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From: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Sender: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Subject: TOPS-20 Y2K report
To: TOPS-20 Hackers and Yackers <[email protected]>
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..Dom Perignon and SPAM... BURP!

The Panda 2020 went through the year without complaint.  However, I noticed
something...

TOPS-20 treats all two-digit years as being in the 20th century; that is,
1/1/00 is treated as 1/1/1900.  Also, if OD%4YR is off in ODTIM%, a four digit
year is output except when the year is in the 20th century, e.g. the following
output from VDIRECTORY:
MAIL.TXT.1;P770000        18 45313(7)    1-Jan-2000 00:47:25 MRC
MM.INIT.75;P777700         1 1211(7)     1-Jul-91 13:21:50 MRC

These are arguably not Y2K bugs, since this behavior has been documented for
years.  But maybe we should fix this.  How should we do it?

My suggestions:

For IDTIM%, any year between 00 and 63 be in the 21st century, and from 64
(the start of TOPS-10) until 99 should be in the 20th century.  That'll give
us another 64 years to figure out something better to do.

For ODTIM%, I suggest that OD%4YR be deprecated, and treated as if it is
always on.


I haven't checked for Y2K bugs in the various random TOPS-10 applications that
were ported to TOPS-20.

04-Jan-2000 00:47:19 -0800,2720;000000000020
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Date: Tue, 4 Jan 2000 09:38:45 +0100 (MET)
From: Bjorn Victor <[email protected]>
To: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Cc: TOPS-20 Hackers and Yackers <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: TOPS-20 Y2K report
In-Reply-To: <[email protected]>
References: <[email protected]>
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Mark Crispin writes:
> My suggestions:
>
> For IDTIM%, any year between 00 and 63 be in the 21st century, and from 64
> (the start of TOPS-10) until 99 should be in the 20th century.  That'll give
> us another 64 years to figure out something better to do.

I think the scheme of Common Lisp (pun unintentional) is better.  In
its definition of Decoded Time format, a year between 0 and 99 is
assumed to be equal to the integer modulo 100 and within fifty years
of the current year (inclusive backwards and exclusive forwards).
Thus, in the year 2001, year 63 is 1963, but year 21 is 2021.

Your scheme has the advantage of being backwards-compatible, but I am
entirely for doing "something better" as soon as possible.

> For ODTIM%, I suggest that OD%4YR be deprecated, and treated as if it is
> always on.

Is there really any reason for this?  I believe that printing
two-digit years will still be useful, as long as we know what those
two-digit numbers mean.


Another issue may be compatibility with the various flavours of
TOPS-20 which actually exist.  For example, it seems like the version
running on a friend's SC30M (monitor version 7(21733)) has a hack
using 2B18 in AC3 to ODTIM% to index a "year base" table, and
if the year being output is within a century of that base, 2-digit
format is used.  The table seems to have the values
[ 1900., 1900., 1964., 1964. ].  Maybe someone out there has
source/documentation of this hack?  Is it a late autopatch thing?  The
XKL system does not seem to have this, but instead always outputs
4-digit format.

Comments?

-- Bjorn
04-Jan-2000 08:30:08 -0800,2363;000000000020
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From: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Sender: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: TOPS-20 Y2K report
To: Bjorn Victor <[email protected]>
cc: TOPS-20 Hackers and Yackers <[email protected]>
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On Tue, 4 Jan 2000 09:38:45 +0100 (MET), Bjorn Victor wrote:
> I think the scheme of Common Lisp (pun unintentional) is better.  In
> its definition of Decoded Time format, a year between 0 and 99 is
> assumed to be equal to the integer modulo 100 and within fifty years
> of the current year (inclusive backwards and exclusive forwards).
> Thus, in the year 2001, year 63 is 1963, but year 21 is 2021.

Hmm.  The problem is, Americans are quite accustomed to writing their birth
year as two digits, and this will present a problem for those of us who are
approaching 50 (or who have already crossed the big five-oh).

The other problem is that in a few short years, there will be files that are
over 50 years old....

> > For ODTIM%, I suggest that OD%4YR be deprecated, and treated as if it is
> > always on.
> Is there really any reason for this?  I believe that printing
> two-digit years will still be useful, as long as we know what those
> two-digit numbers mean.

That's the problem.  We may not always remember what two-digit years actually
mean.  Also, what do we do after 2064, when it truly becomes ambiguous what a
two digit date in a printout means?

> For example, it seems like the version
> running on a friend's SC30M (monitor version 7(21733)) has a hack
> using 2B18 in AC3 to ODTIM% to index a "year base" table, and
> if the year being output is within a century of that base, 2-digit
> format is used.  The table seems to have the values
> [ 1900., 1900., 1964., 1964. ].  Maybe someone out there has
> source/documentation of this hack?  Is it a late autopatch thing?  The
> XKL system does not seem to have this, but instead always outputs
> 4-digit format.

This isn't in the final DEC sources; it might be an SC hack.

21-Apr-2000 13:06:30 -0700,1772;000000000000
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Date: Fri, 21 Apr 2000 16:04:03 -0400 (EDT)
From: Pat Barron <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: What is on the second tape of V4.1 distribution ?
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OK, so I'm messing with this KS10 emulator (don't ask for a copy - at
least, not yet; I'm somewhat embarrassed by how long I've been working on
it and how little is done).  I'd like to be able to try running TOPS-20 on
it, when it's ready for that.

I have two 4.1 tape images; one "TOPS-20 V4.1 2020 INSTL", which I *hope*
is a bootable tape.  The other tape image is "T-20 V4.1 2020 DIST 1/2"
(i.e., tape 1 of 2).  I don't have the second tape.

So, two (hopefully quick) questions:

 1) Is the "INSTL" tape indeed bootable?

 2) What is on the second tape of the "DIST" set, and can I get by
without it?  Would the second tape have TCP/IP?  I believe this was
available for V4, but not sure if it was supported on the KS10.

Thanks,
--Pat.


21-Apr-2000 13:27:35 -0700,2362;000000000000
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From: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Sender: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Subject: re: What is on the second tape of V4.1 distribution ?
To: Pat Barron <[email protected]>
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On Fri, 21 Apr 2000 16:04:03 -0400 (EDT), Pat Barron wrote:
>   1) Is the "INSTL" tape indeed bootable?

Yes.  It contains: KS ucode, MONITR.EXE, EXEC.EXE, DLUSER.EXE, DLUSER data,
DUMPER.EXE, DUMPER data.  Simple instructions after loading microcode

1) boot the monitor, start at 143, follow prompts to create a PS filesystem,
  enter date/time, wait until it quiets down.
2) Type CTRL/C, get "NO EXEC" message following by mini-EXEC "MX>" prompt.
3) Type "G MTA0:", then "S".  You should now be in an EXEC.
4) Type "RUN MTA0:", get DLUSER with a "DLUSER>" prompt.
5) Type "LOAD MTA0:", wait for completion, type "EXIT".
6) Type "RUN MTA0:", get DUMPER with a "DUMPER>" prompt.
7) Type "RESTORE MTA0:", wait for completion; repeat until end of tape.
8) Type "EXIT".
9) Do whatever procedure is necessary to install SMBOOT.BIN for bootstrap
   purposes in your emulator.
10) Type CTRL/E followed by "CEASE +0:0:5", then LOGOUT.
11) Wait for "Shutdown complete"
12) Give console shutdown command; this is a command that deposits non-zero
    into location 30.
13) Reboot the system, loading the monitor from disk this time, and answer "Y"
    to the "Run CHECKD?" question.
14) CTRL/C, log in as OPERATOR, password DEC-20, start creating accounts.

