From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!eco.twg.com!twg.com!nntp-server.twg.com!frank Mon Apr 5 15:00:48 EDT 1993 Article: 209 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!eco.twg.com!twg.com!nntp-server.twg.com!frank From: frank@twg.com (Frank McConnell) Subject: DECmate II seen for sale Message-ID: Sender: news@twg.com (USENET News System) Organization: The Wollongong Group, Palo Alto, CA (USA) Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1993 17:51:13 GMT Lines: 44 I saw a DECmate II for sale at the Livermore, California hamfest/swap meet yesterday, complete with a "Go ahead -- make a RIDICULOUS offer" sign on it. Equipment appeared to include system unit with RX50 minifloppy drive, keyboard, monitor, Letterprinter 100, manuals, and software (including diagnostics and WPS); it all looked like it was in good shape. No, I didn't pick it up -- I've got a pretty full apartment already, but thought some of the more PDP-8-knowledgeable folks here might be interested. I've seen the seller at the Foothill swap meet in the past as well, and so there is a good chance it will appear there too. Look for a brown van; the seller has not-quite-shoulder-length brown hair and a mustache. (Side note: I did inquire whether he had video cables for a Pro 350, as I have a friend who is trying to revive one but was not able to make it to Livermore yesterday; he let drop that he could use several himself for VT240s.) Yes, I am kicking myself for not getting his name and address. If I had it, I would post it for the benefit of readers not in the SF Bay Area. At the time I wasn't sure whether it would be worthwhile to post about DECmates here; most of the activity here seems to center around older (and more hacker-friendly) PDP-8 equipment. An aside: I have this vague impression that DECmates are not particularly hackable machines. I also have a vague recollection that exactly this matter was discussed here (or was it on a.f.c?) some time ago. Of course, I didn't save it, so I am forced to ask: is there an archive of discussions from this group? (I certainly hope so -- some of what I've seen pass by looks like esoterica any PDP-8 hacker would enjoy well into the next century!) The Foothill swap meet occurs on the second Saturday of every month from March to September inclusive, and is at Foothill College, 12345 El Monte Road, Los Altos Hills, CA. Next one is 10 April 1993. Official opening time is 7:00 AM (it is rumored that most of the Good Stuff is gone by then), and it pretty much winds up by noon. Bring four quarters per car for parking fee; admission for buyers is otherwise free. Take Interstate 280 to the El Monte Road exit, and go to the right if you're coming from the north, or to the left if you're coming from the south. The entrance to Foothill College will be on your right. -Frank McConnell "I want my MPE" (w/apologies to Dire Straits) From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Mon Apr 5 21:11:37 EDT 1993 Article: 210 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: Re: DECmate II seen for sale Message-ID: <1993Apr6.011120.5913@news.columbia.edu> Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University References: Date: Tue, 6 Apr 1993 01:11:20 GMT In article frank@twg.com (Frank McConnell) writes: >I saw a DECmate II for sale at the Livermore, California hamfest/swap >meet yesterday, complete with a "Go ahead -- make a RIDICULOUS offer" >sign on it. Equipment appeared to include system unit with RX50 >minifloppy drive, keyboard, monitor, Letterprinter 100, manuals, and >software (including diagnostics and WPS); it all looked like it was in >good shape. I have been getting these systems almost for nothing from the right places. The commercial market believes them to be worthless; members of this group will have a very different opinion. The problems of the DECmate series are basically solvable, thus eventually they will be put into the "mainstream" of the PDP-8 world. I have mapped out how to accomplish this, etc. and it's just a matter of man-months, etc. However, documentation is scarce, so you sort-of have to know what's implemented to get anywhere with it at the hardware level, etc. (Schematics for all of the option cards seem to be unavailable :-(.) And yes, it's not a hardware hacker's system, as it ain't expandable much, if at all. But it does make a good basic system to run -8 software on, and can be considered to be at least a physically small -8 with a VT-220 (-like) terminal attached as a console. cjl From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!uwm.edu!caen!hellgate.utah.edu!cc.usu.edu!ivie Tue Apr 6 13:19:13 EDT 1993 Article: 211 of alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!uwm.edu!caen!hellgate.utah.edu!cc.usu.edu!ivie From: ivie@cc.usu.edu Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Subject: Re: DECmate II seen for sale Message-ID: <1993Apr6.102501.65795@cc.usu.edu> Date: 6 Apr 93 10:25:01 MDT References: <1993Apr6.011120.5913@news.columbia.edu> Organization: Utah State University Lines: 12 In article <1993Apr6.011120.5913@news.columbia.edu>, lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: > > And yes, it's not a hardware hacker's system, as it ain't expandable much, if > at all. It's expandable a little bit if you're willing to give something up. You could hack a bit of hardware on if you didn't have/didn't want the graphics module, for instance. Unfortunately, the best hacking spot is where the hard disk controller goes; just about the entire pin-bus of the 6120 shows up over there. Roger Ivie ivie@cc.usu.edu From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Tue Apr 6 13:28:41 EDT 1993 Article: 212 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: Re: DECmate II seen for sale Message-ID: <1993Apr6.172030.12163@news.columbia.edu> Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University References: <1993Apr6.011120.5913@news.columbia.edu> <1993Apr6.102501.65795@cc.usu.edu> Date: Tue, 6 Apr 1993 17:20:30 GMT In article <1993Apr6.102501.65795@cc.usu.edu> ivie@cc.usu.edu writes: >In article <1993Apr6.011120.5913@news.columbia.edu>, lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: >> >> And yes, it's not a hardware hacker's system, as it ain't expandable much, if >> at all. > >It's expandable a little bit if you're willing to give something up. You could >hack a bit of hardware on if you didn't have/didn't want the graphics module, >for instance. Unfortunately, the best hacking spot is where the hard disk >controller goes; just about the entire pin-bus of the 6120 shows up over there. In that sense, the DM III is a better machine. The III/III+ outputs an actual bus (2 slots) mechanically as well as electrically. cjl From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!uunet!digex.com!rocinante.digex.net!mcguire Thu Apr 8 10:22:34 EDT 1993 Article: 213 of alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!uunet!digex.com!rocinante.digex.net!mcguire From: mcguire@rocinante.digex.net (Dave McGuire) Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Subject: DECmate II's ? Date: 8 Apr 1993 06:53:45 GMT Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt MD USA Lines: 11 Message-ID: <1q0i5p$rls@news1.digex.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: rocinante.digex.net X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL8] If anyone's interested, I have a friend that's in the government surplus business that has around 50 or so DECmate II's sitting in a warehouse. I think he's planning on scrapping them, but I'm really not sure. If he'll sell them individually, they'd probably go REALLY cheap. If anyone's interested, send me some mail and I'll contact him about it. -Dave Systems Programmer Digital Express Group, Inc. mcguire@digex.net From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!moe.ksu.ksu.edu!hobbes.physics.uiowa.edu!news.uiowa.edu!news Thu Apr 8 16:18:23 EDT 1993 Article: 214 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!moe.ksu.ksu.edu!hobbes.physics.uiowa.edu!news.uiowa.edu!news From: jones@cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones) Subject: Frequently Asked Questions about the PDP-8 Sender: news@news.uiowa.edu (News) Message-ID: <1993Apr8.141737.3674@news.uiowa.edu> Date: Thu, 8 Apr 1993 14:17:37 GMT Nntp-Posting-Host: pyrite.cs.uiowa.edu Organization: Computer Science, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, USA Keywords: FAQ Lines: 772 Frequently Asked Questions about the PDP-8 By Douglas Jones, jones@cs.uiowa.edu (with help from many folks) Last updated, Mar. 3, 1993 Contents What is a PDP? What is a PDP-8? What is the PDP-8 instruction set? What does PDP-8 assembly language look like? What different PDP-8 models were made? What about the LINC-8 and PDP-12? Where can I get a PDP-8 today? Where can I get PDP-8 documentation? What operating systems were written for the PDP-8? What programming languages were supported on the PDP-8? Where can I get PDP-8 software? Where can I get additional information? What use is a PDP-8 today? What is a PDP? For over a decade, all programmable digital computers sold by Digital Equipment Corporation were sold as Programmable Data Processors (PDPs) instead of computers. I have DEC documentation that actually calls them "PDPs", so this is not improper usage. DEC's first computer, the PDP-1, had a selling price of only $120,000 at a time when competing machines were selling for over $1,000,000. Everyone (the government and DEC's stockholders included) knew that computers were big and expensive and needed a computer center and a large staff, and apparently, DEC chose to avoid dealing with these stereotypes by entirely avoiding the term "computer". DEC built a number of different computers under the PDP label, with a huge range of price and performance. The largest of these are fully worthy of large computer centers with big support staffs. Many early DEC computers were not really built by DEC. With the PDP-3 and LINC, for example, customers built the machines using DEC parts and facilities; the PDP-5 may also have been built on this basis. Here is the list of PDP computers: MODEL DATE PRICE BITS COMMENTS ===== ==== ======== ==== ===== PDP-1 1960 $120,000 18 DEC's first computer PDP-2 NA 24 Never built? PDP-3 36 One was built by a customer, not by DEC. PDP-4 1962 18 Predecessor of the PDP-7. PDP-5 1963 $27,000 12 The ancestor of the PDP-8. PDP-6 1964 36 A big computer; 23 built, most for MIT. PDP-7 1965 ~$60,000 18 Widely used for real-time control. PDP-8 1965 $18,500 12 The smallest and least expensive PDP. PDP-9 1966 $35,000 18 An upgrade of the PDP-7. PDP-10 1967 36 A PDP-6 successor, great for timesharing. PDP-11 1970 $10,800 16 DEC's first and only 16 bit computer. PDP-12 1969 $27,900 12 A PDP-8 relative. PDP-13 NA Bad luck, there was no such machine. PDP-14 A ROM-based programmable controller. PDP-15 1970 $16,500 18 A TTL upgrade of the PDP-9. PDP-16 1972 NA 8/16 A register-transfer module system. Corrections and additions to this list are welcome! The prices given above are the prices for minimal systems in the year the machine was first introduced. The bits column indicates the word size. It's worth noting that the DEC PDP-10 became the DECSYSTEM-20 as a result of marketing considerations, and DEC's VAX series of computers began as the Virtual Address eXtension of the never-produced PDP-11/78. It is worth mentioning that there are persistant rumors that the the Data General Nova was originally developed as a candidate design for the PDP-11, and that Data General was founded by the design team when Gordon Bell rejected their RISC design in favor of the CISC architecture now known as the PDP-11. An alternate version of this story is that the reason that DEC never produced a PDP-13 was because this number was assigned what became the Nova. Both DEC and Data General seem to deny these rumors on a regular basis, but nobody believes their denials. Today, all