[Info-vax] Whither VMS?

[Bob Eager]

On Fri, 11 Sep 2009 15:57:31 -0400, John Reagan wrote:

> "Bob Eager" <rde42 at spamcop.net> wrote in message
> news:7gvj6hF2ricj3U4 at mid.individual.net...
>> On Fri, 11 Sep 2009 17:46:35 +0200, Michael Kraemer wrote:
>>
>>> Paul Anderson schrieb:
>>>
>>>
>>>> Unix is older than VMS but don't confuse me with the facts.  ;-)
>>>
>>> At worst the difference is a few years only (and don't confuse Multics
>>> with Unix), which is insignificant in hindsight of 30* years.
>>
>> Anyway, 32 bit UNIX didn't arrive until *after* VMS. One would have to
>> compare early UNIX (even on the PDP-11) with 16 bit VMS (or RSX-11, as
>> we know it)! :-)
> 
> The Perkin-Elmer 8/32 (a 32-bit computer) ran a flavor of UNIX and was
> in the field before the first VAXen.  My former employer had one.  It
> was the first non-PDP-11 computer to run UNIX.

<pedant>
UNIX first appeared on the PDP-7, in around 1970. OK, it was written in 
assembler...!
</pedant>

Anyway...I'd be interested in dates. UNIX didn't go (semi-) public until 
about 1976 (I started using it in July 1976). Not sure about first VMS 
dates but I thought it was about then. Presumably the PE 8/32 (that was 
the Interdata later, wasn't it?) post-dates the PDP-11 version going 
public as v6?

Perhaps VMS was later than I thought, but 1976 sticks in my mind.




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