Tops-10 originated in the monitor for the PDP-6. Is that
enough to call it mainframe? And is that a good thing? Tops-10 wasn't
very fancy or capable in some ways, even though it had some nifty things.
TOPS-20 is a completely different thing (as you also observed), with a
much more capable and nice design, if you ask me. If definitely have
some features and capabilities that VMS lacked. But was it more
mainframe-oriented? What does that even mean? TOPS-20 was probably worse
from an execution point of view than VMS, requiring more resources to
get the job done. But VMS isn't really any kind of batch oriented
environment either...

>> I'm quite aware of the hardware specifications.
>
>> How does TOPS DCL compare with VMS DCL?
>
> Again, there ain't no "TOPS".

[...MIC and and PCL text deleted...]
I think the question wasn't about scripting, but interactive use here.
Tops-10 or TOPS-20 did not have DCL. I can't remember what the
interactive command line interpreter was called in Tops-10, but in
TOPS-10 it's EXEC.
EXEC is for most people a much nicer environment than DCL. Command name
completion, filename completion, guide words, interactive help... It's
just so much nicer than DCL.

Scripting wise, it's much more muddled.

Apart from user interaction, some things are better, and some are worse
in VMS. It's hard to answer a generic question like "how were they
different", or what advantages one had over the other, unless we want to
just talk specific technical details. Because the rest is pretty subjective.

Johnny
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413457 is a reply to message #413433] Sun, 06 March 2022 11:29 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Johnny Billquist

On 2022-03-04 22:23, Paul Rubin wrote:
> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> writes:
>> It would have to be hard to tell, since the VAX hardware was a lot faster
>> than the PDP-10. I enjoyed working with both systems.
>
> For the first N years, VAXes were much slower than the faster 10's.

Not really. The KL10 was about 1.5 MIPS, while the original VAX-11/780
was 1 MIPS.

Speed parity was basically achieved with the VAX-11/785. After that, the
VAXen just were becoming faster.

The PDP-10 was never a speed daemon. It was helped a lot by being
offloaded for terminal I/O by the front end processor. But with the
spreading of ethernet, all of that work started moving back to the
PDP-10 itself, at which point you really felt the pain. 40 users on a
-2060 was usually not all that much fun, I can tell you. Heck, even 20
was painful.

> Faster VAXes appeared later, and eventually overtook the 10 mostly due
> to improved chip technology. The main VAX for a long time was the
> original 11/780 (introduced 1977) which was the canonical 1 MIP machine.
> A KL-10 (introduced 1975) was maybe 3x that, about equivalent(?) to the
> VAX 8600 that that came out in 1984.

KL-10 was about 1.5x. The 8600, introduced in 1984 was 4x the 11/780,
and was noticeably faster than the KL-10.

> I don't know about today, but legend has it that a few 11/780's were
> kept operational for decades after that model's obsolescence, to serve
> as benchmark hosts for MIPs rating of newer cpus.

I think I heard such stories, but I never put any value to them. Another
story/problem is that the original MIPS definition was also based on a
specific version of OS and compiler. And as these evolved, the
VAX-11/780 actually became significantly faster than 1 MIPS. Which
exposed a problem with the whole MIPS definition. And also meant keeping
any VAXen around for reference was pretty pointless.

And that's a big reason DEC themselves never used MIPS. They instead
talked about VUPs. Where a VAX-11/780 was by definition 1 VUP. And it
was more properly based on the actual processing speed, and not
depending on various software.