>   2) What is on the second tape of the "DIST" set, and can I get by
> without it?

It's a continuation of <LANGUAGE-SOURCES>, which is mostly BLISS garbage, but
also has such things as MACRO.MAC and LINK sources.  For some bizarre reason,
GALAXY sources are there too.

The real impact is that you'll lose the ability to rebuild GALAXY if you don't
have the second tape.

> Would the second tape have TCP/IP?

Nope.  Not on 4.x  TCP was first supported in 5.1.

21-Apr-2000 18:04:51 -0700,1449;000000000000
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Subject: Re: What is on the second tape of V4.1 distribution ?
From: Mark Garrett <[email protected]>
To: Pat Barron <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>
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on 22/04/2000 06:04, Pat Barron at [email protected] wrote:

> OK, so I'm messing with this KS10 emulator (don't ask for a copy - at
> least, not yet; I'm somewhat embarrassed by how long I've been working on
> it and how little is done).  I'd like to be able to try running TOPS-20 on
Never get embarrassed by that, you don't now how short a time unless you
know how long the rest of us have also been at it :)


   Cheers
       mark :)

10-May-2000 10:21:59 -0700,603;000000000000
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From: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Sender: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Subject: 36th anniversary of 36 bits at DEC
To: TOPS-20 Hackers and Yackers <[email protected]>
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Rumor has it that today is the 36th anniversary of 36 bits at DEC.  Give your
favorite PDP-10 a hug today.

16-May-2000 08:17:13 -0700,2012;000000000000
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From: Ken Rossman - NYC SE <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Original Adventure game
Resent-To: [email protected]

OK, so this is not quite exactly a TOPS20-specific question, but since TOPS
was one major platform this code ran on...

Anyone remember the old, original, text-based Adventure game (OK, OK, I
know that's kinda like asking, "Anyone remember AIR?")...

Any chance this might still be kicking around in close to its original
form, and/or in source code.  Or might there perhaps be the same game (same
cave map, treasure list, etc) in some other form, such as one that could
run under Unix, or even on a Windows or a Mac machine???

:-)

Ken Rossman, NYC SE           212-558-9182  ||  212-558-9329 (FAX)
Sun Microsystems              Email: [email protected]
2 World Trade Ctr, 25th Fl.   SUN URL: http://noho.East/~rossman
New York, NY 10048            Ext.URL: http://www.columbia.edu/~rossman
16-May-2000 12:05:12 -0700,2388;000000000000
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Date: Tue, 16 May 2000 12:03:04 -0700
From: Joe Smith <[email protected]>
To: Ken Rossman - NYC SE <[email protected]>
Cc: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
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In-Reply-To: <[email protected]>; from [email protected] on Tue, May 16, 2000 at 11:17:16AM -0400

On Tue, May 16, 2000 at 11:17:16AM -0400, Ken Rossman - NYC SE wrote:
> OK, so this is not quite exactly a TOPS20-specific question, but since TOPS
> was one major platform this code ran on...
>
> Anyone remember the old, original, text-based Adventure game (OK, OK, I
> know that's kinda like asking, "Anyone remember AIR?")...
>
> Any chance this might still be kicking around in close to its original
> form, and/or in source code.  Or might there perhaps be the same game (same
> cave map, treasure list, etc) in some other form, such as one that could
> run under Unix, or even on a Windows or a Mac machine???

Someone at Stanford had a CGI interface to ADVENT; it would do a
[ restore-game, do one move, save-game ] operation by saving state in
a long URL.  It appears that that one is no longer around.

While running Netscape, enter
       advent colossal cave
in the Location field (instead of a URL).  That will bring up the
Google search engine.  The fourth entry it lists is "'Adventure' downloads"
http://people.delphi.com/rickadams/adventure/e_downloads.html

It lists DOS, Amiga, Mac, and Unix-C versions.
       -Joe

--
Joe Smith    MCI WorldCom, On-Net Design/Impl, Product Technical Support
UNIX and Tech Sup: TYMNET Network, Xstream Packet Services (Public X.25)
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16-May-2000 17:54:23 -0700,2292;000000000000
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Date: Tue, 16 May 2000 17:18:11 -0400
To: Ken Rossman - NYC SE <[email protected]>, [email protected]
From: Wexelblat <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game

At 11:17 AM -0400 5/16/00, Ken Rossman - NYC SE wrote:
>OK, so this is not quite exactly a TOPS20-specific question, but since TOPS
>was one major platform this code ran on...
>
>Anyone remember the old, original, text-based Adventure game (OK, OK, I
>know that's kinda like asking, "Anyone remember AIR?")...
>
>Any chance this might still be kicking around in close to its original
>form, and/or in source code.  Or might there perhaps be the same game (same
>cave map, treasure list, etc) in some other form, such as one that could
>run under Unix, or even on a Windows or a Mac machine???
>
>:-)
>
>Ken Rossman, NYC SE           212-558-9182  ||  212-558-9329 (FAX)
>Sun Microsystems              Email: [email protected]
>2 World Trade Ctr, 25th Fl.   SUN URL: http://noho.East/~rossman
>New York, NY 10048            Ext.URL: http://www.columbia.edu/~rossman

I have a file on this here machine called Zork anthology that has "zork I"
on it that's as close as I can remember to Bill Crowther's adventure; It
has a couple of frobozz things addad, but is basically adventure
I don't remember where it came from and this thing's a Mac.

--
       ...wex


16-May-2000 18:34:31 -0700,1372;000000000000
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To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
In-Reply-To: Message from Wexelblat <[email protected]>
            dated "Tue, 16 May 2000 20:59:20 EDT"
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From: Rob Austein <[email protected]>
Message-Id: <[email protected]>
Date:   Tue, 16 May 2000 21:32:19 -0400

I may be misremembering something that was already ancient history by
my era, but wasn't the original Adventure/Zork written on MIT-DM,
perhaps written in MDL, but in any case running under ITS?  If so, LCS
probably still has the code in a vault somewhere.  It's even possible
that it was transcribed from 7-track to 9-track tape sometime in the
early '90s (CENT, ALAN, or TY would be most likely to know).
16-May-2000 18:55:24 -0700,1447;000000000000
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<[email protected]>
Date: Tue, 16 May 2000 21:52:09 -0400
To: Rob Austein <[email protected]>, [email protected]
From: John Wroclawski <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed"

At 9:32 PM -0400 5/16/00, Rob Austein wrote:
>I may be misremembering something that was already ancient history by
>my era, but wasn't the original Adventure/Zork written on MIT-DM,
>perhaps written in MDL, but in any case running under ITS?  If so, LCS
>probably still has the code in a vault somewhere.  It's even possible
>that it was transcribed from 7-track to 9-track tape sometime in the
>early '90s (CENT, ALAN, or TY would be most likely to know).

Zork was. Adventure predates that; not the same game. (Why yes, I
-am- old yet; why do you ask?)

I'm under the impression that the original Adventure was written in Fortran..

