[Info-vax] OT: obscure PDP11 OSes (even more dinosaury)

[Bill Gunshannon]

In article <1d839638-6951-4b1c-b10c-9ff0313d344b at googlegroups.com>,
	johnwallace4 at yahoo.co.uk writes:
> On Friday, 12 June 2015 18:26:37 UTC+1, Alan Frisbie  wrote:
>> On 06/12/2015 07:14 AM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>> 
>> > Oh, and there was another from DEC that I think would have been in the same
>> > class as VAXELN.  It was called IAS, I think.  But I know of no copies of it
>> > still inexistence.  At least I have never been able to get a copy anywhere.
>> 
>> I have the distribution tapes for IAS v3.0.   They will be part of the
>> archive of 9-track tapes I am creating (TPC and TAP container files).
>> They are all 800 BPI, so they will get copied after I finish all the
>> 1600 BPI ones (I will have to switch to a different system and tape drive).
>> 
>> IAS was a variant of RSX-11D, and I enjoyed using it back in the late 1970s.
>> 
>> Right now, the project is on hold until I can get a replacement CPU daughterboard
>> for my Alpha XP1000.   It died last Friday, so I am currently Alpha-less.  :-(
>> 
>> Alan Frisbie
> 
> Good to hear that IAS isn't completely forgotten. I had the pleasure
> of working with it on 11/70 in the late 1970s, after it effectively
> replaced 11D. Another play one day might be fun.
> 
> DECUS proceedings were forever full of folk complaining about sysgens
> on RSX. I didn't really understand, as SYSGEN was a largely foreign
> concept on 11D and (especially) IAS.
> 
> John Harper's page on IAS: 
> http://www.john-a-harper.com/ias.html
> 
> I *thought* I'd seen an IAS3.1 downloadable somewhere but can't
> quickly find it, neither a local private copy nor a websearch
> reference. 3.0 seems relatively widely distributed, often on
> the darker fringes of the web, so a Known Trustworthy copy
> would be handy. Manuals seem to exist for IAS3.4 but I'd moved
> on to the world of VMS and UNIX by that time.
> 
> Another PDP11 OS was Venix11, from Venturcom. 

Just another flavor of Unix.  If you have Ultrix-11 the rest are just
fluff.  :-)

> 
> Bill may have been getting muxed ip between MicroPower PASCAL
> (DEC-developed ROMable/netloadable RTOS with RT11 host toolkit
> for low end PDP11) and VAXELN. That well known auction site has
> a copy of Introduction to MicroPower Pascal AA-M388A-TC on offer
> for $16.25 at the moment.
> 
> If it's just the manual's content you want, it's
> already on Bitsavers (thank you) e.g.
> /pdf/dec/pdp11/rt11/micropowerPascal/AA-M388A-TC_IntroToMicroPowerPascal_Jan82.pdf
> 
> There's also a slight chance Bill may be thinking of VENIX11 from
> Venturcom, a UNIX V7 (?) derivative sold with alleged realtime
> capabilities (iirc - it was a loooong time ago).
> 

No, I think I just forgot that IAS was RSX-11 based.  But i am still
pretty sure it had real-time capabilities.  Venix I can't see doing
real-time.  The only machine I ever saw a version of Venix for was
the Pro and i can't imagine who would try running real-time on their
office automation machine.  :-)

Of course, all of this still doesn't explain how the VAX was
"a best-seller" when compared to the PDP-11 when the PDP-11
sold 50% more systems.

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>