[Info-vax] Whither VMS?

[Robin Fairbairns]

 "Richard B. Gilbert" <rgilbert88 at comcast.net> writes:
>Bob Koehler wrote:
>>  rf10 at cl.cam.ac.uk (Robin Fairbairns) writes:
>>> and the fortran compiler also ran in compatibility mode, though (iirc)
>>> it produced 32-bit code.
>> 
>>    So did the SOS editor.  You should have seen the CPU load on my
>>    11/780 go down when I convinced people full screen EDT was easier
>>    to learn than SOS was to use.
>
>I had to use SOS early in my VMS career!

i had forgotten sos.  (selective memory...)

when we first got our vax, i started a porting exercise for a rather
more rational line-based editor by an old colleague at the university.

>EDT was available but it 
>required a DEC terminal, VT-52, VT-100 or VT-200.  Nobody had realized 
>before we ordered our VAX, that it required proprietary terminals.  SOS 
>wasn't too bad as an editor but I replaced as soon as wee got some VT 
>compatible third party terminals for which we payed about $600 instead 
>of the ~$2,000 each VT-220s.

we bought (rather grotty) compatibles, and worked with them for a long
time.  their arrival stopped my porting effort (it was going slowly
anyway, due to workload).

however, we were a dec oem, and eventually dec made us an offer we
couldn't refuse, for vt100s.  i never liked vt100s much but they were
an awful lot better than the previous compatibles.
-- 
Robin Fairbairns, Cambridge