[Info-vax] Reimplementing VMS, was: Re: HP adds OpenVMS Mature Product Support beyond the end of Standard Support

[JF Mezei]

On 14-02-02 18:08, Johnny Billquist wrote:

> At no point is any code actually being written as a part of this. It's a 
> feasibility study.

We'll never know. Such code is probably hidden very deep. It is quite
likely proof of concept would have been done for very early stages of
boot. Remember that VMS already knows about EFI so booting from EFI
8086s should be easier.

Knowing if existing X86 compilers can handle VMS code is an important
part of an evaluation.

> This part sounds like just nonsense. What has things done in 2004 have 
> to do with anything? 

2004 is when Intel relented and announced 64 bit 8086s.
2004 is when Intel announced CSI for both IA64 and 8086 (granting 8086
servers same memory performance for multi processor/core systems as the
"high perfrormance computing" IA64.

2004 is when HP announced IA64 would be reduced to HPC niche, dropped
workstations and low end servers as a focus for growth.

As a point of reference, Apple announced its move to Intel mid 2005.
First 64bit Mac was in Aug 2006, full transition to 64 bit chips by 2007.

2007 is when the first life support deal for IA64 was signed, 2010 is
when it was renewed/re-adjusted to extend the life again (spread the
releases over longer period). (Remember that Tukwila, the first CSI (now
Quickpath) based IA64 was originally due 2007.

2009 is when dismantlement of VMS engineering began.

So any pilot project to look into porting VMS to 8086 would have been
between 2004 and 2009, likely just before/around 2007.

>You can do a feasibility study at any point.

Until Intel announced 64 bit 8086s a port of VMS to 32 bit 8086 did not
make sense. And until Quickpath arrived for 8086 (circa late 2008 as I
recall), multi-core/processor performance for 8086s did not scale that
well in a large data centre.


> the decision to kill VMS was done in 1995?

isn't that roughly when Palmer started his "Migrate away from VMS" ads ?
 I know that by 1996, banks had been told to not touch VMS. And I know
SWIFT had been told by Palmer to migrate from VMS.

> The problem is when people start thinking that DEC/Compaq/HP wrote some 
> code to actually get VMS running in x86. Which does not exist.
> Studies are a different thing than code.

"writing" code. No. But test compiling with the 8086 compilers yes. They
would need to evaluate differences in code generated and syntax
translation to know how much code syntax/structures might have to be
changed.  (and look into compiler/linker issues for off platform
building, if any.)