of the PDP machines are in DEC's corporate past, with the exception of the PDP-11 family of minicomputers and microprocessors. What is a PDP-8? The PDP-8 family of minicomputers were built by Digital Equipment corporation between 1965 and 1990 (if you include the PDP-5, the starting date should be 1963). These machines were characterized by a 12 bit word, with no hardware byte structure, a 4K minimum memory configuration, and a simple but powerful instruction set. By 1970, the PDP-8 was the best selling computer in the world, and many models of the PDP-8 set new records as the least expensive computer on the market. The PDP-8 has been described as the model-T of the computer industry because it was the first computer to be mass produced at a cost that just about anyone could afford. C. Gordon Bell (who later was chief architect of the PDP-11 and who, as Vice President, oversaw the development of the VAX) says that the basic idea of the PDP-8 was not really original with him. He gives credit to Seymour Cray (of CDC and later Cray) for the idea of a single-accumulator 12 bit minicomputer. Cray's CDC 160 family, sold starting around 1959, certainly was a very similar 12 bit architecture, and the peripheral processors of Cray's first supercomputer, the CDC 6600, are also familiar to PDP-8 programmers. Note that the CDC 160 and CDC 6600 peripheral processors had 6 basic addressing modes, with variable length instruction words and other features that were far from the simple elegance of the PDP-8. Despite its many modes, the CDC architecture lacked the notion of current page addressing, and the result is that for examples that don't involve indexing, PDP-8 code is frequently just as effective as the code on the more complex CDC 12-bit minicomputers. What is the PDP-8 instruction set? The PDP-8 word size is 12 bits, and the basic memory is 4K words. The minimal CPU contained the following registers: PC - the program counter, 12 bits. AC - the accumulator, 12 bits. L - the link, 1 bit, commonly prefixed to AC as . It is worth noting that many operations such as procedure linkage and indexing, which are usually thought of as involving registers, are done with memory on the PDP-8 family. Instruction words are organized as follows: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ |_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_| | | | | | | op |i|z| addr | op - the opcode. i - the indirect bit (0 = direct, 1 = indirect). z - the page bit (0 = page zero, 1 = current page). addr - the word in page. The top 5 bits of the 12 bit program counter give the current page, and memory addressing is also complicated by the fact that absolute memory locations 8 through 15 are incremented prior to use when used for indirect addressing. These locations are called the auto-index registers (despite the fact that they are in memory), and they allow the formulation of very tightly coded array operations. The basic instructions are: 000 - AND - and operand with AC. 001 - TAD - add operand to (a 13 bit value). 010 - ISZ - increment operand and skip if result is zero. 011 - DCA - deposit AC in memory and clear AC. 100 - JMS - jump to subroutine. 101 - JMP - jump. 110 - IOT - input/output transfer. 111 - OPR - microcoded operations. The ISZ and other skip instructions conditionally skip the next instruction in sequence. The ISZ is commonly used to increment a loop counter and skip if done, and it is also used as an general increment instruction, either followed by a no-op or in contexts where it is known that the result will never be zero. The subroutine calling sequence involves putting the return address in relative word zero of the subroutine, with execution starting with relative word one. Return from subroutine is done with an indirect jump through the return address. Subroutines frequently increment their return addresses to index through inline parameter lists or to provide return codes by conditionally skipping the next instruction. The IOT instruction has the following form: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ |1|1|0|_|_|_|_|_|_|t|c|s| | | | | | | device | op | The IOT instruction specifies one of up to 8 operations on one of 64 devices. Typically (but not universally), each bit of the op field evokes an operation as follows: If the s bit is set, the instruction causes a skip if the device is ready, if the c bit is set, the device ready status is reset and, for some devices, AC is also cleared, and if the t bit is set, data is either ored with AC or output from AC to the device. Prior to the PDP-8/E, there were severe restrictions on the interpretation of the t, c and s bits. IOT instructions may be used to initiate data break transfers from block devices such as disk or tape. The term "data break" was, for years, DEC's preferred term for cycle-stealing direct-memory- access data transfers. Some CPU functions are accessed only by IOT instructions. For example, interrupt enable and disable are IOT instructions, as are instructions controlling the optional memory management unit that is needed to address more than 4K words. A wide variety of operations are available through the OPR microcoded instructions: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Group 1 |1|1|1|0|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|_| 1 - CLA - clear AC 1 - CLL - clear the L bit 1 - CMA - ones complement AC 1 - CML - complement L bit 1 - IAC - increment 1 0 0 - RAR - rotate right 0 1 0 - RAL - rotate left 1 0 1 - RTR - rotate right twice 0 1 1 - RTL - rotate left twice In general, the above operations can be combined by oring the bit patterns for the desired operations into a single instruction. If none of the bits are set, the result is the NOP instruction. When these operations are combined, they operate top to bottom in the order shown above. The exception to this is that IAC cannot be combined with the rotate operations on some models, and attempts to combine rotate operations have different effects from one model to another (for example, on the PDP-8/E, the rotate code 001 means swap 6 bit bytes in the accumulator, while previous models took this to mean something like "shift neither left nor right 2 bits"). _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Group 2 |1|1|1|1|_|_|_|_|_|_|_|0| 1 0 - SMA - skip on AC < 0 \ 1 0 - SZA - skip on AC = 0 > or 1 0 - SNL - skip on L /= 0 / 0 0 0 1 - SKP - skip unconditionally 1 1 - SPA - skip on AC >= 0 \ 1 1 - SNA - skip on AC /= 0 > and 1 1 - SZL - skip on L = 0 / 1 - CLA - clear AC 1 - OSR - or switches with AC 1 - HLT - halt The above operations may be combined by oring them together, except that there are two distinct incompatible groups of skip instructions. When combined, SMA, SZA and SNL, skip if one or the other of the indicated conditions are true, while SPA, SNA and SZL skip if all of the indicated conditions are true (logical and). When combined, these operate top to bottom in the order shown; thus, the accumulator may be tested and then cleared. Setting the halt bit in a skip instruction is a crude but useful way to set a breakpoint for front-panel debugging. If none of the bits are set, the result is an alternative form of no-op. A third group of operate microinstructions (with a 1 in the least significant bit) deals with the optional extended arithmetic element to allow such things as hardware multiply and divide, 24 bit shift operations, and normalize. These operations involve an additional data register, MQ or multiplier quotient, and a small step count register. On the PDP-8/E and successors, MQ and the instructions for loading and storing it were always present, even when the EAE was absent, and the EAE was extended to provide a useful variety of 24 bit arithmetic operations. What does PDP-8 assembly language look like? Here is an example: START, CLA CLL / Clear everything TAD X / Load X AND I Y / And with the value pointed to by Y DCA X / Store in X HLT / Halt X, 1 / A variable Y, 7 / A pointer Note that labels are terminated by a comma, and comments are separated from the code by a slash. There are no fixed fields or column restrictions. The "CLA CLL" instruction on the first line is an example of the microcoding of two of the Group 1 operate instructions. CLA alone has the code 7200 (octal), while CLL has the code 7100; combining these as "CLA CLL" produces 7300, the instruction to clear both AC and the link bit. As a general rule, except when memory reference instructions are involved, the assembler simply ors together the values of all blank separated fields between the label and comment. Indirection is indicated by the special symbol I in the operand field, as in the third line of the example. The typical PDP-8 assembler has no explicit notation to distinguish between page zero and current page addresses. Instead, the assembler is expected to note the page holding the operand and automatically generate the appropriate mode. If the operand is neither in the current page nor page zero, some assemblers will raise an error, others will automatically generate an indirect pointer to the off-page operand (This feature should be avoided!). Note, in the final two lines of the example, that there is no "define constant" pseudo-operation. Instead, where a constant is to be assembled into memory, the constant takes the place of the op-code field. The PDP-8 has no immediate addressing mode, but some assemblers provide an optional mechanism to allow the programmer to ignore this lack: TAD (3) / add 3, from memory on the current page. TAD [5] / add 5, from memory on page zero. JMP I (LAB) / jump indirect through the address of LAB. Assemblers that support this automatically fill the end of each page with constants defined in this way that have been accumulated during the assembly of that page. Arithmetic is allowed in operand fields and constant definitions, but expressions are evaluated in strict left-to-right order, as shown below: TAD X+1 / add the contents of the location after X. TAD (X-1) / add the address of the location before X. Other operators allowed included and (&), or (!), multiply (^) and divide (%), as well as a unary sign (+ or -). Unfortunately, one of the most widely used assemblers, PAL 8, has trouble when unary operators are mixed with multiplication. Generally, identifiers are not limited in length, but only the first 6 characters are significant. All numeric constants are in octal, unless a DECIMAL pseudo-op has been used to change number base (change back with the OCTAL pseudo-op). Other assembly language features are illustrated below: / Comments may stand on lines by themselves / Blank lines are allowed *200 / Set the assembly origin to 200 (octal) NL0002= CLA CLL CML RTL / Define new opcode NL0002. NL0002 / Use new opcode (load 0002 in AC) JMP .