Johnny
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413458 is a reply to message #413456] Sun, 06 March 2022 13:34 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Peter Flass is currently offline  Peter Flass
Messages: 8375
Registered: December 2011
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> wrote:
> I am of course, late to the game. And the bootcamp have already
> happened. So people might already know the answers and comments I'm
> about to give, but anyway...
>
> On 2022-03-03 21:33, Rich Alderson wrote:
>> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) writes:
>>
>>> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> writes:
>>>> On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT
>>>> scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) wrote:
>>
>>>> > Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the
>>>> > PDP-10 vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a
>>
>>>> PDP-10 was a 36 bit mainframe that (usually) ran TOPS.
>>>> VAX-11/780 was a 32 bit mini that (usually) ran VMS.
>>
>>> What were the advantages, if any, of one family over the other family?
>>
>> VMS ran on supported hardware after 1983.
>
> True. Or perhaps you should have said "developed after 1983". Not sure
> if I'd classify that as an advantage when trying to do some kind of
> comparison between the systems, though.
>
>> The PDP-10 operating systems were mainframe oriented ab origine, unlike VMS.
>
> Not entirely sure what you mean by that, Rich.
> As you noted, Tops-10 originated in the monitor for the PDP-6. Is that
> enough to call it mainframe? And is that a good thing? Tops-10 wasn't
> very fancy or capable in some ways, even though it had some nifty things.
> TOPS-20 is a completely different thing (as you also observed), with a
> much more capable and nice design, if you ask me. If definitely have
> some features and capabilities that VMS lacked. But was it more
> mainframe-oriented? What does that even mean? TOPS-20 was probably worse
> from an execution point of view than VMS, requiring more resources to
> get the job done. But VMS isn't really any kind of batch oriented
> environment either...
>
>>> I'm quite aware of the hardware specifications.
>>
>>> How does TOPS DCL compare with VMS DCL?
>>
>> Again, there ain't no "TOPS".
>
> [...MIC and and PCL text deleted...]
> I think the question wasn't about scripting, but interactive use here.
> Tops-10 or TOPS-20 did not have DCL. I can't remember what the
> interactive command line interpreter was called in Tops-10, but in
> TOPS-10 it's EXEC.
> EXEC is for most people a much nicer environment than DCL. Command name
> completion, filename completion, guide words, interactive help... It's
> just so much nicer than DCL.
>
> Scripting wise, it's much more muddled.
>
> Apart from user interaction, some things are better, and some are worse
> in VMS. It's hard to answer a generic question like "how were they
> different", or what advantages one had over the other, unless we want to
> just talk specific technical details. Because the rest is pretty subjective.
>
> Johnny
>

It’s been a lot of years, but doesn’t VMS DCL have command-line completion?
(sorry for all the included text, I can’t seem to get this darn thing to
select text to delete)

--
Pete
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413459 is a reply to message #413457] Sun, 06 March 2022 13:34 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Peter Flass is currently offline  Peter Flass
Messages: 8375
Registered: December 2011
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> wrote:
> On 2022-03-04 22:23, Paul Rubin wrote:
>> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> writes:
>>> It would have to be hard to tell, since the VAX hardware was a lot faster
>>> than the PDP-10. I enjoyed working with both systems.
>>
>> For the first N years, VAXes were much slower than the faster 10's.
>
> Not really. The KL10 was about 1.5 MIPS, while the original VAX-11/780
> was 1 MIPS.
>
> Speed parity was basically achieved with the VAX-11/785. After that, the
> VAXen just were becoming faster.
>
> The PDP-10 was never a speed daemon. It was helped a lot by being
> offloaded for terminal I/O by the front end processor. But with the
> spreading of ethernet, all of that work started moving back to the
> PDP-10 itself, at which point you really felt the pain. 40 users on a
> -2060 was usually not all that much fun, I can tell you. Heck, even 20
> was painful.
>
>> Faster VAXes appeared later, and eventually overtook the 10 mostly due
>> to improved chip technology. The main VAX for a long time was the
>> original 11/780 (introduced 1977) which was the canonical 1 MIP machine.
>> A KL-10 (introduced 1975) was maybe 3x that, about equivalent(?) to the
>> VAX 8600 that that came out in 1984.
>
> KL-10 was about 1.5x. The 8600, introduced in 1984 was 4x the 11/780,
> and was noticeably faster than the KL-10.
>
>> I don't know about today, but legend has it that a few 11/780's were
>> kept operational for decades after that model's obsolescence, to serve
>> as benchmark hosts for MIPs rating of newer cpus.
>
> I think I heard such stories, but I never put any value to them. Another
> story/problem is that the original MIPS definition was also based on a
> specific version of OS and compiler. And as these evolved, the
> VAX-11/780 actually became significantly faster than 1 MIPS. Which
> exposed a problem with the whole MIPS definition. And also meant keeping
> any VAXen around for reference was pretty pointless.
>
> And that's a big reason DEC themselves never used MIPS. They instead
> talked about VUPs. Where a VAX-11/780 was by definition 1 VUP. And it
> was more properly based on the actual processing speed, and not
> depending on various software.
>
> Johnny
>

