[Info-vax] State of the OpenVMS hobbyist program?

[Simon Clubley]

On 2019-11-20, Dave Froble <davef at tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
> On 11/20/2019 9:10 AM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>>
>> Welcome to the same world as PDP-11 "Hobbyists".  :-)
>
> Maybe, but, I don't think it's the same world.
>
> I'm not aware of any LMF type of thing on PDP-11 OSs.  Does such exist?
>
> There is plenty of VAX/VMS media available.  Not sure it's the same with 
> PDP-11 OSs.
>
> Probably the biggest problem for PDP-11 stuff is media.  At least media 
> for which there still exists devices which can access such media. 
> Haven't seen a 9-track tape drive for quite a long time.
>
> Another issue would be documentation.  Back in the day it was all on paper.
>

As Bill says, there are various media kits and documentation sets available
(and the media kits are compatible with SimH).

The main issue is whether you are still legally allowed to run the PDP-11
operating systems under SimH. Mentec created a hobbyist licence which
allowed people to run older versions of the various PDP-11 operating
systems for hobbyist purposes.

However, the catch is that the licence specifies you can only run them
on an emulator owned by DEC (I forget the exact wording but that is the
meaning of the wording used).

However, DEC no longer own SimH and so the argument made by some people
is that the Mentec hobbyist licence is now invalid because there is no
longer any DEC owned emulator.

Simon.

-- 
Simon Clubley, clubley at remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.