-1 / Jump to the previous instruction X1= 10 / Define X1 (an auto-index register address) TAD I X1 / Use autoindex register 1 IAC; RAL / Multiple instructions on one line $ / End of assembly The assembly file ends with a line containing a $ (dollar sign) not in a comment field. What different PDP-8 models were made? The total sales figure for the PDP-8 family is estimated at over 300,000 machines. Over 8500 of these were sold prior to 1970. During the PDP-8 production run, a number of models were made, as listed in the following table. Of these, the PDP-8/E is generally considered to be the definitive machine. If the PDP-8 is considered to be the Model T of the computer industry, perhaps the PDP-8/E should be considered to be the industry's Model A. MODEL DATES SALES COST TECHNOLOGY REMARKS PDP-5 63-65 Transistor Limited compatibility PDP-8 65-68 >1000 $18,500 Transistor Table-top or rack LINC-8 66-69 153 $38,500 Transistor Rack only PDP-8/S 66-70? >1000? $10,000 Transistor Incompatable, slow! PDP-8/I 68-70? >2000? $12,800 TTL Pedistal or rack PDP-8/L 68-70? >2000? $8,500 TTL Scaled down 8/I (1) PDP-12 69-71 3500 $27,900 TTL Followup to LINC-8 PDP-8/E 70-78 >10K? $7,390 TTL MSI Omnibus Table-top or rack PDP-8/F 72-78? >10K? <$7K TTL MSI Omnibus Based on 8/E CPU PDP-8/M 72-78? >10K? <$7K TTL MSI Omnibus OEM version of 8/F PDP-8/A 75-84? >10K? <$7K TTL LSI Omnibus New CPU or 8/E CPU VT78 78-80 > ? Microprocessor Intersil IM6100 Dm I (2)80-84 Microprocessor Intersil IM6120 Dm II 82-86 $1,435 Microprocessor Intersil IM6120 Dm III 84-90 $2,695 Microprocessor Dm III+ 85-90 Microprocessor Notes (1) Memory upgrade to 32K words was eventually sold. (2) Dm stands for DECmate. When possible, the costs given in the above table are for a minimal system in the first year of production; for most PDP-8 systems, such a system would have 4K of main memory, a console teletype, and the minimal software needed to use the machine (FOCAL, BASIC, or a paper-tape based assembler). Additional information on costs and production is needed! The above list does not include many PDP-8 variants sold by DEC to meet the needs of various special users. For example, the Industrial-8 was really just a PDP-8/E with a different nameplate and color scheme. Burger King had thousands of PDP-8/M based point-of-sale systems with no standard peripherals. In addition, DEC made many peripheral controllers for the PDP-11 and PDP-15 that used IM6100 microprocessors made by Intersil and Harris. The last years of the PDP-8 family were dominated by the DECmate machines. DEC sold these primarily as word processing systems, and in the end, they chose to obscure the ability of the DECmate systems to run any software other than WPS, DEC's word processing system. The following PDP-8 compatible or semi-compatible machines were made and sold by others; very little is known about many of these: MODEL DATE MAKER, NOTES MP-12 6? Fabritek TPA 68? Hungarian, possibly a DEC PDP-8/L in drag DCC-112 70-71 Digital Computer Controls DCC-112H 71 Digital Computer Controls 6100 Sampler 7? Intersil, their IM6100 promotional kit Intercept 7? Intersil, based on IM6100 Intercept Jr 7? Intersil, based on IM6100 PCM-12 7? Pacific CyberMetrix, based on Intercept bus SBC-8 84-88 CESI, Based on IM6120, SCSI bus What about the LINC/8 and PDP-12? Wesley Clark, then at Lincoln Labs, developed the LINC, or Laboratory INstrumentation Computer, as a personal laboratory computer in the early 1960's. He developed it in response to the needs of Mary Brazier, a neurophysiologist at MIT who needed better laboratory tools. When Lincoln Labs decided that the LINC did not fit their mission, a group at the the National Institute of Health funded an experiment to see if the LINC would be a productive tool in the life sciences. As a result of this project, 12 LINCs were built and debugged, each by its eventual user. The LINC was built using DEC's first family of logic modules, and along with the CDC 160, it paved the way for the PDP-5 and PDP-8. When compared with the PDP-8, the LINC instruction set was not as well suited for general purpose computation, but the common peripherals needed for lab work such as analog to digital and digital to analog converters were all bundled into the LINC system. Users judged it to be a superb laboratory instrument. One of the major innovations introduced with the LINC was the LINCtape. These tapes could be carelessly pocketed or dropped on the floor without fear of data loss, and they allowed random access to data blocks. DEC improved on this idea slightly to make their DECtape format, and DECtape was widely used with all DEC computers made in the late 1960's and early 1970's. Within a year of the introduction of the PDP-8, DEC released the LINC-8, a machine that combined a PDP-8 with a LINC in one package. This was not a general purpose dual processor, in the sense of allowing both machines to execute in parallel, but rather, a machine with the hardware of both but restrictions that effectively prevented more than one from running at a time. The sales success of the LINC-8 led DEC to re-engineer the machine using TTL logic in the late 1960's; the new version was originally developed as the LINC-8/I, but it was sold as the PDP-12; thousands were sold. Both the LINC-8 and the PDP-12 had impressive consoles, with full sets of lights and switches for the registers of each processor. These machines could run essentially any PDP-8 or LINC software, but because they included instructions for switching between modes, a third body of software was developed that required both instruction sets. One feature of LINC and LINC-8 software is the common use of the graphic display for input-output. These machines were some of the first to include such a display as a standard component, and many programs used the knobs on the analog to digital converter to move a cursor on the display in the way we now use a mouse. LAP, the Linc Assembly Program, was the dominant assembler used on the LINC. WISAL (WISconson Assembly Language) or LAP6-W was the version of this assembler that survived to run on the PDP-12. Curiously, this includes a PDP-8 assembler written in LINC code. LAP-6 DIAL (Display Interactive Assembly Language) evolved from this on the PDP-12 to became the dominant operating system for the PDP-12. The 8K version of this is DIAL MS (Mass Storage), even if it has only two LINCtape drives. These were eventually displaced by the OS/8 variant known as OS/12. Where can I get a PDP-8 today? The CESI machine may still be on the market, for a high price, but generally, you can't buy a new PDP-8 anymore. There are quite a few PDP-8 machines to be found in odd places on the used equipment market. They were widely incorporated into products such as computer controlled machine tools, X-ray diffraction machines, and other industrial and lab equipment. Many of them were sold under the EduSystem marketing program to public schools and universities, and others were used to control laboratory instrumentation. Reuters bought the tail end of the Omnibus based production run. If you can't get real hardware, you can get emulators. Over the years, many PDP-8 emulators have been written; the best of these are indistinguishable from the real machine from a software prespective, and on a modern high-speed RISC platform, these frequently outperform the hardware they are emulating. It is worth noting that the PDP-8, when it was introduced in 1965, was about as fast as was practical with the logic technology used at the time; only by using tricks like memory interleaving or pipelining could the machine have been made much faster. Where can I get PDP-8 documentation? The 1973 Introduction to Programming was probably DEC's definitive manual for this family, but it is out of print, and DEC was in the habit of printing much of their documentation on newsprint with paperback bindings, which is to say, surviving copies tend to be yellow and brittle. DEC distributed huge numbers of catalogs and programming handbooks in this inexpensive paperback format, and these circulate widely on the second-hand market. When research laboratories and electronics shops are being cleaned out, it is still common to find a few dusty, yellowed copies of these books being thrown in the trash. Maintenance manuals are harder to find, but more valuable. Generally, you'll need to find someone who's willing to photocopy one of the few surviving copies. Fortunately, DEC has been friendly to collectors, granting fairly broad letters of permission to reprint obsolete documentation, and the network makes if fairly easy to find someone who has the documentation you need and can get copies. What operating systems were written for the PDP-8? A punched paper-tape library of stand-alone programs was commonly used with the smallest (diskless and tapeless) configurations from the beginning up through the mid 1970's. Many paper tapes from this library survive to the present at various sites! The minimum configuration expected by these tapes is a CPU with 4K memory, and a teletype ASR 33 with paper tape reader and punch. The DECtape Library System was an early DECtape oriented save and restore system that allowed a reel of tape to hold a directory of named files that could be loaded and run on a 4K system. Eventually, this supported a very limited tape-based text editor for on-line program development. This did not use the DECtape's block addressable character; the software was based on minimal ports of the paper-tape based software described above. The 4K Disk Monitor System provided slightly better facilities. This supported on-line program development and it worked with any device that supported 129 word blocks (DECtape, the DF32 disk, or the RF08 disk). MS/8 or the R-L Monitor System, developed starting in 1966 and submitted to DECUS in 1970. This was a disk oriented system, faster than the above, with tricks to make it run quickly on DECtape based systems. POLY BASIC, a BASIC only system submitted to DECUS and later sold by DEC as part of its EduSystem marketing program. P?S/8, developed starting in 1971 from an MS/8 foundation. Runs on minimal PDP-8 configurations, supports device semi-independant I/O and a file system on a random-access device, including DECtape. P?S/8 runs compatably on most PDP-8 machines including DECmates, excepting only the PDP-8/S and PDP-5. P?S/8 is still being developed! OS/8, developed in parallel with P?S/8, became the main PDP-8 programming environment sold by DEC. The minimum configuration required was 8K words and a random-access device to hold the system. For some devices, OS/8 requires 12K. There are a large number of OS/8 versions that are not quite portable across various subsets of the PDP-8 family. TSS/8 was developed in 1968 as a timesharing system. It required a minimum of 12K words of memory and a swapping device. It was the standard operating system on the EduSystem 50 which was sold to many small colleges and large public school systems. Each user gets a virtual 4K PDP-8; many of the utilities users ran on these virtual machines were only slightly modified versions of utilities from the Disk Monitor System. Late versions of TSS/8 may have allowed individual users to have extended memory on their virtual machines. Other timesharing systems developed for the PDP-8 include MULTI-8, ETOS (which required special hardware), MULTOS, and OMNI-8; these were similar to TSS/8, and by the mid 1970's, many of these were true virtual machine operating systems in the same spirit as IBM's VM-370. All are able to support OS/8 running on a 32K virtual PDP-8 assigned to each user. Some could support multiple user operating systems, others required OS/8 as the user system. CAPS-8 was a cassette based operating system supporting PAL and BASIC. There are OS/8 utilities to manipulate CAPS-8 cassettes, and the file format on cassette is compatible with a PDP-11 based system called CAPS-11. WPS was DEC's word processing system that was widely used on the 1980's vintage machines with a special WPS keycaps replacing the standard keycaps on the keyboard. This was written in the 1970's, and was the primary system used on the DECmate systems. COS-310, DEC's commercial operating system for the PDP-8, supported the DIBOL language. COS-310 was a derivative of MS/8 and OS/8, but with a new text file format. The file system is OS/8 compatable, and a few applications can run under either COS or OS/8. What programming languages are supported on the PDP-8 The PAL family of assembly languages are as close to a standard assembly language as can be found for the PDP-8. These produce absolute object code and versions of PAL will run on minimally configured machines (but with a small symbol table). Assembly of large programs frequently requires far more memory for symbol table management. MACRO-8 was DEC's first macro assembly language for the PDP-8, but it was never used outside the paper-tape environment. MACREL and SABR are assembly languages that produce relocatable output. SABR is the final pass for the ALICS II FORTRAN compiler, and MACREL was developed in (unfulfilled) anticipation