[Info-vax] [OT] Early 64-bit test build of Windows 2000 for Alpha found

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 5/19/2023 7:28 PM, John Dallman wrote:
> In article <u48n61$pdn1$1 at dont-email.me>,
> clubley at remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP (Simon Clubley) wrote:
>> In fact about the only major idea he didn't bring across was the
>> use of Pillar (or something comparable) instead of C as the SIL.
>>
>> We lost a major opportunity to establish a viable alternative to C
>> because of that and the security of our computing infrastructure
>> is poorer because of it.
> 
> I think it was already too late by 1988. Such an OS would have had to
> have supported C and C++ for software portability.

It would need to support standard C and standard C++ and
possible Posix API, but that does not preclude the OS
being written in something else than C/C++ and also
exposing a non-C/C+ centric API.

>                                                  Microsoft would have
> had to implement any new language but must have wanted to get on with > Windows NT.

MS has implemented lots of new languages or at least new flavors
of languages.

>             Also, their developers already knew C/C++ and they really
> weren't very security-conscious in those days.

True.

OS/2 was C and C++.

> DEC had languages of its own, like BLISS,

Bliss is a bit low level compared to other languages
mentioned in this thread.

>                                            and was more willing to use
> different languages for different projects. The elaborate VAX calling
> standard meant that integrating modules written in different languages
> was reasonably straightforward.

Yes. DEC was ahead of time on that one.

>                                  That was not the case with any Microsoft
> environment until .NET appeared in 2003.

(1.0 was 2002 and 1.1 was 2003)

.NET CTS was their first let us call it VAX calling standard easy to
use solution.

But COM back from 1993 intended the same "integrating
modules written in different languages" - mixing C++, VB6,
Delphi, VBS etc.. But I am not so sure about the
"reasonably straightforward" though. Using a COM
component from any language but C/C++ is relative
easy. But the rest is more tricky.

Arne