IBM never used MIPS either, but rated processors relative to each other. I
always thought they did this to avoid comparisons to other vendors’
machines, but it was probably as much because it was meaningless, as you
say.

--
Pete
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413464 is a reply to message #413457] Sun, 06 March 2022 14:17 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Paul Rubin

Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
> The KL10 was about 1.5 MIPS, while the original VAX-11/780 was 1 MIPS.

Ah ok, for some reason I had thought the KL10 was faster than that.
EIther way: "36 bits -- a full DEC" ;-)
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413465 is a reply to message #413459] Sun, 06 March 2022 14:40 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
Messages: 4237
Registered: February 2012
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Senior Member
Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> writes:
> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> wrote:

>>
>> And that's a big reason DEC themselves never used MIPS. They instead
>> talked about VUPs. Where a VAX-11/780 was by definition 1 VUP. And it
>> was more properly based on the actual processing speed, and not
>> depending on various software.
>>
>> Johnny
>>
>
> IBM never used MIPS either, but rated processors relative to each other. I
> always thought they did this to avoid comparisons to other vendors’
> machines, but it was probably as much because it was meaningless, as you
> say.

Likewise, Burroughs used RPM (Relative Performance Metric) to rate their
machines. RPM was measured using the throughput of a selected set of
customer applications in banking, finance and back-office fields.

The application set was once ported to run on the dominant competitors machines
and run on one of the 3030 series (iirc) to get a baseline for comparison.
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413470 is a reply to message #413456] Sun, 06 March 2022 20:43 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Rich Alderson is currently offline  Rich Alderson
Messages: 489
Registered: August 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:

> I am of course, late to the game. And the bootcamp have already
> happened. So people might already know the answers and comments I'm
> about to give, but anyway...

> On 2022-03-03 21:33, Rich Alderson wrote:

>> The PDP-10 operating systems were mainframe oriented ab origine, unlike VMS.

> Not entirely sure what you mean by that, Rich.

> As you noted, Tops-10 originated in the monitor for the PDP-6. Is that
> enough to call it mainframe? And is that a good thing? Tops-10 wasn't
> very fancy or capable in some ways, even though it had some nifty things.

I have in personal collection an advertisement from a UK magazine of the
Scientific American sort for the PDP-6 which touts it as a large system
available both for batch and for timesharing operations for a large number
of users. It was clearly positioned to compete with IBM and the rest of the
Seven Dwarves. (I do not believe that they had contracted into the BUNCH by
the 2nd quarter of 1964.)

On those grounds I will claim that it was considered to be a mainframe. KO
clearly considered it to be such when he declared (following its failure in the
marketplace) that DEC would not compete with IBM.

> TOPS-20 is a completely different thing (as you also observed), with a much
> more capable and nice design, if you ask me. If definitely have some features
> and capabilities that VMS lacked. But was it more mainframe-oriented? What
> does that even mean? TOPS-20 was probably worse from an execution point of
> view than VMS, requiring more resources to get the job done. But VMS isn't
> really any kind of batch oriented environment either...

DEC positioned the DEC-20 and TOPS-20 as *replacements* for Tops-10 on the
earlier generations of the PDP-10. If we can agree that DEC marketed those as
mainframe systems, then we have to accept that the -20 was also intended as a
mainframe.

> [...MIC and and PCL text deleted...]
> I think the question wasn't about scripting, but interactive use here.
> Tops-10 or TOPS-20 did not have DCL. I can't remember what the
> interactive command line interpreter was called in Tops-10, but in
> TOPS-10 it's EXEC.