of similar use. MACREL was heavily used by the DECmate group at DEC. There was also RALF, the relocatable assembler supporting RTPS FORTRAN, and FLAP, an absolute assembler derived from RALF. Both SABR and RALF/FALP are assemblers that handle their intended applications but have quirky and incompatible syntax. A subset of FORTRAN was supported on both the PDP-5 and the original PDP-8. Surviving documentation describes a DEC compiler from 1964 and a compiler written by Information Control Systems from 1968. The latter, ALICS II FORTRAN, was originally a paper tape based compiler, but it forms the basis of the OS/8 8K FORTRAN compiler, and was also adapted to the Disk Monitor System. RTPS FORTRAN required 8K and a floating point processor; it had real-time extensions and was a full implementation of FORTRAN IV (also known as ANSI FORTRAN 66). OS/8 F4 is RTPS FORTRAN stripped of the requirement for hardware floating point (if the hardware is missing, it uses software emulation). FOCAL, an interpretive language comparable to BASIC was available on all models of the family, including the PDP-5 and PDP-8/S. Varsions of FOCAL run under PS/8, P?S/8 and other systems. BASIC was also available, and was widely used on PDP-8 systems sold under the EduSystem marketing program. A paper-tape version was available that ran in 4K, there were versions that ran under OS/8 and TSS/8, there was an 8K stand-alone time-sharing version, and there were many others. DIBOL was DEC's attempt at competing with COBOL in the commercial arena. It was originally implemented under MS/8 but most versions were sold to run under the COS operating system. Algol was available from a fairly early date. At least two Pascal compilers were developed for the PDP-8. One was a Pascal-S interpreter, written in assembler, the other was a Pascal-P compiler with a P-code interpreter written in assembler. At least two LISP interpreters were written for the PDP-8; one runs in 4K, the other can use up to 16K. TECO, the text editor, is available, and is also a general purpose language, and someone is working on a PDP-8 C. The story of TECO on the PDP-8 is convoluted. Russ Ham implemented TECO under his OS8 (without a slash) system, an operating system for the PDP-8 that was based on PDP-10 format DECtapes. This version of TECO was pirated by the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI), where the system was ported to PS/8. Richard Lary and Stan Rabinowitz made it compatible with the version under RT-11 on the PDP-11, and this is the version distrubuted by DECUS. Where can I get PDP-8 software? DECUS, the DEC User Society, is still alive and well, and their submission form still lists PAL-8 and FOCAL as languages in which they accept submissions! The DECUS library is available on-line by anonymous FTP at acfcluster.nyu.edu in subdirectory DECUS. To quote the README file from the current on-line catalog, "Items from older DECUS Library catalogs are still also available (provided their media can still be read), but machine readable catalog information is not available for these." Direct questions by E-mail to INFORMATION@DECUS.ORG. There is a young but growing FTPable archive of PDP-8 software at ftp.telebit.com in directory /pub/pdp8. Another archive that contains considerable PDP-8 related material, along with material related to other DEC computers, is at sunsite.unc.edu in directory /pub/academic/computer-science/history/. Where can I get additional information? The file WHAT-IS-A-PDP8, by Charles Lasner contains considerable additional information; this file is included in the FTPable archive cited above. This file gives details of every model of the PDP-8, including the small quirks and incompatabilities that (to be generous) allow software to determine which model it is running on. These quirks also make it all too easy for careless programmers to write almost portable software with very obscure bugs. The mailing list pdp8-lovers@ai.mit.edu reaches a number of PDP-8 owners and users, not all of whom have USENET feeds. The USENET newsgroup alt.sys.pdp8 is fairly new, but someday, the newsgroup and mailing list should be gatewayed to each other. Many "archival" books have included fairly complete descriptions of the PDP-8; among them, "Computer Architecture, Readings and Examples" by Gordon Bell and Allen Newell is among the most complete (and difficult to read). Considering Bell's role in the design of the PDP-8 and the history of DEC, the description in this book should be accurate! What use is a PDP-8 today? What use is a Model T today? Collectors of both come in the same basic classes. First, there are antiquarians who keep an old one in the garage, polished and restored to new condition but hardly ever used. Once a year, they warm it up and use it, just to prove that it still works, but they don't have much practical use. PDP-8 systems maintained by antiquarians are frequently in beautiful shape. Antiquarians worry about dust, chipped paint, and missing switches, and they establish newsgroups and mailing lists to help them locate parts and the advice needed to fix their machines. In the second class are those who find old machines and soup them up, replacing major parts to make a hotrod that only looks like the original from the outside, or keeping the old mechanism and putting it to uses that were never intended. Some PDP-8 owners, for example, are building PDP-8 systems with modern SCSI disk interfaces! There is serious interest in some quarters in constructing an omnibus board that would support an IDE disk of the variety that was mass-produced for the IBM PC/AT. Last, there are the old folks who still use their old machines for their intended purposes long after any sane economic analysis would recommend such use. If it ain't broke, don't fix it, and if it can be fixed, why bother replacing it? Both Model T Fords and the classic PDP-8 machines are simple enough that end users can maintain and repair them indefinitely. All you need to keep a vintage -8 running are a stock of inexpensive silicon diodes and a stock of 2N3639B or better, 2N3640 transistors. Unlike most modern personal computers, PDP-8 systems were routinely sold with complete maintenance manuals; these included schematic diagrams, explanations of not only how to use the devices, but how they are built, and suggestions to those considering building their own peripherals. Compared with many so-called "open systems" of today, the PDP-8 seems to have been far better documented and far more open. Finally, the PDP-8 is such a minimal machine that it is an excellent introduction to how computers really work. Over the years, many students have built complete working PDP-8 systems from scratch as lab projects, and the I/O environment on a PDP-8 is simple enough that it is a very appropriate environment for learning operating system programming techniques. From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!not-for-mail Thu Apr 8 16:19:05 EDT 1993 Article: 215 of alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!not-for-mail From: dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Subject: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Date: 8 Apr 1993 15:07:28 -0400 Organization: Department of Mathematics, The Ohio State University Lines: 19 Message-ID: <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu I was approached for help this week by a user who has a DecMate II and about 100 RX50 floppies with years of his work on them. He has decided that the time has come to enter the MS-LOSS world and be compatible with everyone else at his office. He likes the DecMates but he hates not being able to exchange data with any of his coworkers. So, does anyone have any advice for how to accomplish this? I do not presently have access to a VAX with DECdx and/or WPS/plus. I should be able to lay my hands on a copy of 22DISK; I do have RX50.ARC, an old MSDOS driver for (I think) RT-11 RX50 disks. I do not presently have a copy of OS/278 for his DecMate II. Thanks, -ethan -- dicks@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu -or- erd@kumiss.cmhnet.org From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Thu Apr 8 16:42:32 EDT 1993 Article: 216 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Message-ID: <1993Apr8.203720.18115@news.columbia.edu> Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University References: <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> Date: Thu, 8 Apr 1993 20:37:20 GMT In article <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: > >I was approached for help this week by a user who has a DecMate II and >about 100 RX50 floppies with years of his work on them. He has decided >that the time has come to enter the MS-LOSS world and be compatible with >everyone else at his office. He likes the DecMates but he hates not >being able to exchange data with any of his coworkers. So, does anyone >have any advice for how to accomplish this? > >I do not presently have access to a VAX with DECdx and/or WPS/plus. I >should be able to lay my hands on a copy of 22DISK; I do have RX50.ARC, >an old MSDOS driver for (I think) RT-11 RX50 disks. I do not presently >have a copy of OS/278 for his DecMate II. Several paths to go here: 1) Easy way: Convert the WPS documents to ASCII TEXT files and lose all WPS "isms" in the process such as soft returns, underlining, bolding, etc. Then attempt to put it back somehow at the PC end. For example, PC WordPerfect 5.0 has a feature that guesses at what a paragraph is - it's a series of sentences delimited by double-spaced CR/LF/CR/LF. Within this "horizontal zone" region hard returns can optionally be replaced by soft returns. (Warning: there is a bug in WordPerfect 5.1 that makes the feature not work :-(.) To turn it into text, use either OS/278 WPFLOP to make OS/278 text files, or use (if APU available) WPSCONV to make CP/M text files or (if XPU available) make CP/M or MS-DOS text files using CONVERT.EXE. Each of the three systems then has ways to get the file elsewhere. OS/278 supports Kermit-12 to send the text to another machine. CP/M and MS-DOS can do the same. Additionally, 22DISK can be run on a PC to recover the CP/M files and convert to MS-DOS files, and RX50 or RAINDOS or MULTIDRV can be used on PC's with MS-DOS to directly access the MS-DOS RX50 diskettes containing the text files, etc. 2) Harder: Start from the original WPS documents and attempt to get them through to another format, such as WPS-80 or WPS-DOS. Some of DEC's WPS-like systems on other DEC machines may or may not like the WPS RX50 format, and/or may not run on the DECmate. (WPS-80 is non-DEC and there is a version for the DECmate with APU and also for the Rainbow. WPS-DOS is for PC's.) Once on a PC is PC-WPS format (or in WPS-80 CP/M format moved with 22DISK to a PC) you then need to use Software Bridge to convert the PC-based WPS documents to something like WordPerfect. (There is some other package besides Software Bridge that is for WordPerfect only; I think it's called Perfect Exchange, while Software Bridge is more generic and expensive.) This should get you where you want to be, since WordPerfect format is recognized by lots of packages/conversion programs, etc. 3) Hardest: There is a package of hardware and software for PC's marketed by Shaftstall that can do the job directly. It is out of the budget for virtually everyone and is only affordable by the large data conversion houses, etc. They will charge you by the character to convert your file, but this way will have the least lossage. However, it is likely prohibitely expensive. BTW, I am available as a consultant for the middle solution :-). In all probability, the first one will be deemed adequate. cj (Have WPS, will travel) l From news.columbia.