-john
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From: [email protected] (Stephen Jones)
Subject: ADVENT.
To: [email protected]
Date: Tue, 16 May 100 21:18:38 +0000 (GMT)
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XKL is distributing ADVENT II (430pt scoring) with their
TOPS-20 Monitor 7(102560)-1 .. I'm pretty sure they're
going to have the source on there as well...

let me look.

@v toad:<*>advent.*.*

  TOAD:<UNSUPPORTED>
ADVENT.EXE.1;P775252      66 33792(36)  21-Jun-1979 02:26:11 HELLIWELL

Total of 66 pages in 1 file
@

@v ps:<*>advent.*.*

  PS:<UNSUPPORTED>
ADVENT.EXE.1;P775252      66 33792(36)  21-Jun-79 02:26:11 ALDERSON

Total of 66 pages in 1 file
@

unfortunately it doesn't look like it .. and these were searching the
DECUS libraries on the systems.

Here is something funny .. if you quit without doing anything you
get 32 points.. but if you quit after asking for instructions, you
get 27 points :)



@advent

This is "Version II" of Adventure.  Top score is now 430 points.

Welcome to Adventure!!  Would you like instructions?
y


Somewhere nearby is Colossal Cave, where others have found fortunes in
treasure and gold, though it is rumored that some who enter are never
seen again.  Magic is said to work in the cave.  I will be your eyes
and hands.  Direct me with commands of 1 or 2 words.  I should warn
you that I look at only the first five letters of each word, so you'll
have to enter "northeast" as "ne" to distinguish it from "north".
(Should you get stuck, type "help" for some general hints.  For infor-
mation on how to end your adventure, etc., type "info".)
                             - - -
This program was originally developed by Willie Crowther.  Most of the
features of the current program were added by Don Woods (DON @ SU-AI).
Contact Don if you have any questions, comments, etc.

You are standing at the end of a road before a small brick building.
Around you is a forest.  A small stream flows out of the building and
down a gully.
quit


Do you really want to quit now?
y


OK



You scored  27 out of a possible 430, using    1 turns.

You are obviously a rank amateur.  Better luck next time.

To achieve the next higher rating, you need 19 more points.

EXIT
@


@advent

This is "Version II" of Adventure.  Top score is now 430 points.

Welcome to Adventure!!  Would you like instructions?
n


You are standing at the end of a road before a small brick building.
Around you is a forest.  A small stream flows out of the building and
down a gully.
quit


Do you really want to quit now?
y


OK



You scored  32 out of a possible 430, using    1 turns.

You are obviously a rank amateur.  Better luck next time.

To achieve the next higher rating, you need 14 more points.

EXIT
@
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Date: Tue, 16 May 2000 19:27:16 -0700
From: Joe Smith <[email protected]>
To: John Wroclawski <[email protected]>
Cc: Rob Austein <[email protected]>, [email protected]
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
Message-Id: <[email protected]>
References: <v03007801b5476a81797f@[206.173.12.49]> <[email protected]> <v04210126b547ab492161@[18.26.0.167]>
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On Tue, May 16, 2000 at 09:52:09PM -0400, John Wroclawski wrote:
> At 9:32 PM -0400 5/16/00, Rob Austein wrote:
> >I may be misremembering something that was already ancient history by
> >my era, but wasn't the original Adventure/Zork written on MIT-DM,
> >perhaps written in MDL, but in any case running under ITS?
>
> I'm under the impression that the original Adventure was written in Fortran..

ADVENT was written in CDC FORTRAN, converted to PDP-10 FORTRAN.
Zork was written in MDL.

--
Joe Smith    MCI WorldCom, On-Net Design/Impl, Product Technical Support
UNIX and Tech Sup: TYMNET Network, Xstream Packet Services (Public X.25)
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Date: Tue, 16 May 2000 19:32:58 -0700
From: Joe Smith <[email protected]>
To: Stephen Jones <[email protected]>
Cc: [email protected]
Subject: Re: ADVENT.
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On Tue, May 16, 2000 at 09:18:38PM +0000, Stephen Jones wrote:
> XKL is distributing ADVENT II (430pt scoring) with their
> TOPS-20 Monitor 7(102560)-1 .. I'm pretty sure they're
> going to have the source on there as well...
> unfortunately it doesn't look like it .. and these were searching the
> DECUS libraries on the systems.

http://people.delphi.com/rickadams/adventure/e_downloads.html
 This is the original game as written by Willie Crowther and expanded by
 Don Woods.
 <LI type=square>The original PDP-10 Fortran
 <A HREF="ftp://ftp.gmd.de/if-archive/games/source/advent-original.tar.gz">
 source code</A>.  Every other version can be tracked down to this one. Not
 to be recommended for actual porting to modern machines though, as it has
 many dependancies on the nature of the PDP-10 (5 characters-per-word packing
 and the like).</LI>
 <LI>Kevin Black's DOS version of his and Bob Supnik's DECUS version, available
 as a <A HREF="ftp://ftp.gmd.de/if-archive/games/pc/adv350kb.zip">DOS</A>
 executable.</LI>
17-May-2000 10:39:16 -0700,1482;000000000000
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From: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Sender: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Subject: Seventeen years ago today
To: TOPS-20 Hackers and Yackers <[email protected]>
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Seventeen years ago today was a day that shall live in infamy: the day that
DEC decided to cancel the PDP-10 product line.  We're still around, but
neither DEC nor VAX is any longer.  When DEC stabbed its mainframe customers
in the back, it set in motion a process that eventually destroyed DEC.  Never
again would purchase decisions be made by "we'll buy the current DEC product,
no matter what it costs."  DEC had a loyal customer base and squandered it.

Let us take a minute from our busy days and reflect on what might had been.

Maybe subsequent history would have ended up the same.  Maybe not.  A healthy
clone market, with 30-bit PDP-10 machines (effectively the same as 32-bit byte
addressed machines, actually slightly larger) and software that wasn't
actively being suppressed, would still be viable today.

Image being able to write code without having to worry about one UNIX kernel
design bug or another...

17-May-2000 11:27:30 -0700,2940;000000000000
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From: Johnny Billquist <[email protected]>
To: Rob Austein <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
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On Tue, 16 May 2000, Rob Austein wrote:

> I may be misremembering something that was already ancient history by
> my era, but wasn't the original Adventure/Zork written on MIT-DM,
> perhaps written in MDL, but in any case running under ITS?  If so, LCS
> probably still has the code in a vault somewhere.  It's even possible
> that it was transcribed from 7-track to 9-track tape sometime in the
> early '90s (CENT, ALAN, or TY would be most likely to know).

Unfortunately, the machine I'm on haven't fixed up their sendmail to
prevent spamming, so I cannot sent to the TOPS-20 list right now. Perhaps
you can relay this.

ADVENT and ZORK are two different programs.
ADVENT was written in FORTRAN from the start, running on different
PDP-10s. Don't know if any one OS was the target.
ZORK was written in MDL at MIT, and later translated to FORTRAN by someone
at DEC. The MDL version is the one you run on TOPS-20 (and ITS amd T10 I
assume), while the FORTRAN version ran on PDP-11s and VAXen.

Furthermore, ADVENT appearantly spread from person to person, never
officially distributed.

