[Info-vax] Oracle RDB 7.1.5 PRECOMP.EXE (ALPHA)

[Andrea Arthur]

On Wednesday, January 27, 2021 at 10:36:42 AM UTC-5, Jan-Erik Söderholm wrote:
> Den 2021-01-27 kl. 16:25, skrev Arne Vajhøj: 
> > On 1/27/2021 8:15 AM, Simon Clubley wrote: 
> >> On 2021-01-26, abrsvc <dansabr... at yahoo.com> wrote: 
> >>> On Tuesday, 26 January 2021 at 13:53:17 UTC-5, Simon Clubley wrote: 
> >>>> On 2021-01-26, Simon Clubley 
> >>>> <clubley at remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP> wrote: 
> >>>>> I am confused. Why can't you simply recover it from the backup of 
> >>>>> that disk ? If you have problems with the backup command, tell us 
> >>>>> what the problem is and we might be able to help you. 
> >>>>> 
> >>>>> I am assuming you have planned for what happens if the disk itself 
> >>>>> fails, so I don't understand why you can't use those procedures to 
> >>>>> recover the deleted file. 
> >>>>> 
> >>>> Ok, I went back to the message and _now_ saw the bit about no backup. 
> >>>> 
> >>>> To the OP, what was your plan if the disk itself failed ? 
> >>>> 
> >>>> If you have procedures for that, use them. If you do not, why not ? 
> >>> 
> >>> You do realize that the original message was posted for another, right? 
> >> 
> >> Yes. 
> >> 
> >>> Asking questions about how (poorly) the system is managed or backed up 
> >>> (is this a correct phrase?) is not relevant here. 
> >>> Regardless of the reason for the request, a simple answer to it does not 
> >>> require a complete analysis or criticism of the system involved. 
> >> 
> >> On the contrary, it's a perfect opportunity to point out flaws in their 
> >> procedures that they might not have realised exist so they can be fixed. 
> > 
> > You don think they have by now realized that a backup would have 
> > been nice?? 
> > 
> > Arne
> Agree. 
> Those offensive notes about backups will probably not help much now...

Thank you all for your input.  As was pointed out early on, this question was posted on behalf of someone else. I do not have access to the server missing the file.
They are working on a backup solution that does not solve their current problem.

I've learned a few things about the lost file -
 
-Yes, it is Oracle 7 v7.1.5-2. (circa 1994/96) and no longer under support.
-It is a PASCAL precompiler. I have found references to precompilers for other languages (Ada, COBOL, PL1, C, etc) with a variety of names in a variety of documents online.
-The file itself, precomp.exe, was likely built during the installation of the Oracle 7 development pack and could be named anything (i.e. prepascal.exe, propas.exe, hippo.exe, etc) the installer chose.   I was hoping to find the facility (build_pascal.com(?))for building the precompiler image but to no avail.
-Without the precompiler image, the users are unable to make modifications to the existing application which would require compiling new code.

Having written conversion tools to convert IBM CICS Cobol (embedded EXEC CICS / END-EXEC) to OpenVMS Cobol/ACMS, I have offered to write (reverse-engineer) the PASCAL precompiler for them provided they can give me enough code samples of previously pre-compiled (*.ppa to *.pas) source code.  Needless to say, this will take some time if they agree to pursue this option.

Thanks again to all of you!
Live long and prosper,
-Andrea!