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wupost!emory!news-feed-1.peachnet.edu!umn.edu!mmm.serc.3m.com!news Fri Apr 9 14:36:52 EDT 1993 Article: 217 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wupost!emory!news-feed-1.peachnet.edu!umn.edu!mmm.serc.3m.com!news From: us048503@cc016.mmm.com us048503 (Art Hurst) Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Message-ID: <1993Apr9.042604.10545@mmm.serc.3m.com> Sender: news@mmm.serc.3m.com Organization: 3M - St. Paul, MN 55144-1000 US X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1.4 PL6] References: <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> Date: Fri, 9 Apr 93 04:26:04 GMT Lines: 21 Ethan Dicks (dicks@math.ohio-state.edu) wrote: : : I was approached for help this week by a user who has a DecMate II and : about 100 RX50 floppies with years of his work on them. He has decided : that the time has come to enter the MS-LOSS world and be compatible with : everyone else at his office. He likes the DecMates but he hates not : being able to exchange data with any of his coworkers. So, does anyone : have any advice for how to accomplish this? I would recommed using Kermit to transmit them from one system to the other. By far the easiest method. You can ftp anon to watsun.cc.columbia.edu for Kermit sources and binaries. I'm not sure WPS files would translate into any other machine. You might have to convert to ASCII before sending to another machine, but there go the fancies! :-( .: -- Art Hurst Email: ahhurst@mmm.com 3M Company Phone: (805)388-4170 Digital Storage Products Division FAX: (805)388-4804 Camarillo CA 93012 From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!agate!dog.ee.lbl.gov!hellgate.utah.edu!cc.usu.edu!ivie Fri Apr 9 14:37:37 EDT 1993 Article: 218 of alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!agate!dog.ee.lbl.gov!hellgate.utah.edu!cc.usu.edu!ivie From: ivie@cc.usu.edu Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Message-ID: <1993Apr9.101916.65967@cc.usu.edu> Date: 9 Apr 93 10:19:15 MDT References: <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> Organization: Utah State University Lines: 30 In article <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu>, dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: > I do not presently have access to a VAX with DECdx and/or WPS/plus. I > should be able to lay my hands on a copy of 22DISK; I do have RX50.ARC, > an old MSDOS driver for (I think) RT-11 RX50 disks. I do not presently > have a copy of OS/278 for his DecMate II. If the documents don't have too much wierd stuff (underlining, etc.; you know what I mean), you can transfer them using the CX communications package built into WPS to just about anything. It takes a bit of fiddling with the setup of CX (it took us about a week or so to get it talking reliably to our VAX) to get good transfers, but it will talk to just about anything. We used to get files between a WPS DECmate and the PC by echoing them through the VAX with CX. The routine was: $ CREATE filename.ext [tell WPS to send the file] ^Z $ then go to another port and use KERMIT to suck them down to a PC. It's been a long time, so the details are a bit fuzzy. I seem to recall that the magic of the CX setup was figuring out how to get it to correctly recognize when the VAX had echoed a line it just sent; something about the end-of-line sequence. Since then, the secretary that liked WPS left and I've taken over the DECmate as my own person in-office CP/M and OS/278 playground. Roger Ivie ivie@cc.usu.edu From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!uunet!psinntp!ukelele!dgent Sun Apr 11 09:44:35 EDT 1993 Article: 219 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!uunet!psinntp!ukelele!dgent From: dgent@ukelele.GCR.COM (Doug Gentges) Subject: PDP-8/e FOR SALE Message-ID: Organization: Genuine Computing Resources, Woodbridge, VA Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1993 22:26:48 GMT Lines: 16 I am posting this for my dad, who has a messed up news post program, please reply to him. ------------------------------------------------------------ For Sale: Large PDP-8/E system for sale. DECTAPES, H/W & S/W with loads of documentation, disk drives, Calcomp 36" wide drum plotter, many extra p.c. boards. Needs a loving home, too nice to scrap out. Buyer must take all of it for the scrap price of $100. Washington D.C. area. E-mail gentges@itd.nrl.navy.mil or phone (703)759-2218 Frank Gentges -- From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!not-for-mail Sun Apr 11 09:45:02 EDT 1993 Article: 220 of alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!not-for-mail From: dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Date: 10 Apr 1993 21:30:19 -0400 Organization: Department of Mathematics, The Ohio State University Lines: 24 Message-ID: <1q7sbb$pop@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> References: <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr9.101916.65967@cc.usu.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu In article <1993Apr9.101916.65967@cc.usu.edu> ivie@cc.usu.edu writes: >In article <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu>, dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: >> I do not presently have access to a VAX with DECdx and/or WPS/plus. I >> should be able to lay my hands on a copy of 22DISK; I do have RX50.ARC, >> an old MSDOS driver for (I think) RT-11 RX50 disks. I do not presently >> have a copy of OS/278 for his DecMate II. > >If the documents don't have too much wierd stuff (underlining, etc.; you know >what I mean), you can transfer them using the CX communications package built >into WPS to just about anything. It takes a bit of fiddling with the setup >of CX (it took us about a week or so to get it talking reliably to our VAX) >to get good transfers, but it will talk to just about anything. If I don't have WPS on the VAX or the DECdx document exchange software (as I mentioned in my original request for help), is there a way to use CX? Thanks, -ethan -- dicks@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu -or- erd@kumiss.cmhnet.org From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!not-for-mail Sun Apr 11 09:46:20 EDT 1993 Article: 221 of alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!not-for-mail From: dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Date: 10 Apr 1993 21:35:09 -0400 Organization: Department of Mathematics, The Ohio State University Lines: 39 Message-ID: <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> References: <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr8.203720.18115@news.columbia.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu In article <1993Apr8.203720.18115@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: >In article <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: >> >>I was approached for help this week by a user who has a DecMate II and >>about 100 RX50 floppies with years of his work on them. >Several paths to go here: > >1) Easy way: > >Convert the WPS documents to ASCII TEXT files and lose all WPS "isms" in the >process [...] > >To turn it into text, use either OS/278 WPFLOP to make OS/278 text files I don't have OS/278, as I said. How can I get a copy? How many RX50 flops does it take? >2) Harder: > >Start from the original WPS documents and attempt to get them through to >another format, such as WPS-80 or WPS-DOS. Some of DEC's WPS-like systems >on other DEC machines may or may not like the WPS RX50 format, and/or may not >run on the DECmate. (WPS-80 is non-DEC and there is a version for the >DECmate with APU and also for the Rainbow. WPS-DOS is for PC's.) Until informed otherwise, as far as I know, the DECMateII in question is bare bones - no hard disk, no APU, no XPU. Where is WPS-DOS available? I have never heard of it and would have no idea where to order it from. Thanks again for the help, -ethan -- dicks@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu -or- erd@kumiss.cmhnet.org From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Sun Apr 11 10:42:41 EDT 1993 Article: 222 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:222 comp.sys.dec.micro:2127 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Message-ID: <1993Apr11.144129.1133@news.columbia.edu> Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University References: <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr8.203720.18115@news.columbia.edu> <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> Date: Sun, 11 Apr 1993 14:41:29 GMT In article <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: >In article <1993Apr8.203720.18115@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: >>In article <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: >>> >>>I was approached for help this week by a user who has a DecMate II and >>>about 100 RX50 floppies with years of his work on them. It would seem that what follows is based on the user not wanting to spend any money whatsoever since I offered to act as a consultant, etc. (Others exist who could also help out, etc.) Thus, the response is tailored to a total do-it-yourself approach, even though this will perhaps be false economy, etc. > >>Several paths to go here: >> >>1) Easy way: >> >>Convert the WPS documents to ASCII TEXT files and lose all WPS "isms" in the >>process [...] >> >>To turn it into text, use either OS/278 WPFLOP to make OS/278 text files > >I don't have OS/278, as I said. How can I get a copy? How many RX50 >flops does it take? This path requires OS/278 which can be purchased from DECUS or it can be acquired as a disk image using PC's. There are various programs available to accomplish this. The currently most popular one is a former shareware program called TELEDISK. Unfortunately, the program has known bugs in it and flakey disk handling. The authors have withdrawn the shareware version so the only way to get a current version is to pay a fairly steep ($150) license fee. (They claim abuse of shareware by some commercial operators so they are taking a dead-head approach that all must suffer equally because of the abuse of a few, etc. :-( ) To use TELEDISK, you have to have a PC with a good quality 1.2 Meg floppy disk preferably a TEAC FD55GFR. The procedure is to first format a floppy on the PC using 22DISK or RAINDOS or the RT-11 program or TELEDISK itself using an MS-DOS file of any arbitrary RX50 format disk archived to that file, etc., or even the ex-Soviet Union software for RSX-11. What all these programs do is to format the floppy on the drive to be used later. This is necessary because RX50's tend to be out of alignment slightly, and a weakness of TELEDISK is that it doesn't retry enough. This in turn is because TELEDISK is attempting to copy the disk with little regard to the actual format, thus often it interprets the errors it encounters as merely aberations in the disk format. The copy won't be correct. (Someone is working on a PD version of a replacement program that is RX50-specific. This will eliminate all of the major hassles of TELEDISK. The authors of TELEDISK won't care either way because the main thrust of TELEDISK has to do with its many other features, which are useless to RX50 people.) The freshly formatted diskette now in RX50 low-level format (aligned as best as possible to the drive needed later) now can be brought to a DECmate where a copy of an OS/278 or other diskette is. Using any available diskette copying program, make a descendent copy of the diskette in question. Then bring the diskette back to the PC. Using TELEDISK, the entire diskette can be turned into an MS-DOS file. While compression is available, it's best not to use it. Then the resultant MS-DOS file can be compressed separately with an available program such as PKZIP. The resultant file will be smaller than using TELEDISK's compression option, which incidentally is implemented in a way that runs quite poorly (real slow). This binary file can then be dealt with as any other binary file, such as uuencode and then mailed to the user who then reverses the process and uses TELEDISK to create an RX50 copy ready to be run on the DECmate. OS/278 consists of three binary diskettes and also five source diskettes (optional). The release refers you to some obscure DEC documentation of OS/78 Version 4 and only provides a modicum of documentation on the differences between OS/278 V2 and OS/78 V4. It's really geared towards oldtimers already familiar with the syntax of OS/8, etc. or someone with access to the older manuals. (Although it's not really that hard since OS/8 is the basis for RT-11, etc.) Also, you have to slightly read between the lines to properly install OS/278 on the hard disk beyond what you obviously have to do with what's provided, etc. since it is provided in a crude form. (Again, no big deal for oldtimers, etc. :-)) Once OS/278 is in place, you need a copy of my Kermit-12 to transfer the files, since all OS/278 can do is to convert the WPS documents into OS/278 ASCII text files with all of the WPS' "isms" removed (using WPFLOP). Kermit-12 is available from watsun.cc.columbia.edu via anonymous ftp in the /kermit/d area as the 30-odd files that match k12* or k12*.