For more information about ADVENT, the source code, and just about
anything else, see:
http://people.delphi.com/rickadams/adventure/e_downloads.html

For a bit of information about ZORK (Called DUNGEON in the "original"
FORTRAN version) see:
http://www.csd.uwo.ca/Infocom/

       Johnny

Johnny Billquist                  || "I'm on a bus
                                 ||  on a psychedelic trip
email: [email protected]           ||  Reading murder books
pdp is alive!                     ||  tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol

17-May-2000 11:43:02 -0700,3325;000000000000
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From: Johnny Billquist <[email protected]>
To: Rob Austein <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
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On Tue, 16 May 2000, Rob Austein wrote:

> I may be misremembering something that was already ancient history by
> my era, but wasn't the original Adventure/Zork written on MIT-DM,
> perhaps written in MDL, but in any case running under ITS?  If so, LCS
> probably still has the code in a vault somewhere.  It's even possible
> that it was transcribed from 7-track to 9-track tape sometime in the
> early '90s (CENT, ALAN, or TY would be most likely to know).

Unfortunately, the machine I'm on haven't fixed up their sendmail to
prevent spamming, so I cannot sent to the TOPS-20 list right now. Perhaps
you can relay this.

ADVENT and ZORK are two different programs.
ADVENT was written in FORTRAN from the start, running on different
PDP-10s. Don't know if any one OS was the target.
ZORK was written in MDL at MIT, and later translated to FORTRAN by someone
at DEC. The MDL version is the one you run on TOPS-20 (and ITS amd T10 I
assume), while the FORTRAN version ran on PDP-11s and VAXen.

Furthermore, ADVENT appearantly spread from person to person, never
officially distributed.

For more information about ADVENT, the source code, and just about
anything else, see:
http://people.delphi.com/rickadams/adventure/e_downloads.html

For a bit of information about ZORK (Called DUNGEON in the "original"
FORTRAN version) see:
http://www.csd.uwo.ca/Infocom/

       Johnny

Johnny Billquist                  || "I'm on a bus
                                 ||  on a psychedelic trip
email: [email protected]           ||  Reading murder books
pdp is alive!                     ||  tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol


17-May-2000 12:16:50 -0700,1203;000000000000
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Date: Wed, 17 May 2000 12:16:55 -0700 (PDT)
From: Ed Falk <[email protected]>
Message-Id: <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
X-Sun-Charset: US-ASCII

> I may be misremembering something that was already ancient history by
> my era, but wasn't the original Adventure/Zork written on MIT-DM,

That's where I remember playing it, around 1975.  I don't think
it was written in MDL (wasn't that zork?).  I think it was actually
written in Fortran.

17-May-2000 12:57:02 -0700,2815;000000000000
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To: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Cc: TOPS-20 Hackers and Yackers <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Seventeen years ago today
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Wed, 17 May 2000 10:22:22 PDT."
            <[email protected]>
Date: Wed, 17 May 2000 15:53:39 -0400
From: "Dr. Tom Blinn, 603-884-0646" <[email protected]>
X-Mts: smtp

> Image being able to write code without having to worry about one UNIX kernel
> design bug or another...

Yes, but you'd still have to worry about TOPS-10 or TOPS-20 kernel design
bugs..  No software (none, ever) is design flaw free or bug free.

Not that I would not have preferred things to have been different; there
were a LOT of good things in TOPS systems (both 10s and 20s) that really
got lost as a side effect of Digital's failed engineering projects (since
when you come down to it, the decision to kill the product line was due
in some part to the failure of the Jupiter project, not to a lack of real
alternatives from other suppliers).  Of course, big egos got bruised and
people did stupid things (but then, people do stupid things..).

Tom

Dr. Thomas P. Blinn + UNIX Software Group + Compaq Computer Corporation
 110 Spit Brook Road, MS ZKO3-2/W17   Nashua, New Hampshire 03062-2698
  Technology Partnership Engineering           Phone:  (603) 884-0646
   Internet: [email protected]            Compaq's Easynet: alpha::tpb
    ACM Member: [email protected]         PC@Home: [email protected]

 Worry kills more people than work because more people worry than work.

     Keep your stick on the ice.        -- Steve Smith ("Red Green")

    My favorite palindrome is: Satan, oscillate my metallic sonatas.
                             -- Phil Agre, [email protected]

    Yesterday it worked / Today it is not working / UNIX is like that
                       -- apologies to Margaret Segall

 Opinions expressed herein are my own, and do not necessarily represent
 those of my employer or anyone else, living or dead, real or imagined.

17-May-2000 13:37:19 -0700,1372;000000000000
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From: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Sender: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Seventeen years ago today
To: "Dr. Tom Blinn, 603-884-0646" <[email protected]>
cc: TOPS-20 Hackers and Yackers <[email protected]>
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On Wed, 17 May 2000 15:53:39 -0400, Dr. Tom Blinn, 603-884-0646 wrote:
> Yes, but you'd still have to worry about TOPS-10 or TOPS-20 kernel design
> bugs..  No software (none, ever) is design flaw free or bug free.

True; the EXEC needed a complete rewrite, and the implementation of TCP/IP was
a disaster.

> when you come down to it, the decision to kill the product line was due
> in some part to the failure of the Jupiter project

True enough.  That project was almost doomed from the start.  However, the
seeds of failure were sown in the late 1970s.

The internal bickering between the 10 and 20 teams was massively destructive.
The TOPS-20 guys were right that TOPS-10 should be retired, but they should
have brought Jim and Tony on board...

17-May-2000 13:49:38 -0700,1634;000000000000
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Date: Wed, 17 May 2000 21:46:30 +0100 (BST)
From: Colin Bruce <[email protected]>
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To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
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On Wed, 17 May 2000, Ed Falk wrote:

> > I may be misremembering something that was already ancient history by
> > my era, but wasn't the original Adventure/Zork written on MIT-DM,
>
> That's where I remember playing it, around 1975.  I don't think
> it was written in MDL (wasn't that zork?).  I think it was actually
> written in Fortran.

Dear All,

Not exactly the topic but related in a way. Does anyone know of a source
for a game called MUD. It was written in Bliss (if I remember correctly)
on a DECsystem-10 (oh god I can't remember the capitalisation anymore)
at Essex university in the UK. I would so love to get the sources even
if they couldn't be run. It would just be nice to read once again the
introduction even ("You are stood on a road between the land and the
place from whence you came....").

Thanks for the memories.
Colin Bruce
17-May-2000 13:55:07 -0700,2391;000000000000
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To: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Cc: TOPS-20 Hackers and Yackers <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Seventeen years ago today
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Wed, 17 May 2000 13:03:03 PDT."
            <[email protected]>
Date: Wed, 17 May 2000 16:51:46 -0400
From: "Dr. Tom Blinn, 603-884-0646" <[email protected]>
X-Mts: smtp

> The internal bickering between the 10 and 20 teams was massively destructive.
> The TOPS-20 guys were right that TOPS-10 should be retired, but they should
> have brought Jim and Tony on board...

Yes, that was a real problem.  People doing people things..  Big egos..
Not necessarily without justification, but none the less..