Most of the discussion of DCL which I see on comp.os.vms has to do with the
scripting features rather than interactive use, so that's what I tend to think
of when asked to compare the PDP-10 offerings to it.

On Tops-10, the command processor is part of the running monitor; TOPS-20 has
only a very very limited built-in command processor, called the Mini-EXEC, with
single character commands to G(et a monitor), S(tart the loaded monitor), and
possibly E(nter DDT on the monitor) but that might be a pipe dream.

I do not know VMS (or RSTS/E or RSX) internals. Is DCL a separate program,
like the TOPS-20 EXEC? Or an interaction with the monitor/kernel?

> EXEC is for most people a much nicer environment than DCL. Command name
> completion, filename completion, guide words, interactive help... It's
> just so much nicer than DCL.

You get no argument from me!

> Scripting wise, it's much more muddled.

> Apart from user interaction, some things are better, and some are worse
> in VMS. It's hard to answer a generic question like "how were they
> different", or what advantages one had over the other, unless we want to
> just talk specific technical details. Because the rest is pretty subjective.

Amen.

--
Rich Alderson news@alderson.users.panix.com
Audendum est, et veritas investiganda; quam etiamsi non assequamur,
omnino tamen proprius, quam nunc sumus, ad eam perveniemus.
--Galen
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413471 is a reply to message #413457] Sun, 06 March 2022 22:11 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Charlie Gibbs is currently offline  Charlie Gibbs
Messages: 5313
Registered: January 2012
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Senior Member
On 2022-03-06, Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> wrote:

> I think I heard such stories, but I never put any value to them. Another
> story/problem is that the original MIPS definition was also based on a
> specific version of OS and compiler. And as these evolved, the
> VAX-11/780 actually became significantly faster than 1 MIPS. Which
> exposed a problem with the whole MIPS definition. And also meant keeping
> any VAXen around for reference was pretty pointless.

Hence that definition of MIPS:

Meaningless Indicator of Processor Speed

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | Microsoft is a dictatorship.
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | Apple is a cult.
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | Linux is anarchy.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | Pick your poison.
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413475 is a reply to message #413470] Mon, 07 March 2022 10:07 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
Messages: 4237
Registered: February 2012
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Senior Member
Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:
> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>

>
> I do not know VMS (or RSTS/E or RSX) internals. Is DCL a separate program,
> like the TOPS-20 EXEC? Or an interaction with the monitor/kernel?

VMS is an odd beast in that respect. The VAX had a four privilege
rings (aside: interestingly enough, the relatively recent ARMv8
architecture also has four privilege rings (with a fifth coming soon)).

The kernel ran in the most privileged ring, Kernel Mode. RMS (mainly
derived from RSX-11, IIRC, and authored by Andy Goldstein (IIRC again))
ran in the next most privileged ring (Executive Mode). The Command
Interpreter (DCL) ran in the next ring (Supervisor Mode), and user
applications ran in the least privileged ring (User Mode).

As with most[*] ring-based privilege architectures, ring switches were
expensive and I believe once they went to Alpha, that architecture was
pretty much dead.

>
>> EXEC is for most people a much nicer environment than DCL. Command name
>> completion, filename completion, guide words, interactive help... It's
>> just so much nicer than DCL.

I didn't miss any of those features during the four years (1979-1983) that
I was doing systems programming on a four-vax cluster (with MA-780!), but
then I had been using TSS8.24 prior to that :-).

[*] most non-risc-based architectures, anyway. ARMv8 ring switches
while not free, can be quite efficient - far different from Intel
ring switches, for which three generations of ring-switch instructions
were created over the decades to make them more efficient.
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413476 is a reply to message #413458] Mon, 07 March 2022 11:42 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Johnny Billquist

On 2022-03-06 19:34, Peter Flass wrote:
> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> wrote:
>> I am of course, late to the game. And the bootcamp have already
>> happened. So people might already know the answers and comments I'm
>> about to give, but anyway...