* (since they all have the "." to form an extension, etc.). The best place to put them in on a PC that can be hooked to the DECmate using the DECmate's printer cable. Within the Kermit-12 release there is a description of a direct download procedure that assumes a local error-free connection (such as connecting a serial port to the DECmate's printer port). Again, an experienced -8 person can make the small changes suggested to customize the download to the DECmate printer port (it's slightly incompatible with the PDP-8 equivalent so there is a small amount of documentation about what to do to accomodate the difference, etc.). Also, the .BWR files have to be read to realize just what exact commands must be used on the DECmate due to bugs in OS/278 specifically that have been found when this sort of thing was actually attempted. It turns out that it can be done, but not in a way intuitively obvious to an -8 user! Fortunately, some of the alternate and seemingly equivalent commands actually do work, so reading the *entire* .bwr file will solve this problem. We still haven't determined exactly *why* these bugs are present, just confirmed that they *are* present :-(. (Were this OS/8 V3D, all of the obvious command forms just work fine. As the system has been worked over by various ever less qualified individuals, bugs have crept in. Part of the work of creating OS/8 Version 5 will be to restore lost features :-)..) So, after all of this is accomplished, the user will have OS/278 on his DECmate, with the ability to create (using WPFLOP) descendants of his WPS documents reduced down to hard-return ASCII text files, and then send these files to any other system via KERMIT. Presumably the connection would be made to the PC required earlier. Once the files are MS-DOS ASCII text files, they can then be processed with WordPerfect 5.0 (not 5.1 - it has the TextIn feature bug!) or some other PC WP package, etc. > >>2) Harder: >> >>Start from the original WPS documents and attempt to get them through to >>another format, such as WPS-80 or WPS-DOS. Some of DEC's WPS-like systems >>on other DEC machines may or may not like the WPS RX50 format, and/or may not >>run on the DECmate. (WPS-80 is non-DEC and there is a version for the >>DECmate with APU and also for the Rainbow. WPS-DOS is for PC's.) > >Until informed otherwise, as far as I know, the DECMateII in question is >bare bones - no hard disk, no APU, no XPU. You are placing an unfair burden on us, since the more options in the machine, the more the "rules" change regarding what you are requesting. Please make an effort to find out! OS/278 on hard disk is something quite different from OS/278 on floppy. The effort required for any of these methods is severely increased if only a floppy system can be run :-(. (However, albeit in "slow motion", all of the described methods do work :-).) > >Where is WPS-DOS available? I have never heard of it and would have no >idea where to order it from. It is not a DEC product, and it's not known if it directly likes WPS-8 RX50 diskettes. (It is entirely conceivable that it merely supports DX protocol, which would allow the documents to be transmitted to the PC in DX protocol directly, presumably without loss, since allegedly WPS-DOS internally supports most if not all of the WPS-isms, etc.) Further, this would mean that the user is then "married" to WPS-DOS, so all that has happened is they are now using a different "orphan" system, etc. It hasn't been determined yet if Software Bridge "likes" WPS-DOS files, since it was designed for DEC's ill-fated WPS+/PC. Moreover, the cost of WPS-DOS and Software PC exceeds the reasonable cost of a consulting fee towards this marginal project :-(. > >Thanks again for the help, >-ethan > > >-- >dicks@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu -or- erd@kumiss.cmhnet.org > cj "Will even convert WPS documents for food :-)" l From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!uunet!digex.com!rocinante.digex.net!mcguire Sun Apr 11 16:07:55 EDT 1993 Article: 223 of alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!uunet!digex.com!rocinante.digex.net!mcguire From: mcguire@rocinante.digex.net (Dave McGuire) Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Subject: Re: DECmate II's ? Date: 11 Apr 1993 19:21:11 GMT Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt MD USA Lines: 20 Message-ID: <1q9r37$grf@news1.digex.net> References: <1q0i5p$rls@news1.digex.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: rocinante.digex.net X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL8] I have received a number of responses regarding the possible availability of a boatload of DECmate II's. My apologies that I haven't yet responded to all the mail I've gotten, but it's been busy lately. You know how it goes. The machines are indeed available, about 50 of them. They are in unknown condition, but I took a quick peek and they looked a bit dirty but they weren't bashed-up or anything. I'll try to crack a few open and see if they're complete on the inside. I've been told that some (not all) of them have hard disks in them, and they all have RX50's. No keyboards (LK201's) are available, and I doubt if the monitors are still there, I didn't see them anywhere. I'll keep you posted, I should be able to get back there next weekend to take a more thorough look at the equipment. Thanks for your patience. -Dave Systems Programmer Digital Express Group, Inc. mcguire@digex.net From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!oz.plymouth.edu!oddjob Mon Apr 12 01:44:14 EDT 1993 Article: 224 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:224 comp.sys.dec.micro:2128 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!oz.plymouth.edu!oddjob From: oddjob@oz.plymouth.edu (Andrew C. Stoffel) Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Message-ID: <1993Apr12.020929.5328@oz.plymouth.edu> Organization: Plymouth State College - Plymouth, NH. References: <1993Apr8.203720.18115@news.columbia.edu> <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr11.144129.1133@news.columbia.edu> Date: Mon, 12 Apr 93 02:09:29 GMT Lines: 46 [Sorry... I cut out all the attrib. lines.. coulnd't figure out who wrote what...] >>>2) Harder: I find this to be the easiest way...... (& yes, I have done it....) >>>Start from the original WPS documents and attempt to get them through to >>>another format, such as WPS-80 or WPS-DOS. Some of DEC's WPS-like systems >>>on other DEC machines may or may not like the WPS RX50 format, >>>and/or may not DEC's ALL-IN-1 with the WPS-PLUS option can communicate with a DECmate ..... I've even written some scripts for it to make life much easier..... just need to know what version of ALL-IN-1 you have (apparently, the most recent version of ALL-IN-1 (3.0-1) can't communicate with older versions of the DECMate software.....)... >>Until informed otherwise, as far as I know, the DECMateII in question is >>bare bones - no hard disk, no APU, no XPU. >>Where is WPS-DOS available? I have never heard of it and would have no >>idea where to order it from. It WAS available from DEC for a while...... >It is not a DEC product, and it's not known if it directly likes WPS-8 >RX50 diskettes. (It is entirely conceivable that it merely supports DX Actually.... speaking from personal experience..... earlier versions (3.something-beta) could actually read DECmate RX50's.... I don't think that capability is in the newer (4.+) versions.... & I discourage any but the most desparate person from using this method. The only format you can convert from WPS-DOS to is ASCII text.... while the method I mentioned above will let you convert it to any format that you have available in ALL-IN-1 (I've been able to convert from DECmate to Wordperfect 5.1 using the ALL-IN-1/Wordperfect Integration product though KeyPak should do the same if you have it...... >cj "Will even convert WPS documents for food :-)" l -AndyS- -- |E-mail --> un*x: oddjob@oz.plymouth.edu |vms: andys@psc.plymouth.edu | |Disclaimer > Any "end-user" software that provides NO avenue for user | |of the week> modification or programmability is NOT user friendly. | From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Mon Apr 12 02:06:29 EDT 1993 Article: 225 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:225 comp.sys.dec.micro:2129 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Message-ID: <1993Apr12.060225.6002@news.columbia.edu> Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University References: <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr11.144129.1133@news.columbia.edu> <1993Apr12.020929.5328@oz.plymouth.edu> Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1993 06:02:25 GMT In article <1993Apr12.020929.5328@oz.plymouth.edu> oddjob@oz.plymouth.edu (Andrew C. Stoffel) writes: > >[Sorry... I cut out all the attrib. lines.. coulnd't figure out who >wrote what...] >>>>2) Harder: > >I find this to be the easiest way...... (& yes, I have done it....) Well, you have done *something* like it :-). > >>>>Start from the original WPS documents and attempt to get them through to >>>>another format, such as WPS-80 or WPS-DOS. Some of DEC's WPS-like systems >>>>on other DEC machines may or may not like the WPS RX50 format, >>>>and/or may not > >DEC's ALL-IN-1 with the WPS-PLUS option can communicate with a DECmate >..... I've even written some scripts for it to make life much >easier..... just need to know what version of ALL-IN-1 you have >(apparently, the most recent version of ALL-IN-1 (3.0-1) can't >communicate with older versions of the DECMate software.....)... >>>Until informed otherwise, as far as I know, the DECMateII in question is >>>bare bones - no hard disk, no APU, no XPU. > > >>>Where is WPS-DOS available? I have never heard of it and would have no >>>idea where to order it from. >It WAS available from DEC for a while...... But this is EBS's WPS-DOS, not to be confused with WPS-PLUS/PC. >>It is not a DEC product, and it's not known if it directly likes WPS-8 >>RX50 diskettes. (It is entirely conceivable that it merely supports DX > >Actually.... speaking from personal experience..... earlier versions >(3.something-beta) could actually read DECmate RX50's.... I don't >think that capability is in the newer (4.+) versions.... & I >discourage any but the most desparate person from using this method. Version of *what* are you talking about? ALL-IN-I, WPS-PLUS/PC or WPS-DOS? >The only format you can convert from WPS-DOS to is ASCII text.... Irrelevant as I described. Software Bridge is designed to convert "WPS" documents to WordPerfect format. The problem is that we still don't quite know what they mean by "WPS" format. What *is* known is that they mean files that already are part of an MS-DOS file structure, thus the only possible candidates for this are files created by: 1) WPS-PLUS (for the Rainbow) since the files are created as MS-DOS files on the Rainbow, which can of course be moved to MS-DOS RX50 diskettes. Using either RX50DRVR, MULTIDRV, or RAINDOS, these diskettes can in turn be read on a PC/MS-DOS system. 