[Info-vax] Current VMS Usage Survey (Was: READ and WRITE...)

[Bill Gunshannon]

In article <529c1b27$0$36907$c3e8da3$f67ceb78 at news.astraweb.com>,
	Subcommandante XDelta <vlf at star.enet.dec.com> writes:
> Subcommandante XDelta:
>> On Wed, 8 Feb 2012 03:46:45 -0800 (PST), Keith Cayemberg
>> <keith.cayemberg at arcor.de> wrote:
>> :
>> :
>>> There are many examples of OpenVMS being used for Real-Time
>>> applications, especially apps that required resources beyond the
>>> capabilities of embedded systems at the time. To my knowledge the
>>> Flight Control System governing the entire North Atlantic airspace and
>>> based in Iceland is still running on OpenVMS. There are also several
>>> radar systems, military communication systems and satellite control
>>> systems running on OpenVMS. 
>> 
>> May we assume that some of the VMS userbase, at least, would have
>> strong opinions about the extinction of VMS if they knew it was on the
>> drawing board?
> 
> Mr Mezel, in a recent conversation thread, estimated, IIRC (senior
> moments notwithstanding), that the remaining VMS end-user population
> might be circa 100,000 shops.

I expect that number to be much higher than reality.  HP made it clear
quite some time ago that there was no future on VMS.  No serious company
waits until the plug is pulled to find an alternative.


> 
> So this topic is not about who or what those shops are, but rather what
> they are using VMS for.
> 
> Port the FCS cited above to NSK from VMS, with new generations of
> Bohrbugs and Heisenbugs to iron out? - not bloody likely.
 
Given that there are  no bugs in the currently running version (yeah,
right!) and that you have the source, a good project is not likely to
introduce all that many, if any, new bugs.  A bigger problem would be
VMS funtions not provided by NSK.  One has to wonder if HP actually has
a VMS -> NSK Porting Kit and Library.
 
bill

-- 
Bill Gunshannon          |  de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n.  Three wolves
billg999 at cs.scranton.edu |  and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.
University of Scranton   |
Scranton, Pennsylvania   |         #include <std.disclaimer.h>