>>>> How does TOPS DCL compare with VMS DCL?
>>>
>>> Again, there ain't no "TOPS".
>>
>> [...MIC and and PCL text deleted...]
>> I think the question wasn't about scripting, but interactive use here.
>> Tops-10 or TOPS-20 did not have DCL. I can't remember what the
>> interactive command line interpreter was called in Tops-10, but in
>> TOPS-10 it's EXEC.
>> EXEC is for most people a much nicer environment than DCL. Command name
>> completion, filename completion, guide words, interactive help... It's
>> just so much nicer than DCL.
>>
>> Scripting wise, it's much more muddled.
>>
>> Apart from user interaction, some things are better, and some are worse
>> in VMS. It's hard to answer a generic question like "how were they
>> different", or what advantages one had over the other, unless we want to
>> just talk specific technical details. Because the rest is pretty subjective.
>>
>> Johnny
>>
>
> It’s been a lot of years, but doesn’t VMS DCL have command-line completion?
> (sorry for all the included text, I can’t seem to get this darn thing to
> select text to delete)

No, it don't. On VAX, there was a hack (from DECUS?) called DCLCOMPLETE
which sortof added this. But I don't think it was ever made to work on
any other hardware platform, it was sortof not working perfectly, and it
was definitely not something DEC ever included.

Johnny
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413477 is a reply to message #413408] Mon, 07 March 2022 11:48 Go to previous messageGo to next message
D.J. is currently offline  D.J.
Messages: 821
Registered: January 2012
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Senior Member
On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT, scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal)
wrote:

> "Stephen M. Jones" <smj@ma.sdf.org> writes:
>> On Saturday March 5th, 2022 SDF will kick off its TOPS-20 Boot Camp series
>> on https://twitch.tv/sdfpubnix at 1PM Pacific Time (9PM GMT). Registration
>> is open at https://twenex.org/?bootcamp which includes access to SDF's
>> XKL Toad-2 and is offered at no cost.
>>
>> If you cannot attend an archive of the live stream (approximately
>> 1 hour long) will be posted to the fediverse via SDF's Peertube instance,
>> https://toobnix.org
>>
>> Looking forward to doing a "TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users", though any User
>> of any operating system background is certainly welcome, kid.
>>
>
> Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the PDP-10
> vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a nostalgia or DEC politics
> standpoint? My migration at the time was from a PDP-8 to PDP-11 to VAX-11.

I didn't have access to the 11/780. The campus I was on had the
11/730. What differences for it ?

--
Jim
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413478 is a reply to message #413475] Mon, 07 March 2022 11:51 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Johnny Billquist

On 2022-03-07 16:07, Scott Lurndal wrote:
> Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:
>> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>>
>
>>
>> I do not know VMS (or RSTS/E or RSX) internals. Is DCL a separate program,
>> like the TOPS-20 EXEC? Or an interaction with the monitor/kernel?
>
> VMS is an odd beast in that respect. The VAX had a four privilege
> rings (aside: interestingly enough, the relatively recent ARMv8
> architecture also has four privilege rings (with a fifth coming soon)).
>
> The kernel ran in the most privileged ring, Kernel Mode. RMS (mainly
> derived from RSX-11, IIRC, and authored by Andy Goldstein (IIRC again))
> ran in the next most privileged ring (Executive Mode). The Command
> Interpreter (DCL) ran in the next ring (Supervisor Mode), and user
> applications ran in the least privileged ring (User Mode).
>
> As with most[*] ring-based privilege architectures, ring switches were
> expensive and I believe once they went to Alpha, that architecture was
> pretty much dead.

People are always making the multiple processor modes a thing way bigger
than it is.

To comment more towards what Rich was thinking/asking, DCL is not a
normal user program. It is possible to have other "shells" than DCL,
which would live at the same level as DCL, but that almost was
non-existant in real life. People instead have shells as programs
running while DCL is still lurking in the background.

So it's less flexible than in Unix or TOPS-20, where it's just a program
like any other.

RSX is in a way maybe the most weird of them all. In the goal to
minimize memory and process resources, there is usually no program
associated with your terminal when you are at the DCL prompt. Instead,
it's all the responsibility of the terminal driver. Only when you've
completed a line and hit enter will DCL (or MCR) be started for you, to
process the line you typed.