2) WPS-PLUS/PC (for the PC) which is the most likely candidate. Files are created directly on PC devices. 3) WPS-DOS which is the EBS product that makes PC/MS-DOS files directly also. The problem is that there are multiple "translations" of what constitutes a WPS document's innards. Apparently, DX protocol is an implied conversion that is undone at the receiving site if the receiver happens to be a DECmate. But, other implementations of WPS-like systems use alternate conversions, some likely based more on the actual DX image protocol format than on the underlying WPS format. (An analogy would be where a system stores binary files, but another system stores the same file in uuencode format, as opposed to restoring the underlying information back into the original binary. Thus, while equivalent in content, the files are hardly identical as stored on their respective systems, etc. In this way, some "DX" file formats tend to exist. WPS documents can be read as a stream of 8-bit bytes directly, and that would be an acceptable translation off of the original WPS diskettes, but instead, these systems are storing one-off translations that use the DX protocol designed for comm port transmission as the basis for the stored data, etc.) In any case, it has not yet been determined which "DX" or "WPS" variant Software Bridge (and perhaps also Perfect Exchange, which could be looking for something different from SB) is expecting to be the internal format of the MS-DOS files you pass into it to be converted to MS-DOS files whose innards are WordPerfect format, etc. BTW, it is also possible to create additional fodder for this problem: Using WPS-80, which has a version for either DECmate with APU/XPU or Rainbow, and runs under CP/M, it is possible to convert WPS-8 documents from the RX50 into WPS-80's format. Again, this implies both the fact that the resultant file is now in a CP/M directory format, and also that the innards are in some format that is "equivalent" to WPS-8 document format, but in an unknown state of possible translation, etc. These files can be moved, using 22DISK, to a PC/MS-DOS machine, and could also possibly be valid input to Software Bridge and/or Perfect Exchange, etc. >while the method I mentioned above will let you convert it to any >format that you have available in ALL-IN-1 (I've been able to convert >from DECmate to Wordperfect 5.1 using the ALL-IN-1/Wordperfect >Integration product though KeyPak should do the same if you have it...... Is the Wordperfect format as described there, identical to the Wordperfect format needed on PC/MS-DOS? Indeed, if one of these files is Kermit-ed to a PC, is it *exactly* what PC WP wants? cjl "Will format RX50 diskettes for food :-)" l From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!oz.plymouth.edu!oddjob Mon Apr 12 19:25:42 EDT 1993 Article: 226 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:226 comp.sys.dec.micro:2130 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!oz.plymouth.edu!oddjob From: oddjob@oz.plymouth.edu (Andrew C. Stoffel) Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Message-ID: <1993Apr12.134812.10588@oz.plymouth.edu> Organization: Plymouth State College - Plymouth, NH. References: <1993Apr11.144129.1133@news.columbia.edu> <1993Apr12.020929.5328@oz.plymouth.edu> <1993Apr12.060225.6002@news.columbia.edu> Date: Mon, 12 Apr 93 13:48:12 GMT Lines: 60 In article <1993Apr12.060225.6002@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: >In article <1993Apr12.020929.5328@oz.plymouth.edu> oddjob@oz.plymouth.edu (Andrew C. Stoffel) writes: >>I find this to be the easiest way...... (& yes, I have done it....) >Well, you have done *something* like it :-). I'll admit to the something :-).... >> >>>>Where is WPS-DOS available? I have never heard of it and would have no >>>>idea where to order it from. >>It WAS available from DEC for a while...... >But this is EBS's WPS-DOS, not to be confused with WPS-PLUS/PC. How do you tell what it is ?? (I just checked the version of WPS-PLUS I had on floppy.... I was wrong.... I haev a copy of something called WPS-PLUS/DOS T3.0 >>>It is not a DEC product, and it's not known if it directly likes WPS-8 >>>RX50 diskettes. (It is entirely conceivable that it merely supports DX >> >>Actually.... speaking from personal experience..... earlier versions >>(3.something-beta) could actually read DECmate RX50's.... I don't >>think that capability is in the newer (4.+) versions.... & I >>discourage any but the most desparate person from using this method. >Version of *what* are you talking about? ALL-IN-I, WPS-PLUS/PC or WPS-DOS? The PC version of WPS-PLUS/DOS I have in my hands... sorry..... I don't think you can get ALL-IN-1 to read an RX50 EVEN if you were able to run it on a workstation that had an RX50 attached.... Also, this version seems to be built around the same "model" as WPS-PLUS for VMS & ALL-IN-1. All of the files are kept in a structure called a "File cabinet" which keeps track of file names (usually something very obnoxious starting with a Z.) and document titles.... > >>while the method I mentioned above will let you convert it to any >>format that you have available in ALL-IN-1 (I've been able to convert >>from DECmate to Wordperfect 5.1 using the ALL-IN-1/Wordperfect >>Integration product though KeyPak should do the same if you have it...... > >Is the Wordperfect format as described there, identical to the Wordperfect >format needed on PC/MS-DOS? Indeed, if one of these files is Kermit-ed to >a PC, is it *exactly* what PC WP wants? I didn't exactly kermit it over (The PC was on a Pathworks network so I just copied it over.....) but yes.... the file that was converted to Wordperfect from WPS-PLUS from the DECMate was in a format that was readable by Wordperfect on a PC (I was even able to import it into Ami-pro as a Wordperfect 5.1 document....) What you have to realize though is that the conversion from DECMate WPS-8 to WPS-PLUS 4.0 in ALL-IN-1 was done by software written by Digital so they know what the formats are they are converting from/to. and the WOrdperfect conversions were done by software supplied by Wordperfect which can be bought from Digital. -- |E-mail --> un*x: oddjob@oz.plymouth.edu |vms: andys@psc.plymouth.edu | |Disclaimer > Any "end-user" software that provides NO avenue for user | |of the week> modification or programmability is NOT user friendly. | From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Mon Apr 12 19:33:44 EDT 1993 Article: 227 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:227 comp.sys.dec.micro:2132 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: Re: looking for DEC Professional 380 computers Message-ID: <1993Apr12.233123.29643@news.columbia.edu> Keywords: DEC Professional 380 Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University References: <1qcd7vINNprn@im4u.cs.utexas.edu> Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1993 23:31:23 GMT In article <1qcd7vINNprn@im4u.cs.utexas.edu> wsmith@cs.utexas.edu (Wesley C. Smith) writes: >I am hoping someone out there knows of a source to buy spare parts >(or entire systems) for DEC Professional 380 computers. I am trying >to keep the exceedingly old systems I have up and running until I can ^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^ ^^^^^^^ >get new hardware and software (which isn't likely to happen any time >soon.) DEC doesn't support these anymore, and it has proven >impossible so far to find anything available anywhere else. If >anyone knows of any possible sources please let me know. > > >Cheri Smith >Vista Chemical >(512) 331-2504 >cheri@arissoft.com I think my functioning 1966 LINC-8 is a tad older :-). cj "No chips here, and a few vacuum tubes in it too" l From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!agate!dog.ee.lbl.gov!hellgate.utah.edu!cc.usu.edu!ivie Tue Apr 13 15:39:58 EDT 1993 Article: 228 of alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!agate!dog.ee.lbl.gov!hellgate.utah.edu!cc.usu.edu!ivie From: ivie@cc.usu.edu Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Subject: CX document transfers Message-ID: <1993Apr13.095125.66130@cc.usu.edu> Date: 13 Apr 93 09:51:25 MDT Organization: Utah State University Lines: 14 Sorry for lack of quoting, but the news system here deleted the original message before I had a chance to respond... It's been a long time since I used CX to send things back and forth between a DECmate II and other systems, so I don't exactly remember what the limitations were. You should be able to at least get the text, but you will probably have to redo all the formatting. I think that everything we shipped that way was pretty much just raw text; the fanciest it might have gotten is strange WordStar margins, but WordStar handles that by sticking the spaces in the file. Roger Ivie ivie@cc.usu.edu From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!agate!darkstar.UCSC.EDU!darkstar.UCSC.EDU!usenet Tue Apr 13 21:04:39 EDT 1993 Article: 229 of alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!agate!darkstar.UCSC.EDU!darkstar.UCSC.EDU!usenet From: ted@helios.ucsc.edu (Sync) Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Subject: DecMate RX02-PA & LQP02 printer Date: 13 Apr 1993 23:00:30 GMT Organization: UCO/Lick Observatory Lines: 27 Distribution: ba Message-ID: <1qfgmeINNcag@darkstar.UCSC.EDU> NNTP-Posting-Host: helios.ucsc.edu I don't know if this system is worth $5 or $500. It was in working condition when removed from service. The main unit is a cabinet on casters about 3' high, 1' wide and 30" or so deep. (Measurements are from memory that lacks a parity check.) - DECmate RX02-PA and VT100-like terminal - Printer, daisy wheel, LQP02 and manual Tractor feed and manual 4 extra print whhels 5 new & 3 used ribbons - 5 boxes of 8" disks includeing wordprocessor, accounting and tax software - 4 different DEC "operators manuals" - DECmate owners guide - DECmate word processing users notebook - DECmate word processing: the Basics V2 cassettes/Workbook 1 - DECmate word processing: the Basics V2 cassettes/Workbook 2 - DECmate word processing: the Basics V2 administrator guide & disk - DECmate system overview V2 & tapes - DIBOL-8 language reference manual - COS-310 system reference manual (the cassettes mentioned are audio training stuff) -ted- ----------------------------Univ Calif @ Santa Cruz---------------------------- ted@helios.ucsc.edu |"He has showed you, O man, what is good; and what does the W (408)459-2110 |Lord require of you but to do justice and to love kindness H (408)423-2444 |and to walk humbly with your God?" Micah 6:8 (RSV) From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wupost!spool.mu.edu!hri.com!noc.near.net!news.cs.brandeis.edu!binah.cc.brandeis.edu!BURT Thu Apr 15 08:01:53 EDT 1993 Article: 230 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:230 comp.sys.dec.micro:2134 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wupost!spool.mu.edu!hri.com!noc.near.net!news.cs.brandeis.edu!binah.cc.brandeis.edu!BURT From: burt@binah.cc.brandeis.edu Subject: Re: looking for DEC Professional 380 computers Message-ID: <1993Apr15.003403.6667@news.cs.brandeis.edu> Sender: news@news.cs.brandeis.edu (USENET News System) Reply-To: burt@binah.cc.brandeis.edu Organization: Brandeis University References: <1qcd7vINNprn@im4u.cs.utexas.edu>,<1993Apr12.233123.29643@news.columbia.edu> Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1993 00:34:03 GMT Lines: 5 For parts for obsolete DEC computers, including the PRO series, try Heffron Computer in Cambridge, MA (617) 547-4005. John Burt I recently bought some RX-50 drives there, and they gave me good service. From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Thu Apr 15 13:58:34 EDT 1993 Article: 231 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: TC01/08 short bootstraps. Message-ID: <1993Apr15.173145.19712@news.columbia.edu> Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1993 17:31:45 GMT Since there is renewed interest in DECtapes, I thought I would post the various techniques to manually boot the TC01/08 system. Many of these peripherals wind up on pre-8/e machines where it's difficult to get an auto-loader, so manual booting should be as "painless" as possible. The easist way to get the machine booted to is to use P?S/8 or possibly OS/8. (OS/8 isn't necessarily compatible with the standard bootstrap, nor are systems such as the Disk Monitor System. There was a change in the OS/8 DECtape system handler to make it compatible with the "official" version of the bootstrap that DEC distributed in the 32 word MI8E 8/e bootstrap card.) Here's a walkthrough of how it's done: Regardless of the code used to do it, the purpose is to get the contents of DECtape block 0000 into memory starting at 007600. Some systems (such as P?S/8) support waiting at the semi-standard address of 007617 to eventually get overlayed by the data that comes in over it through the DMA facility (data break aka cycle stealing) and then what code has just been loaded takes over. Essentially what this means is that 007617 can contain something like a JMP . that eventually gets overlayed with a JMP .