Tom

Dr. Thomas P. Blinn + UNIX Software Group + Compaq Computer Corporation
 110 Spit Brook Road, MS ZKO3-2/W17   Nashua, New Hampshire 03062-2698
  Technology Partnership Engineering           Phone:  (603) 884-0646
   Internet: [email protected]            Compaq's Easynet: alpha::tpb
    ACM Member: [email protected]         PC@Home: [email protected]

 Worry kills more people than work because more people worry than work.

     Keep your stick on the ice.        -- Steve Smith ("Red Green")

    My favorite palindrome is: Satan, oscillate my metallic sonatas.
                             -- Phil Agre, [email protected]

    Yesterday it worked / Today it is not working / UNIX is like that
                       -- apologies to Margaret Segall

 Opinions expressed herein are my own, and do not necessarily represent
 those of my employer or anyone else, living or dead, real or imagined.

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Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
In-Reply-To: Johnny Billquist <[email protected]>'s message of "Wed, 17 May 2000 11:27:17 PDT."
            <[email protected]>
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From: Per Danielsson <[email protected]>

Johnny Billquist wrote:
> ZORK was written in MDL at MIT, and later translated to FORTRAN by someone
> at DEC. The MDL version is the one you run on TOPS-20 (and ITS amd T10 I
> assume),

AFAIK there was no version of ZORK for Tops-10. I don't think MDL was ported
to T10.
However: A friend and I wrote a "TOPS-20-simulator" for Tops-10 which
simulated enough JSYSes to enable ZORK.EXE for T20 to run on T10. Quite
a nice hack.

PD
--
Per Danielsson                          [email protected]
Swedish Institute of Computer Science, PO Box 1263, SE-164 29 KISTA, SWEDEN
N59.24.20, E17.56.53                    "Why not? Yeah."


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From: Eric Smith <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
In-reply-to: <[email protected]> (message
       from Mark Crispin on Wed, 17 May 2000 13:03:03 -0700 (PDT))
Subject: Re: Seventeen years ago today
References:  <[email protected]>

Mark Crispin <[email protected]> wrote:
> The TOPS-20 guys were right that TOPS-10 should be retired,

[foolishly taking the flame bait...]

If technical merit was the only criterion, I suppose you might have been
able to make a case for that.  However, when other factors are
considered, it becomes clear that such a decision isn't simply "right".

The TOPS-20 folks wanted TOPS-10 retired *despite* the fact that
customers still wanted it supported, and they were still selling systems
to run TOPS-10.  The customer is always right, even when he (or she) is
wrong.  Trying to kill a product that customers still want, even if
you're trying to migrate them to another product, is suicidal.

The reality was that TOPS-20 was NOT as good at supporting some
workloads as TOPS-10 was.  It almost certainly could have been improved
until it was, but even so, forcing customer migration would simply have
lost a lot of customers.  Even though migrating from TOPS-10 to TOPS-20
would obviously be much easier than migrating from either of those to
VAX/VMS.  DEC didn't learn the lesson until after they did the latter.
And it's not clear that they even learned it then.
17-May-2000 15:28:02 -0700,2215;000000000000
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From: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Sender: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Seventeen years ago today
To: Eric Smith <[email protected]>
cc: TOPS-20 Hackers and Yackers <[email protected]>
In-Reply-To: <[email protected]>
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
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On 17 May 2000 22:10:37 -0000, Eric Smith wrote:
> The TOPS-20 folks wanted TOPS-10 retired *despite* the fact that
> customers still wanted it supported, and they were still selling systems
> to run TOPS-10.

The problem was that there was no serious attempt to make TOPS-20 be an
acceptable substitute for these customers.  This was a case in which the Not
Invented Here disease in the TOPS-20 group ultimately proved destructive.

> The customer is always right, even when he (or she) is
> wrong.  Trying to kill a product that customers still want, even if
> you're trying to migrate them to another product, is suicidal.

Exactly correct!  That's why many TOPS-20 sites rejected VAX, and with it DEC,
after 1984.

> The reality was that TOPS-20 was NOT as good at supporting some
> workloads as TOPS-10 was.

My understanding was that Jim and Tony actually offered to do something about
that, and they were told in effect to jump in the mill pond.

> It almost certainly could have been improved
> until it was, but even so, forcing customer migration would simply have
> lost a lot of customers.

Of course there should not have been a forced migration.  TOPS-20 should have
been TOPS-10 v8.0; in every way a superior and logical upgrade.

There were a few half-hearted attempts in that area, e.g. the TOPS-10 shell
and the abortive TOPS-36 project.  But these missed the whole point.  It
didn't matter whether you used uuos or jsi, or whether the prompt was a dot or
an atsign.  What mattered was SMP, the heavy-duty workload that TOPS-10 could
handle, and the devices that TOPS-10 supported.

17-May-2000 15:31:18 -0700,1236;000000000000
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To: Per Danielsson <[email protected]>
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Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
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Per Danielsson wrote:
..
> However: A friend and I wrote a "TOPS-20-simulator" for Tops-10 which
> simulated enough JSYSes to enable ZORK.EXE for T20 to run on T10. Quite
> a nice hack.

Yeah, Stu Grossman did the same thing at Stevens Institute around 1980.
(Probably helped inspire his later PDP-10 simulator, indirectly).
                               /AHM
--
Alan Howard Martin                              [email protected]
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In-reply-to: <[email protected]> (message
       from Mark Crispin on Wed, 17 May 2000 15:16:44 -0700 (PDT))
Subject: Re: Seventeen years ago today
References:  <[email protected]>


  Date: Wed, 17 May 2000 15:16:44 -0700 (PDT)
  From: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
  Sender: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
[...]
  There were a few half-hearted attempts in that area, e.g. the TOPS-10 shell
  and the abortive TOPS-36 project.  But these missed the whole point. [...]

Mark, can you tell us (me?) more about the TOPS-36 project please ?
Never heard of it.

 ,
Stephane
[ex user of the DEC2060 of the CMIRH/Paris/France in 82, I saw you there
I think ]

--
Stephane.Tsacas                 Stephane Tsacas, Institut Curie
@curie.fr                       11 rue Pierre et Marie Curie
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From: Bjorn Victor <[email protected]>
To: Colin Bruce <[email protected]>
Cc: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
In-Reply-To: <Pine.OSF.3.91.1000517214248.6113B-100000@leofric>
References: <[email protected]>
       <Pine.OSF.3.91.1000517214248.6113B-100000@leofric>
X-Mailer: VM 6.72 under 21.1 (patch 6) "Big Bend" XEmacs Lucid

On Wed, 17 May 2000, Colin Bruce wrote:
> Dear All,
>
> Not exactly the topic but related in a way. Does anyone know of a source
> for a game called MUD. It was written in Bliss (if I remember correctly)
> on a DECsystem-10 (oh god I can't remember the capitalisation anymore)
> at Essex university in the UK. I would so love to get the sources even
> if they couldn't be run. It would just be nice to read once again the
> introduction even ("You are stood on a road between the land and the
> place from whence you came....").

   Narrow road between lands.
   You are stood on a narrow road between The Land and whence you came.
   To the north and south are the small foothills of a pair of majestic
   mountains, with a large wall running round. To the west the road
   continues, where in the distance you can see a thatched cottage opposite
   an ancient cemetery. The way out is to the east, where a shroud of
   mist covers the secret pass by which you entered The Land.

   *A playful rabbit snuffles round your feet.