In VMS, DCL is there the whole time.

>>> EXEC is for most people a much nicer environment than DCL. Command name
>>> completion, filename completion, guide words, interactive help... It's
>>> just so much nicer than DCL.
>
> I didn't miss any of those features during the four years (1979-1983) that
> I was doing systems programming on a four-vax cluster (with MA-780!), but
> then I had been using TSS8.24 prior to that :-).

It's one of those things where if you never used it, you don't
understand how much it means, and how much you'll miss it if it goes away.

It's very similar to how you'll feel today if someone throws /bin/sh at
you, and you are used to tcsh or bash. No filename completion, no line
editing, no interactive information, no nothing. It's like going back to
the dark ages.

And TOPS-20 EXEC is *better* than tcsh or bash...

Johnny
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413479 is a reply to message #413464] Mon, 07 March 2022 11:53 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Johnny Billquist

On 2022-03-06 20:17, Paul Rubin wrote:
> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>> The KL10 was about 1.5 MIPS, while the original VAX-11/780 was 1 MIPS.
>
> Ah ok, for some reason I had thought the KL10 was faster than that.
> EIther way: "36 bits -- a full DEC" ;-)

You are not alone. Lots of people seem to think the KL10 was way faster
than it was.

Anyway, I still appreciate the 36-bit quote. But deep down inside, I'm a
PDP-11 person. :-D

Johnny
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413480 is a reply to message #413477] Mon, 07 March 2022 12:03 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
Messages: 4237
Registered: February 2012
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Senior Member
D.J. <chucktheouch@gmail.com> writes:
> On Thu, 03 Mar 2022 14:30:52 GMT, scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal)
> wrote:
>
>> "Stephen M. Jones" <smj@ma.sdf.org> writes:
>>> On Saturday March 5th, 2022 SDF will kick off its TOPS-20 Boot Camp series
>>> on https://twitch.tv/sdfpubnix at 1PM Pacific Time (9PM GMT). Registration
>>> is open at https://twenex.org/?bootcamp which includes access to SDF's
>>> XKL Toad-2 and is offered at no cost.
>>>
>>> If you cannot attend an archive of the live stream (approximately
>>> 1 hour long) will be posted to the fediverse via SDF's Peertube instance,
>>> https://toobnix.org
>>>
>>> Looking forward to doing a "TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users", though any User
>>> of any operating system background is certainly welcome, kid.
>>>
>>
>> Can you refresh my memory on the advantages and disadvantages of the PDP-10
>> vs. the VAX-11/780? From a technical standpoint, not from a nostalgia or DEC politics
>> standpoint? My migration at the time was from a PDP-8 to PDP-11 to VAX-11.
>
> I didn't have access to the 11/780. The campus I was on had the
> 11/730. What differences for it ?

From the perspective of the average user, there was no difference
between the 11/730, 11/750 or 11/780 other than absolute performance.
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413482 is a reply to message #413478] Mon, 07 March 2022 12:07 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
Messages: 4237
Registered: February 2012
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Senior Member
Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
> On 2022-03-07 16:07, Scott Lurndal wrote:
>> Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:
>>> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>>>

>
> It's very similar to how you'll feel today if someone throws /bin/sh at
> you, and you are used to tcsh or bash. No filename completion, no line
> editing, no interactive information, no nothing. It's like going back to
> the dark ages.

For what it's worth, I've been using ksh since 1989 and while it supports
filename completion, I've never used it (since I use vi-style command
line editing, it takes more than just the tab key to invoke completion).
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413483 is a reply to message #413482] Mon, 07 March 2022 13:47 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Peter Flass is currently offline  Peter Flass
Messages: 8375
Registered: December 2011
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Scott Lurndal <scott@slp53.sl.home> wrote:
> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>> On 2022-03-07 16:07, Scott Lurndal wrote:
>>> Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:
>>>> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>>>>
>
>>
>> It's very similar to how you'll feel today if someone throws /bin/sh at
>> you, and you are used to tcsh or bash. No filename completion, no line
>> editing, no interactive information, no nothing. It's like going back to
>> the dark ages.
>
> For what it's worth, I've been using ksh since 1989 and while it supports
> filename completion, I've never used it (since I use vi-style command
> line editing, it takes more than just the tab key to invoke completion).
>

I’m always amazed when I try to use some piece of software I used to use
years ago how primitive it seems now. Back then non-ISPF TSO or DOS EDLIN
seemed like usable, if not much fun, pieces of software. Playing with old
systems like TSS or Multics it seems like my biggest problem is lack of a
decent editor.

