[Info-vax] How do I make zip, unzip etc. available to all users?

[Stephen Hoffman]

On 2016-01-07 23:37:01 +0000, johnwallace4 at yahoo.co.uk said:

> What you're after is a combination of VAX Remote System Manager (which 
> iirc became Polycenter Software Distribution before being Palmerised 
> into oblivion - correction welcome) for what applications are where.

Making PCSI or some replacement product network aware, or some replacement.

Some sort of software update server and controls to allow certain 
patches to be held or released — for those that need that — and a way 
to remotely trigger updates on a target server.

Logging into a web site and clicking on patches and downloading the 
patches and unpacking them and then manually installing them is...  is 
absurd.

> For what network devices are where, there's VAX Ethernim. And as well 
> as Ethernim you'll be wanting the MOP functionality from DECnet, so 
> that devices can self-identify and be automagically added to the LAN 
> config database.

Many of the devices implement mDNS service discovery.  IPv6 also adds 
neighbor discovery.   No NIC emit the old MOP SYSID data that the old 
tools expected.

https://developer.apple.com/bonjour/
http://www.avahi.org

Have a freshly-installed OpenVMS box boot up, activate the network 
connection via IPv6 or DHCP, and both enabled for remote management, 
and also ready and looking to load (preferably signed) configuration 
data from a configuration server.  Preferably, have a way to run the 
install remotely — an updated version of InfoServer, for instance.

Allow access to the newly-installed host by Puppet or such tools — 
Munki, for OS X — for easier and repeatable deployments, as well as 
remote management and monitoring for backups and other tasks.

> And the bridge protocol (whose name I forget) that allows clever 
> software to work out what MAC address is where on a bridged LAN.

The shortest-path bridging stuff, which is the current implementation 
of the old DEC-era spanning tree?  That's part of most current managed 
switches.   (If you don't already have managed switches or haven't 
looked at updating your networking recently, you will want to look at 
the current GbE web-managed switch prices and features.   GbE 
web-managed switch prices have cratered.  But I digress.)   I'm less 
concerned about the switches, though.   There are tools to manage 
those, and OpenVMS isn't going to compete there in any case.

> And maybe you'll need some other vendor supplied bits and pieces 
> (VAXcluster Console System would be an obvious one) and usually some 
> location-specific stuff such as the ones you mention.

Something akin to Apple Remote Desktop and Server.app would be nice, 
but I'd rather not have to hit the consoles.   They're not boxes I want 
to care for individually.   Have that console stuff transferred over to 
the log server(s).

> DIGITAL had it then (probably in the 1980s, for these requirements).  
> Wouldn't it be nice if anybody had actually known about and bought this 
> stuff before it was all Palmerised away.

>From twenty years ago, for those that want a trip down memory lane...

http://www.itec.suny.edu/scsys/vms/OVMSDOC073/ovms_archived/pdf/BUILD_DEPEND_SYS.PDF 


Much of what wasn't sold off or spun off wasn't particularly upgraded 
or enhanced or reworked, either.   That includes OpenVMS itself, too.   
But many of the competing vendors didn't stop working on their tools, 
and newer vendors appeared, and newer problems.  Security, 
communications, etc.

In more recent times, many of the pieces and parts are better 
integrated together and into the operating systems, the basic protocols 
have shifted from MOP and DECnet to IP and mDNS and such, and more than 
a few sites and operating systems have these capabilities.   Software 
and hardware prices have cratered, and the environments have greatly 
increased in scale, too.

None of this is really about OpenVMS in 2016, either.   Given the 
development lead times, that's already happened.   We'll likely get 
V8.4-2, and some updates.   We might see some VSI OpenVMS documentation 
posted, too.   Rather, this is about OpenVMS in 2018 or 2020.  What we 
will be looking for and using in several years, and across an 
increasing variety of systems.   Well, technically, more than a little 
of what I've written about above is available now.




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