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

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 12/15/2020 12:45 PM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
> On 12/15/20 10:53 AM, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>> On 12/15/2020 10:47 AM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>>> On 12/15/20 10:35 AM, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>>>> On 12/15/2020 10:19 AM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>>>>> On 12/15/20 8:26 AM, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>>>>>> On 12/15/2020 8:17 AM, Chris Townley wrote:
>>>>>>> On 15/12/2020 13:05, Michael C wrote:
>>>>>>>> On Monday, December 14, 2020 at 9:39:20 PM UTC-5, Dave Froble 
>>>>>>>> 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.
>>>>>>>>> Well Bob, perhaps you can acquire a copy of the DIBOL product 
>>>>>>>>> in order
>>>>>>>>> to implement it on x86 VMS?
>>>>>>>>>> This is a request for VMS software to port VAX DIBOL to the 
>>>>>>>>>> x86 OpenVMS environment.
>>>>>>>>> This forum, as Jan-=Erik may have mentioned, is not a VSI 
>>>>>>>>> support venue.
>>>>>>>>>> I have started a project using DIBOL and need to implement it 
>>>>>>>>>> on the x86 platform.
>>>>>>>>> Use Basic ....
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> :-)
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> DIBOL runs circles around basic :0
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Wasn't Dibol based on Cobol?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> It is supposedly inspired by Cobol and Basic and Fortran.
>>>>>
>>>>> Point out one thing in a DIBOL program that even vaguely
>>>>> resembles COBOL (other than the last three letters of the
>>>>> name).
>>>>
>>>> Wikipedia claims:
>>>> * BCD arithmetic
>>>
>>> Lots of languages did and do BCD Arithmetic doesn't mean they
>>> resemble or acquired that from COBOL.
>>
>> Today most languages do have some sort of decimal type.
>>
>> Back then not so many.
> 
> COBOL, PL/I and even 360 Assembler.  May have been more, but my'memory 
> dims more every day.

I am not sure that I would count any assembler. They support whatever
the HW supports.

Macro-32 also got P instructions.

But yes PL/I. Which supposedly got inspired by Cobol and Algol.

>>>> * data and procedure divisions
>>>
>>> While the manual states there is a data and a procedure division the 
>>> word division is not used in source code, the start of the data area
>>> is  not delinieated and the separation of the two is merely the symbol
>>> PROC.  Again, no similarity to COBOL.
>>
>> I find it very unlikely that those words was invented independently
>> of Cobol.
> 
> Most languages (other than maybe BASIC :-) separate data and procedure.

Most languages more than 35 years old separate data and code, but
they do typical have an implicit delimitation not an explicit.

Cobol and Dibol use an explicit marker. Different marker though.

Pascal also has an explicit separation, but that is a very different
style.

Newer languages tend to allow mixing.

Arne