[Info-vax] VMS Software needs to port VAX DIBOL to OpenVMS X86 platform

[Michael C]

On Tuesday, December 15, 2020 at 8:45:25 AM UTC-5, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2020-12-14, Arne Vajhøj <ar... at vajhoej.dk> wrote: 
> > On 12/14/2020 2:08 PM, ultr... at gmail.com wrote: 
> >> So Synergex as of now refuses to port their OpenVMS version of DIBOL to OpenVMS X86. 
> > 
> > That is not good. 
> >
> It's more like a disaster if this is also happening with other ISVs. 
> 
> VSI have just lost a good number of VMS users with this one decision. 
> 
> What I would like to know is how the hell did VSI allow this to happen ??? 
> 
> Synergex is _exactly_ the kind of company VSI should have been in continuous 
> and close contact with and VSI should have been working closely with them 
> to help port Synergy to x86-64 VMS. 
> 
> VSI should have also been making all the right public marketing and update 
> noises to reassure Synergex (and other companies) that x86-64 VMS was 
> happening and that it was going to be a viable platform. 
> 
> I wonder if Synergex saw that nothing appeared to be happening with x86-64 
> VMS and hence decided to drop any plans for porting to x86-64 VMS ? 
> 
> With this one decision, VSI has not only lost the x86-64 VMS sales from 
> developers who would have bought x86-64 VMS to develop Synergy applications 
> on, but have also lost all the x86-64 VMS sales to customers of those 
> developers to run those applications on. That latter number is a much 
> larger number. 
> 
> I would hope that VSI are now in touch with Synergy to see if anything can 
> be done to fix this, but based on VSI's public performance so far, I don't 
> have a great deal of confidence in that. 
> 
> It's also probably too late if the decision has been driven by Synergex's 
> customers also moving on from VMS because those customers may have gained 
> the impression that nothing appeared to be happening with x86-64 VMS. 
> 
> That marketing and building public confidence in x86-64 VMS stuff that I 
> was talking about a few weeks ago ? This is _exactly_ why that kind of thing 
> is required and I hope at least some of you are now starting to see that.
> >> This is a request for VMS software to port VAX DIBOL to the x86 OpenVMS environment. 
> >
> That's not going to happen for two reasons: 
> 
> 1) It was already considered at the time of the VAX to Alpha migration and 
> rejected by DEC in favour of a partnership with Synergex. That's when there 
> were a lot more VMS users than there are now. 
> 
> 2) What VAX DIBOL offers is extremely limited compared to what Synergy offers. 
> 
> Unless code written using Synergy was _very_ restricted in what language 
> features it used and didn't use Synergy specific features such as the UI 
> toolkit, there's no way you would get Synergy code to run under VAX DIBOL. 
> 
> Simon. 
> 
> -- 
> Simon Clubley, clubley at remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP 
> Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

AMEN TO THE ABOVE.

BUT DIBOL IS WAY BETTER THAN THAT C THING EVERYONE THINKS IS A LANGUAGE IS USING