[Info-vax] Alternative _legal_ operating systems for VAX ?

[Bill Gunshannon]

On 1/6/22 6:33 AM, David Wade wrote:
> On 06/01/2022 09:44, Johnny Billquist wrote:
>> On 2022-01-06 00:29, Bob Eager wrote:
>>> On Wed, 05 Jan 2022 17:18:40 +0100, Johnny Billquist wrote:
>>>
>>>> For a PDP-11 I would definitely point at 2.11BSD any day of the week.
>>>> It's really nice and good, and actually pretty useful even for "real"
>>>> work.
>>>
>>> If the machine is use doesn't have separate I and D space, it's a bit of
>>> a tight fit. I remember the struggles we had.
>>
>> Today I'm not even sure you can get a non-I/D space machine running 2.11.
>>
>>> In that case, there's always Sixth Edition.
>>
>> Or Ultrix 11, as Bill suggested.
>> But then we're back to much less useful systems again.
>>
>>> And if it's a PDP-11 with no memory management, Mini-UNIX (a little 
>>> known
>>> thing, but a genuine Bell Labs one):
>>>
>>>   http://www.tavi.co.uk/unixhistory/mini-unix.html
>>
>> Cool. Thanks for the link.
>>
>>    Johnny
> 
> Whilst all these suggestions may work, I can't really see any point in 
> running anything other than VMS on my VAXs. That is what they were 
> bought for, that is what I have always done.
> 
> Given the lack of a legal OS I am quite inclined to send them to the 
> re-cyclers to be crushed and scrapped.
> 
> This would appear to be my only legal way to dispose of them

Why would you say that?  As has been pointed out here there is
at least one legitimate option.  If you don't want to run anything
but VMS find someone who will take them to run Unix.  No reason
to destroy them other than spite.

> 
> Thank you HP for "letting me go" and then destroying one of my few 
> remaining pleasures...
> 

HP did nothing that hasn't been the industry standard for as long
as I have been in this business.

bill