   *

MUD was written i BCPL at Essex; I later "ported" it to TOPS-20 by
adding a startup program which patched PA1050 and MUD itself at
appropriate places.  Much much later, but still a long while ago, I
and a colleague Wizard started porting it (the MUD world) to the
"lpmud" system for networked MUDs.  I don't know where that code ended
up, but I still have the original MUD running on my TOPS-20 system.

Aaah, memories...

   *kill rabbit
   The bunny kicks a little, but its resistance is futile as you
   bash its brains in.

:-o

-- Bjorn
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From: Phil Budne <[email protected]>
Message-Id: <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Good use for a VAX



http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/~vance/www/vaxbar.html
21-May-2000 10:42:32 -0700,910;000000000000
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Date: Sat, 20 May 2000 13:52:48 -0400
From: "Alan H. Martin" <[email protected]>
To: Phil Budne <[email protected]>
CC: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Good use for a VAX
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Phil Budne wrote:
>
> http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/~vance/www/vaxbar.html

Compare and contrast:

http://www.networkcomputing.com/822/822f35.html
                               /AHM
--
Alan Howard Martin                              [email protected]

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From: Dan Murphy <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Seventeen years ago today
Reply-To: Dan Murphy <[email protected]>

   Mark Crispin <[email protected]> on Wed, 17 May 2000 15:16:44 -0700 (PDT) writes:

> On 17 May 2000 22:10:37 -0000, Eric Smith wrote:
> > The TOPS-20 folks wanted TOPS-10 retired *despite* the fact that
> > customers still wanted it supported, and they were still selling systems
> > to run TOPS-10.

> The problem was that there was no serious attempt to make TOPS-20 be an
> acceptable substitute for these customers.  This was a case in which the Not
> Invented Here disease in the TOPS-20 group ultimately proved destructive.

   'Course, I had this debate innumerable times back then, but, being
   an engineer, I firmly belive that *management* was responsible for
   most of these brain-damanged decisions.  Yes, there was some
   rivalry between the engineering groups, but ultimately, we could
   have cooperated to build one even better OS if management hadn't
   prohibited it.

   Case in point: SMP.  TOPS-10 had it, big customers clearly liked
   it and wanted it, but the TOPS-20 engineers were *forbidden* to do
   it by management!  The work was mostly done.  TENEX had been
   designed from day 1 with SMP in mind, and it was running SMP on
   KI-10's at Stanford before the first real DECSYSTEM-20 even
   shipped.  Nonetheless, the external memory KL-10 configurations
   needed for SMP were declared by management to be DECSystem-10
   only.

   There were lots of other things like that.  Basically, once
   management got burned by thinking they could switch everyone from
   TOPS-10 to TOPS-20 on day one, they just bought into the
   two-system forever strategy and never tried to come up with a
   practical plan for convergence.

   Thus, over the years, lots of things had to get done twice,
   everything cost more than it should have, and neither operating
   system became as good or as competitive as it should have been.

> My understanding was that Jim and Tony actually offered to do something about
> that, and they were told in effect to jump in the mill pond.

   That's about right.  Again, once management bought into the
   two-system strategy, the plans continued to force differences
   between the systems, even when they were unnecessary and cost
   extra to do.  Management continued to create artifical differences
   by mandating certain hardware as 10-only and other hardware as
   20-only.

> There were a few half-hearted attempts in that area, e.g. the TOPS-10 shell
> and the abortive TOPS-36 project.  But these missed the whole point.  It
> didn't matter whether you used uuos or jsi, or whether the prompt was a dot or
> an atsign.  What mattered was SMP, the heavy-duty workload that TOPS-10 could
> handle, and the devices that TOPS-10 supported.

   Agreed.  And as with SMP, management continued to reinforce these
   differences over the life of the products.


   I agree with Mark that the 36-bit cancellation was evidence of the
   disease that soon killed the company.  I say 'soon' because DEC
   peaked in 1987, only about four years later.  From then on, it was
   downhill to oblivion.  From then on, revenues were flat and the
   stock price declined to as low as 10% of its 1987 high.  It never
   recovered more than about 1/3.  In the mid-80s, DEC squandered
   unbelievable amounts of money on projects and then cancelled them.
   The company never again seemed able to figure out how to do the
   right thing at the right time.



   dlm
26-May-2000 18:01:51 -0700,3247;000000000000
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From: [email protected] (Carl Baltrunas & Cherie Marinelli 1.6v2)
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
Date: Fri, 26 May 00 01:20:10 PDT
Cc: [email protected], [email protected]
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Sheesh... how quickly we forget. ;-)

If my memory serves me right, the original ADVENT came from stanford's WAITS
system and was indeed written in FORTRAN.  I probably have a copy of the source
and binary (albeit probably unreadable) on tape with my files from Catholic
University which is where I first played it.

Also, there was a ZORK version that ran under TOPS-10.  I played several
versions on MIT-DM while zork was under development and I recall the number
of possible points changing as I played.. a 448 point version is the lowest
I can recall.  With some effort I can probably remember which things were
added last ;-)

The TOPS-10 runable version had 560 or so points, I think.  I'm pretty sure it
did not include the 3 spheres that you could use to look into and view one of
the other 2 rooms containing spheres, each worth 15 points.  And, of course,
the last 616th point wasn't either.  Send for free information!

I have (or know where it is, anyway) a 9-track tape with the TOPS-10 version
of zork or dungeon on it.  Anyone want to try and read a 20+ year old tape ;-)

-Carl

If I get a chance, I'll try to find my tapes and see if I can load the TOPS-10
version on my TOPS-20 system and see what the details are <g>!



In Regards to your letter <[email protected]>:
:  Johnny Billquist wrote:
:  > ZORK was written in MDL at MIT, and later translated to FORTRAN by someone
:  > at DEC. The MDL version is the one you run on TOPS-20 (and ITS amd T10 I
:  > assume),
:
:  AFAIK there was no version of ZORK for Tops-10. I don't think MDL was ported
:  to T10.
:  However: A friend and I wrote a "TOPS-20-simulator" for Tops-10 which
:  simulated enough JSYSes to enable ZORK.EXE for T20 to run on T10. Quite
:  a nice hack.
:
:  PD
:  --
:  Per Danielsson                          [email protected]
:  Swedish Institute of Computer Science, PO Box 1263, SE-164 29 KISTA, SWEDEN
:  N59.24.20, E17.56.53                    "Why not? Yeah."
:
:

Carl A Baltrunas <[email protected]> and Cherie Marinelli <[email protected]>
Catalyst Industries: The One-Stop Internet registration and distribution service
URL: <http://www.reststop.com>    INFO: [email protected]
-owned by EWBR & EWBR-ette [our house bunnies] and Czazu [our dog]
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27-May-2000 14:14:01 -0700,989;000000000000
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Date: Sat, 27 May 2000 14:13:55 -0700
From: Rich Alderson <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Original Adventure game
To: [email protected]
In-Reply-To: <[email protected]>
Message-ID: <[email protected]>

Carl Baltrunas wrote:

> If my memory serves me right, the original ADVENT came from stanford's WAITS
> system and was indeed written in FORTRAN.

The *original* ADVENT was written in CDC FORTRAN IV by Will Crowther.  The
*well-known* version was ported to WAITS by Don Woods of SAIL; this was the
basis of the UChicago (David Long) version, which added the outdoor portions
of the map, and the second entrance to the cave (and 151 points).

