[Info-vax] Part number encoding

[Richard B. Gilbert]

Michael Kraemer wrote:
> H Vlems schrieb:
>> On Dec 25, 11:03 am, Michael Kraemer <M.Krae... at gsi.de> wrote:
>>
>>> H Vlems schrieb:
>>>
>>>
>>>> I'm guessing here but may be if the first two characters are digits
>>>> the product code refers to hardware, otherwise it's either software of
>>>> documentation.
>>>> The last two characters are either a patch level or a (hardware)
>>>> variant of the product. Software was issued on various media, called H-
>>>> kits.
>>>> The reason was that all media kits had product codes that ended in -
>>>> Hn.  When n was 9 you got 9 track PE magtape.
>>>> Hans
>>>
>>> Sure?
>>> All CDs I know of start with "AG" and end with "BE", "RE", "XE" or "BS",
>>> be it for VMS, DUNIX or Ultrix.
>>
>>
>> Of course I'm not sure. The term H-kit was invented well before a cd
>> was even thought of!
> 
> well, they could have kept the old nomenclature.
> -HC for a CD kit for example.
> 
>> And by the time they were, it was to distribute music.....
> 
> When did the CD appear, 1981/83?
> And when was the first time that software was shipped on CD?
> 

I think MAYBE 1985.  One big problem was that existing machines did not 
have CDROM drives and, in many cases, could not be economically 
retrofitted with CDROM.