--
Pete
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413485 is a reply to message #413482] Mon, 07 March 2022 14:18 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Johnny Billquist

On 2022-03-07 18:07, Scott Lurndal wrote:
> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>> On 2022-03-07 16:07, Scott Lurndal wrote:
>>> Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:
>>>> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>>>>
>
>>
>> It's very similar to how you'll feel today if someone throws /bin/sh at
>> you, and you are used to tcsh or bash. No filename completion, no line
>> editing, no interactive information, no nothing. It's like going back to
>> the dark ages.
>
> For what it's worth, I've been using ksh since 1989 and while it supports
> filename completion, I've never used it (since I use vi-style command
> line editing, it takes more than just the tab key to invoke completion).

Never used ksh, but it still certainly sounds like miles from sh.

I don't expect people will really get involved in TOPS-20 EXEC now, but
if you were to use it for a while, I think you'd start see my point. :-)

If you ever use Cisco gear, you might have gotten some taste of it as
well...

Johnny
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413486 is a reply to message #413483] Mon, 07 March 2022 14:19 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
Messages: 4237
Registered: February 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> writes:
> Scott Lurndal <scott@slp53.sl.home> wrote:
>> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>>> On 2022-03-07 16:07, Scott Lurndal wrote:
>>>> Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:
>>>> > Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>>>> >
>>
>>>
>>> It's very similar to how you'll feel today if someone throws /bin/sh at
>>> you, and you are used to tcsh or bash. No filename completion, no line
>>> editing, no interactive information, no nothing. It's like going back to
>>> the dark ages.
>>
>> For what it's worth, I've been using ksh since 1989 and while it supports
>> filename completion, I've never used it (since I use vi-style command
>> line editing, it takes more than just the tab key to invoke completion).
>>
>
> I’m always amazed when I try to use some piece of software I used to use
> years ago how primitive it seems now. Back then non-ISPF TSO or DOS EDLIN
> seemed like usable, if not much fun, pieces of software. Playing with old
> systems like TSS or Multics it seems like my biggest problem is lack of a
> decent editor.

Yeah. I occasionally fire up tss8.24 on simh just to recall the old days;
using PIP to copy files seems so 1974. I also fire up the HP-3000 MPE
on simh as I used that after the PDP-8, but before the VAX. Interactively,
it was better than tss8.24, but compared to DCL, the command language was
limited (no scripting capability, for example) - however, the concept of
PASS files was an interesting feature - during a compile-link-run job
the output of a step could be written to $NEWPASS and the next step would
read from $OLDPASS; a transient unnamed temporary disk file.

$ BASICCOMP FILE.BAS
$ PREP $OLDPASS, $NEWPASS
$ RUN $OLDPASS
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413487 is a reply to message #413470] Mon, 07 March 2022 14:24 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Johnny Billquist

On 2022-03-07 02:43, Rich Alderson wrote:
> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>
>> I am of course, late to the game. And the bootcamp have already
>> happened. So people might already know the answers and comments I'm
>> about to give, but anyway...
>
>> On 2022-03-03 21:33, Rich Alderson wrote:
>
>>> The PDP-10 operating systems were mainframe oriented ab origine, unlike VMS.
>
>> Not entirely sure what you mean by that, Rich.
>
>> As you noted, Tops-10 originated in the monitor for the PDP-6. Is that
>> enough to call it mainframe? And is that a good thing? Tops-10 wasn't
>> very fancy or capable in some ways, even though it had some nifty things.
>
> I have in personal collection an advertisement from a UK magazine of the
> Scientific American sort for the PDP-6 which touts it as a large system
> available both for batch and for timesharing operations for a large number
> of users. It was clearly positioned to compete with IBM and the rest of the
> Seven Dwarves. (I do not believe that they had contracted into the BUNCH by
> the 2nd quarter of 1964.)
>
> On those grounds I will claim that it was considered to be a mainframe. KO
> clearly considered it to be such when he declared (following its failure in the
> marketplace) that DEC would not compete with IBM.

