[Info-vax] VSI plans to offer an IA64 to X86 binary translator similar to AEST?

[Stephen Hoffman]

On 2019-03-14 14:07:33 +0000, Rod Regier said:

> Has VSI indicated any plans to offer on OpenVMS IA64 to X86 translater 
> application...

Set some expectations with local management...

Translation is the desperation-pending-app-rewrite part of the migration path.

That might be a rewrite because of lost source code, or because of a 
tool that's no longer available from the vendor (and where you have 
permission to translate).

The translation path has and likely always will produce apps that are 
difficult to support and to maintain.

When translation works, it works.

When the translated apps crash, figuring out what happened and why—app 
bug, compiler bug, translation bug, OpenVMS bug—can be difficult, at 
best.

Debugging a native app—with the existing and supported architectures, 
with x86-64 to be determined—is vastly easier than debugging a 
translated app, too.

If the application source code is available, then plan to tweak the 
source code as (if) necessary and recompile and relink, and don't even 
think about translating.




-- 
Pure Personal Opinion | HoffmanLabs LLC