                                                               Rich Alderson
-------
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Date: Fri, 2 Jun 2000 19:02:42 -0700
From: Joe Smith <[email protected]>
To: Eric Smith <[email protected]>, [email protected]
Cc: Al Kossow <[email protected]>, Joe Smith <[email protected]>,
       Carl Baltrunas <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [[email protected]: Can someome explain how arithmetic works?]
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In-Reply-To: <[email protected]>; from [email protected] on Fri, Jun 02, 2000 at 10:26:18PM +0000

On Fri, Jun 02, 2000 at 10:26:18PM +0000, Eric Smith wrote:
> ------- Start of forwarded message -------
> X-Coding-System: undecided-unix
> Date: Fri, 2 Jun 2000 05:52:12 -0700
> From: "Daniel A. Seagraves" <[email protected]>
> Subject: Can someome explain how arithmetic works?
> To: [email protected]
> Sender: [email protected]
> Reply-To: [email protected]
>
> Need this for my emulator, and nobody can explain to me how it works, and
> I can't find any documentation that's useful to me.  Specifically, I need stuff
> like "you shift left and then check the last bit" etc. etc.  Basically, I have
> a bunch of ones and zeroes and I have to know how to add/subtract/multiply/
> divide with them.
> ------- End of forwarded message -------

I posted a followup to his newsgroup article:

 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp10
 From: Daniel Seagraves <[email protected]>
 Date: Tue, 30 May 2000 12:30:13 -0500
 Re: Daniel Seagrave's e10
 Message-ID: <[email protected]>

       -Joe
--
Joe Smith    MCI WorldCom, On-Net Design/Impl, Product Technical Support
UNIX and Tech Sup: TYMNET Network, Xstream Packet Services (Public X.25)
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24-Aug-2000 14:11:49 -0700,6791;000000000000
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Date: Thu, 24 Aug 2000 17:07:45 -0400
Message-Id: <[email protected]>
From: Dan Murphy <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: The Last VAX
Reply-To: Dan Murphy <[email protected]>


from the Houston Chronicle 8/22/2000

Compaq to scrap Digital's long-lived VAX computer line

                          By DWIGHT SILVERMAN
                          Copyright 2000 Houston Chronicle

   In the market for a VAX, the near-legendary minicomputer that
   Digital Equipment Corp. designed and marketed for over 20 years?

   Better move fast, shoppers.

   Compaq Computer Corp., which acquired the VAX when it bought
   Digital in 1998, is putting the venerable line to rest.  Compaq
   will stop taking orders for VAX systems at the end of September,
   and will stop shipping them by the end of the year.

   The machine that is considered to have given birth to the concept
   of client-server computing -- in which smaller, full-powered
   computers are networked to larger, central ones -- has been made
   obsolete by cheaper, more muscular products.

   The VAX was the computer that kept Digital soaring during its
   glory years -- but the company's dogged adherence to it helped
   usher in Digital's decline.

   There are an estimated 100,000 VAX computers still operating in
   the world.

   "Why are they still there? Because they still work," said Terry
   Shannon, who followed Digital for years with his Shannon Knows
   Digital trade newsletter. He has renamed his publication Shannon
   Knows Compaq.

   "The people still running VAX systems don't need or don't want
   Unix or Windows," Shannon said. "It's a classic example of `If it
   ain't broke, don't fix it.' "

   VAX, which stands for Virtual Address eXtension, was unveiled in
   1977. It was designed in conjunction with its operating system,
   VMS, or Virtual Memory System. The operating system has since been
   renamed OpenVMS.

   The VAX was one of the first computers to process information in
   32-bit chunks. Previous computers, including Digital's popular PDP
   line, were 16-bit computers.

   VAX also was compact for its time, a breakthrough in corporate
   computers.

   "The original VAX 11/780, which was introduced in 1977, was a
   double-cabinet computer," said Mary Ellen Fortier, Compaq's vice
   president of OpenVMS marketing.  "It was about the size of two
   really good-sized refrigerators, which was very small. It was
   revolutionary."

   Over the years, the size of VAX systems shrunk while its power
   increased. There are now desktop-sized VAXes and some that are 50
   times more powerful than the first 11/780.

   Digital focused almost exclusively on the VAX during the 1980s. In
   the process, it pioneered several computing practices popular
   today.

   They include clustering -- linking machines together so that if
   one fails, the others pick up the slack -- and building networks
   using Ethernet, the standard now used for linking most corporate
   and home systems.

   "This line of systems was quite successful, and even up through
   1996 was producing over $100 million in annual revenue for
   Digital," said Jeffrey Hewitt, a senior analyst with Gartner
   Dataquest, a market research firm.

   "Digital had incredible success with the VAX -- they sold billions
   of dollars worth," newsletter editor Shannon said.  "They probably
   sold half a million VAX 2s alone."

   But analysts say Digital's staying with the VAX during the shift
   to personal computers was partly responsible for the company's
   problems in the 1990s.

   "Sticking with the VAX, and keeping its 100-percent allegiance as
   long as Digital did, was one of the reasons behind the company's
   decline," Shannon said.

   Indeed, the VAX's capabilities long have been surpassed by other
   computer types, including the PC.

   "There is a company that sells a VAX and OpenVMS emulator that
   runs on Windows NT or Linux," Shannon said.  "If you have a
   500-megahertz Pentium III computer, you can run circles around the
   average VAX workstation."

   Although the VAX and OpenVMS were designed to avoid obsolescence
   -- early Digital design documents indicate the platform was
   supposed to last 15 to 20 years -- Digital began planning for its
   successor in the mid-1980s.

   The Alpha processor, a high-speed computer chip designed for use
   in desktop and server computers, was created specifically to
   replace the VAX design, said Compaq's Fortier.

   In fact, Digital designed its Alpha systems to run OpenVMS as well
   as other operating systems. They can also be clustered together,
   so that VAXes work in tandem with Alpha computers.

   Fortier estimated that there are 450,000 computers running the
   OpenVMS operating system, and between 20-25 percent of them are
   VAX.

   The demise of the VAX is not a surprise. As early as 1997, Digital
   said it planned to phase it out this year. Compaq repeated that
   pledge shortly after acquiring Digital.

   Even thought they had warning, the end of the VAX will put
   customers like Cliff Pedersen in a bind.  Pedersen, manager of
   information technology at Sunoco of Canada, said he now has to
   make a decision about replacing his last VAX computer.

   "It does affect us -- now we have to figure out what we want to
   do," Pedersen said.

   At one point, Sunoco had 20 VAX systems, most of which have been
   replaced by Alpha computers. The lone VAX runs a Honeywell process
   control system, and even it is bolstered with another Alpha
   server.

   Pedersen said he used VAX systems because they were so reliable.

   "We ran those machines for years without rebooting them," he
   said. "You could never run a Windows desktop for a year without
   rebooting it."



24-Aug-2000 15:46:26 -0700,1326;000000000000
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From: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Sender: Mark Crispin <[email protected]>
Subject: re: The Last VAX
To: Dan Murphy <[email protected]>
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It seems that the PDP-6/10 (1964-1988) outlasted the VAX (1977-2000) by one
year.  At least I think that 1988 was when the last new KL was delivered.

