[Info-vax] BASIC compiler in the hobbyist distribution

[lists at openmailbox.org]

On Sat, 30 May 2015 14:00:59 -0700 (PDT)
johnwallace4--- via Info-vax <info-vax at rbnsn.com> wrote:

> On Saturday, 30 May 2015 19:50:05 UTC+1, li... at openmailbox.org  wrote:
> > On Fri, 29 May 2015 14:01:05 -0400
> > David Froble via Info-vax <info-vax at rbnsn.com> wrote:
> > 
> > > lists at openmailbox.org wrote:
> > > > On Fri, 29 May 2015 08:30:15 -0400
> > > > Stephen Hoffman via Info-vax <info-vax at rbnsn.com> wrote:
> > > 
> > > big snip ...
> > > 
> What, specifically, does 'x86' mean in the streams of abuse it's
> getting round here at the moment?

It's a generic name for Intel x86 or x86_64. And everything before that.

> What follows is a request for clarification, not an attempt to
> religiously defend x86 (it's already a dead-end architecture, 
> surviving largely because of its association with Windows, but
> it's probably got quite a few years yet).

snip

You asked this before and I answered you before. Nothing has changed since
then.

> Is it seriously being suggested here that there's no significant
> difference in business class suitability between a sensible Proliant
> server system at one end, and at the other end a consumer-centric
> box with e.g. a Packard Bell badge, just because they're both 'x86'
> based and both capable of running some flavours of Windows?

There is a difference but it's not big enough to:

1) Make Intel a premium platform. Intel remains a crapware platform with
high and low-ends.

2) Stop the inevitable comparison between VMS on Intel and other commodity
crapware OS and software running on Intel. And this is as a practical
matter even worse than 1) above.

There are reasons IBM runs iOS on i boxes and AIX on POWER and none of it
has to do with IBM's inability to write an OS or port anything anywhere
they want. OS and software written specifically to target (good) bespoke
hardware platforms work better, more efficiently, and get much more
throughput than generic, portable OS and software even with some or much
code optimization in the latter.

All the best loved platforms are and were owned end-to-end by one vendor.
They were all developed to work together as greater than the sum of the
parts. And they did.


> I note you mention Solaris and SPARC. The Solaris folk seemed quite
> happy with AMD64 when it came along. They didn't see it as irrelevant
> simply because of its x86 origins.

I wasn't there and I don't know. I have spoken to quite a few Solaris
sysadmins from the old days who are mostly getting out of Solaris/SPARC
today because of Oracle's way of doing things. They have the same view
of Intel I do. To them Solaris is meant to run on SPARC. Intel is junk and
not worthy of consideration. It just adds to the pain of helping their
shops move to Linux that it has to run on Intel, too. Insult on top of
injury!

If anybody was happy back then it was individual developers who couldn't
afford good hardware (SPARC) and wanted something good to run on their Intel
crapware box and Solaris advocates who wanted more uptake in colleges and
universities. We've heard similar musings from people on this list with
respect to VMS.

Today good SPARC hardware is cheap and it runs Solaris a lot better than
Intel although the (C) code is the same. We don't know why that is, it just
is.

> What am I missing? Enquiring minds might want to better understand
> where you're coming from. 

I already answered this and nothing has changed.

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