Fair enough. I would still consider both Tops-10 and TOPS-20 to be very
interactive centered. Not really mainframe, except for size and approach
to solve some problems using smaller processors attach and offload stuff
to them.

>> TOPS-20 is a completely different thing (as you also observed), with a much
>> more capable and nice design, if you ask me. If definitely have some features
>> and capabilities that VMS lacked. But was it more mainframe-oriented? What
>> does that even mean? TOPS-20 was probably worse from an execution point of
>> view than VMS, requiring more resources to get the job done. But VMS isn't
>> really any kind of batch oriented environment either...
>
> DEC positioned the DEC-20 and TOPS-20 as *replacements* for Tops-10 on the
> earlier generations of the PDP-10. If we can agree that DEC marketed those as
> mainframe systems, then we have to accept that the -20 was also intended as a
> mainframe.

I think part of the problem that this all becomes just labels for
marketing. Does it mean anything, and if so - what?

I don't think the differences between VMS and the PDP-10 OSes are that
radical. They are basically useful and used in the same type of
environments.

>> [...MIC and and PCL text deleted...]
>> I think the question wasn't about scripting, but interactive use here.
>> Tops-10 or TOPS-20 did not have DCL. I can't remember what the
>> interactive command line interpreter was called in Tops-10, but in
>> TOPS-10 it's EXEC.
>
> Most of the discussion of DCL which I see on comp.os.vms has to do with the
> scripting features rather than interactive use, so that's what I tend to think
> of when asked to compare the PDP-10 offerings to it.

Fair enough. I just got the impression that the OP in this case was
trying to understand the differences perceived by an interactive user.

>> EXEC is for most people a much nicer environment than DCL. Command name
>> completion, filename completion, guide words, interactive help... It's
>> just so much nicer than DCL.
>
> You get no argument from me!

:-)

Johnny
Re: TOPS-20 Boot Camp for VMS Users 05-Mar-2022 [message #413488 is a reply to message #413485] Mon, 07 March 2022 14:37 Go to previous messageGo to previous message
scott is currently offline  scott
Messages: 4237
Registered: February 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
> On 2022-03-07 18:07, Scott Lurndal wrote:
>> Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>>> On 2022-03-07 16:07, Scott Lurndal wrote:
>>>> Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:
>>>> > Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se> writes:
>>>> >
>>
>>>
>>> It's very similar to how you'll feel today if someone throws /bin/sh at
>>> you, and you are used to tcsh or bash. No filename completion, no line
>>> editing, no interactive information, no nothing. It's like going back to
>>> the dark ages.
>>
>> For what it's worth, I've been using ksh since 1989 and while it supports
>> filename completion, I've never used it (since I use vi-style command
>> line editing, it takes more than just the tab key to invoke completion).
>
> Never used ksh, but it still certainly sounds like miles from sh.

Indeed, ksh is quite powerful - you can even access arbitrary shared
library functions linked in at runtime; has associative arrays and
a host of other useful scripting features (ksh93).

>
> I don't expect people will really get involved in TOPS-20 EXEC now, but
> if you were to use it for a while, I think you'd start see my point. :-)

I find most of those old command interpreters limited and unusable after
using the korn shell for so many years. I could give TOPS-20 EXEC
a try on simh someday to see, but I don't expect to like it much;
I suppose I could try to port the COBOL startrek game to COBOL on
the PDP-10 someday when I have absolutely nothing else to do :-)

>
> If you ever use Cisco gear, you might have gotten some taste of it as
> well...

I got an offer to join the IOS team (and an offer from NetApp at the
same time), but turned them down and went to SGI instead - both Cisco
and Netapp would have been financially more lucrative in the long run, sadly.
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