I took a look at the TOPS-20 mailing list traffic.  The peak years of activity
were in 1982 and 1983.  The list was alive and will for a few years after
that, but it started dipping from 1987 to 1991.  It then briefly picked up
again, only to collapse in 1994.  It reached a low in 1997, which all of 5K
was sent the entire year.

Traffic jumped by an order of magnitude the next year, and has been steadily
picking up.  This year already has the greatest traffic since 1993; I don't
think that 1993's record will be beat but possibly it will beat 1991.

We've held out pretty well.  I wonder how well the VAX will be doing in 2014.

13-Oct-2000 00:20:50 -0700,1478;000000000000
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Subject: TECO and DDT.
To: [email protected], [email protected]
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2000 19:16:05 -0500 (CDT)
Reply-To: "Stephen Jones" <[email protected]>
From: "Stephen Jones" <[email protected]>
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10-10-00 slipped by us, didn't it?  I was going to announce this on
DEC-10 day, but I couldn't really wait.  Besides, we've got 10-20 day
coming up soon.  As some of you might know, I've got a band that does
some electronic/punk sort of music.  We recorded a song based on the
ending of Alice's PDP-10.  Its more like a commercial I suppose.. but
it brings up alot of questions from fans of our music which allows me
to get on my soap box on what hacking is.

http://redmartian.com/tecoddt.mp3

--
Stephen Jones, Minister of Montage . Severed Communications, SEVCOM.COM
              Severed Heads . project codename: 'laptop'
20-Oct-2000 06:05:13 -0700,2256;000000000000
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To: [email protected]
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Subject: Happy 10/20 day (or 20/10 day if you prefer)
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2000 09:01:17 -0400
From: "Dr. Tom Blinn, 603-884-0646" <[email protected]>
X-Mts: smtp

Well, it is that time of year again, and until we get to 2010,
this is as good as it gets..  A happy 10/20 day (or 20/10 for
those who prefer to put the day first, in this case it hardly
matters because the ambiguity is irrelevant) to all!

Tom

Dr. Thomas P. Blinn + UNIX Software Group + Compaq Computer Corporation
 110 Spit Brook Road, MS ZKO3-2/W17   Nashua, New Hampshire 03062-2698
  Technology Partnership Engineering           Phone:  (603) 884-0646
   Internet: [email protected]            Compaq's Easynet: alpha::tpb
    ACM Member: [email protected]         PC@Home: [email protected]

 Worry kills more people than work because more people worry than work.

     Keep your stick on the ice.        -- Steve Smith ("Red Green")

    My favorite palindrome is: Satan, oscillate my metallic sonatas.
                               -- Phil Agre, [email protected]

    Yesterday it worked / Today it is not working / UNIX is like that
                       -- apologies to Margaret Segall

 Opinions expressed herein are my own, and do not necessarily represent
 those of my employer or anyone else, living or dead, real or imagined.

02-Nov-2000 10:06:58 -0800,1488;000000000000
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Message-ID: <[email protected]>
From: Eric Smith <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Nearly the last DECSYSTEM-20

[The following is as I posted it to UseNet.  I should clarify that I
think there are probably some more KS10s still running, but I only know
of one KL10 still in service.]

I met someone at a site that shut down their DECSYSTEM-20 within the
last 60 days.  Now I only know of one system still running (not counting
XKL machines, which run TOPS-20 but are not DECSYSTEM-20s).

The story is not much like the one recounted in "The Soul of an Old
Machine."  (Yes, I do mean *Old*, and it's not the book by Tracy Kidder.
Do a web search.)

I asked whether anyone would miss the system, and the answer was "no".
In fact, the person seemed to think it was a strange question.  This
seems sad to me.  I suppose it can be interpreted in several ways.
Perhaps there are people who miss the system, but they've already
moved on to other things.

They've migrated their applications to Windows NT.

Presumably they'll do the same with their VAX 6000 before too much longer.
09-Nov-2000 08:35:44 -0800,3071;000000000000
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       Thu, 9 Nov 2000 09:25:36 -0700 (MST)
Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2000 09:25:36 -0700 (MST)
From: Pieter Bowman <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Cc: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected],
       [email protected]
X-US-Mail: "University of Utah, Department of Mathematics, 155 S 1400 E RM
       233, Salt Lake City, UT 84112-0090"
X-Telephone: 801-581-5252
X-Fax: 801-581-4148
Subject: 10 years
Message-ID: <[email protected]>

The past 10 years has gone by very quickly.  Here is the last "systat"
command given on science.utah.edu (a DECsystem 20/60):

$sys a
Fri 9-Nov-90 18:33:31  Up 2000:00:05
4+16 Jobs   Load av (class 1)   0.63   1.06   0.76
No operator in attendance

Job TTY  Pgm   St Idle  Time   Cl Sh Us  Limit  User,<Directory>  Foreign host
 9 316 EXEC   TI      0:29:57  1 10 38         BEEBE,APS:<.PLOT79>
11*314 SYSTAT RN      4:12:36  1 10  5         OP.BOWMAN,APS:<.LABELS>
19 DET EXEC   RN      0:13:00  1 10  0         OP.BACKUS
23 323 EXEC   TI      1:08:53  1 10  0         BEEBE,ND20:<TEMP>

 1 232 OPR    TI 1:16 0:01:36  0  2  0         OPERATOR
 2 233 NETSRV TI      1:13:25  0  2  0         OPERATOR
 3 234 SMTJFN RN      7:08:47  0  2  0         OPERATOR
 4 235 MMAILR RN      12:11:02  0  2  0         OPERATOR
 5 236 SATAN  TI 1:31 0:14:31  0  2  0         OPERATOR
 6 237 NFS    RN    9 11:07:12  0  2  0         OPERATOR
 7 240 RESOLV RN      5:23:38  0  2  0         OPERATOR,<DOMAIN>
 8 241 BATCON RN *:** 0:41:21  0  2  0         OPERATOR
10 242 LPTSPL RN      0:39:29  3  2  0         OPERATOR
12 243 PTYCON TI *:** 0:00:46  3  2  0         OPERATOR
13 246 MACDUM RN      3:26:07  1 10  0         OPERATOR,<MACDUMPS>
14 244 LPTSPL RN      0:52:31  3  2  0         OPERATOR
15 245 EXEC   RN      3:20:32  3  2  0         OPERATOR,APS:<SPOOL.PS.SP>
16 247 EXEC   RN      1:18:30  3  2  0         OPERATOR,APS:<SPOOL.IMAGEN>
17 250 MACRES RN      0:20:47  1 10  0         OPERATOR,<MACDUMPS>
18 205 PTYCON TI      0:06:29  1 10  0         OPERATOR,<MACDUMPS>
$


Pieter

Pieter Bowman                        Voice:                 1-801-581-5252
University of Utah                   FAX:                   1-801-581-4148
Department of Mathematics            Email:           [email protected]
155 S 1400 E RM 233                  URL: http://www.math.utah.edu/~bowman
Salt Lake City, Ut, 84112-0090       Office:                       103 JWB
20-Dec-2000 00:43:35 -0800,983;000000000000
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From: Rich Alderson <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Happy DEC-20!

I'm sure others will post here, too.

Peace and joy to you all at the Solstice.

                               Rich Alderson
                               XKL LLC

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