-something to a routine loaded a few microseconds ago. Then that routine waits for the entire DMA operation to finish, etc. and the system is essentially up after jumping to the main routine start, etc. In any case, all relevant DECtape systems support an alternative method, which is to do the same read via DMA, but from an external vantage point. After the code is loaded, start it at 007600. The code loaded there will be able to accomplish whatever is necessary to continue the boot process. To accomplish the latter, here's a typical example: *600 /PUT HERE TO SAVE A SWITCH REGISTER STEP LAS /LOAD AC FROM SWITCHES 6766 /DTLA; LOAD THE HARDWARE WITH THE COMMAND JMP . /WAIT FOR IT *7754 /WORD COUNT AND CURRENT ADDRESS AREA 7600-1 /ANY REASONABLE NUMBER WOULD WORK 7600-1 /THIS HAS TO BE 7577, SO WE MIGHT AS WELL /MAKE BOTH OF THEM THE SAME TO SAVE STEPS Note that ALL boot versions demand that 7754 and 7755 be set to these values namely that 7754 be between 0000 and 7600, not more, and that 7755 be set to 7577. To use this particular one, set the switches to 0600, and start the program there. The switches are set to 0600, so this commands the controller to rewind the tape on drive zero into the end zone. The END ERROR automatically terminates the rewind. You just wait until the tape stops and appears to be in the end zone. If you have a status panel, it will indicate an END ERROR. Any other problem means it didn't work, so do it again. Alternately, you can just "know" the tape is in the end zone my winding it an appropriate amount, no more. Exact position is unimportant, since there's about 6 feet or more of end zone. Then you stop the machine and start it at 0600 again, after first changing the switches to 0220. This is the command to read forward. Since we are at the end zone, this is implicitly for block 0000. All of the end zone is ignored, and the read starts automatically on the data; searching for it is not required; it will wait until the mark code for DATA appears, etc. Eventually, the tape will stop with a TIMING ERROR which is normal. This is because the little program is not attempting to do anything about the done condition after the read completes. However, the deed is done; the data is now in 007600 and you just stop and start there. The code just read in knows what to do to continue the boot process, etc. For P?S/8, POLY BASIC, MS/8, DECtape Library System, and possibly some newer versions of OS/8 (certainly using my handler I wrote myself :-)) there is a further simplification: Moving the code to 007615 requires only one additional step: that the switches have to be set to 0600 (if necessary) and later 0220. All else is the same. In this case, the handler is designed to wait at 007617 already, so it treats the boot process as if it had started it all by itself, such as from 007600 had it already been read in previously. The code at 007617 is a JMP .-some to a wait routine that is normally in something like 007612-007616 or so. That wait loop then does the appropriate thing to continue the boot process. The reason all of these methods work is that certain words are preloaded with "magic" values to cause the correct action. For example, the words that load over 7754 and 7755 have the proper values they should be in the midst of the DMA, thus 7754 gets "corrected" as the DMA progresses, and 7755 is maintained. (It is set to 7755 when it gets the DMA cycle since that's the value it ought to be at that instant. Thus, effectively the DMA is "transparent" to the two locations. P?S/8 takes the process one step further: The subroutine headers are preloaded to appear to be a boot started from a mythical subroutine call to request an overlay of the handler code over itself called from within the handler itself. The appropriate variables are preloaded with the appropriate values to "fake" this as well. The contents of 7754 are set to a value that causes overlay to continue for the rest of the bootstrap portion of the system, etc. The net effect of all of this is that unlike the other systems, P?S/8 boots up without turning the tape around. When OS/8 or whatever is booted, the tape has to do a tape rock(s) to get multiple portions of the O/S in, etc. It's real cute using P?S/8 and the short bootstrap: *7615 /OVER WAIT ROUTINE 7604 /READ SWITCHES 6766 /DTLA TO LOAD THE REGISTER WITH THE COMMAND 5217 /JMP . TO WAIT FOR DMA *7754 /OVER WC AND CA 7577 /A GOOD NUMBER; SAME AS FOLLOWING 7577 /MUST BE ONE LESS THAN 7600 Just mount the tape, give only a few turns to ensure being in the end zone. Load adress 7615, change switches to 0220 and start it up. The tape moves forward and it just comes up :-). At that point, you can run a booting program to any desired additional software, etc. BTW, P?S/8 supports booting to ANY TC01/08 unit, not just 0 as the rest of the systems do. (I believe there was a typeset-8 system convention of a boot to unit 4.) cj "Have boot, will travel" l From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!darwin.sura.net!haven.umd.edu!uunet!munnari.oz.au!uniwa!cujo!cc.curtin.edu.au!zrepachol Fri Apr 16 22:22:31 EDT 1993 Article: 232 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:232 comp.sys.dec.micro:2138 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!darwin.sura.net!haven.umd.edu!uunet!munnari.oz.au!uniwa!cujo!cc.curtin.edu.au!zrepachol From: zrepachol@cc.curtin.edu.au (Paul Repacholi) Subject: WPS-8 and Kermit Message-ID: <1993Apr17.010317.1@cc.curtin.edu.au> Lines: 10 Sender: news@cujo.curtin.edu.au (News Manager) Organization: Curtin University of Technology References: <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr11.144129.1133@news.columbia.edu> <1993Apr12.020929.5328@oz.plymouth.edu> <1993Apr12.060225.6002@news.columbia.edu> Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1993 16:03:17 GMT In article <1993Apr12.060225.6002@news.columbia.edu>, lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: [trails and tribulations of file xfer flushed] Is there a Kermit FOR WPS-8? Or alternatly, where can I FTP OS/278 from? ~Paul Who quite like the relaxing speed of a DMII From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Fri Apr 16 23:16:32 EDT 1993 Article: 233 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:233 comp.sys.dec.micro:2139 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: Re: WPS-8 and Kermit Message-ID: <1993Apr17.031517.1799@news.columbia.edu> Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University References: <1993Apr12.020929.5328@oz.plymouth.edu> <1993Apr12.060225.6002@news.columbia.edu> <1993Apr17.010317.1@cc.curtin.edu.au> Date: Sat, 17 Apr 1993 03:15:17 GMT In article <1993Apr17.010317.1@cc.curtin.edu.au> zrepachol@cc.curtin.edu.au (Paul Repacholi) writes: >In article <1993Apr12.060225.6002@news.columbia.edu>, lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: > >[trails and tribulations of file xfer flushed] ^^^^^^ Trails may be happy to you; trials may not be :-). > >Is there a Kermit FOR WPS-8? Or alternatly, where can I FTP OS/278 from? > >~Paul > >Who quite like the relaxing speed of a DMII > WPS-8 is a closed system, so not so directly. All of the other methods mentioned have to do with some form of conversion. I assume that using the WPFLOP program on OS/278 is acceptable since it makes an ASCII text file out of what the WPS document loaded with WPS-isms used to be, etc. As to acquiring OS/278, this is a totally different problem/situation: 1) Get it by buying a copy from DECUS. The (almost accurate, incomplete) sources are available as DM-111. The running binary and hard disk install are available as DM-101. They refer you to a possibly available document set from DEC, complete with part number. It's the last known documentation for OS/78 Version 4. The release notes are an attempt to augment that prior document set with about 70% accuracy. 2) The disks themselves are RX50's. There are ways to get RX50's copied using programs that run on PC's. The requirements are that you have a PC-AT or other compatible with a good quality 5.25" HD drive, such as a TEAC FD55GFR. Some drives have been observed to be too poor to be used, etc. The relevant set of stuff currently available is: a) TELEDISK. This program can be used to create an MS-DOS file that contains all info needed for another copy of TELEDISK to recreate the original disk. There are several problems with TELEDISK: i) It is proprietary. Formerly it was shareware, but the author is griping that certain commercial BBS sysops are ripping him off by heavily using it without registering it. He also claims that he has helped some end lusers over the phone with some minimal support that better lusers wouldn't require. He did this with the knowledge that they were not yet registered users, instead of forcing them to register first, etc. Thus, he wants to punish all of his potential customer base over the wrong-doings of a few individuals, etc. There may be an old version of TELEDISK floating around the net that still claims to be shareware. This version is known to have bugs, although it is possible that the bugs do not pertain to RX50 usage, just to attempts to copy certain 1.44 Meg 3.5" disks in PC format or related, etc. Newer versions or the program certainly do still have some of these bugs, which the author claims to have fixed (at least in part). Apparently, he really ought to work harder on his product since the problems are still being observed. ii) The program has a major design weakness: it assumes that anything it finds is a valid interpretation of the actual disk format. The program is designed to find all sorts of "odd" variations on disk formats, and thus "believes" just about anything it can read. It is difficult to determine just what an actual error is, but clearly the program fails to retry any questionable reads, to determine if the read data is repeatable, etc. Thus, to successfully use TELEDISK on any particular machine, it is recommended that an RX50 diskette first be formatted on the drive which will be used to read the data for the MS-DOS file, then the disk should be copied on an RX50-based machine, such as a DECmate II, and then brought back to the PC where TELEDISK will then be used. At the other end, a good drive on a PC-AT should be able to recover the disk data effectively. If desired, it can then be read and copied on the DECmate at that end, etc. Since the DECmate will complain if the disk is not a valid RX50 diskette, this should be a good confidence check on the validity of the data. (An aside: note that WPS does not provide any disk copying facility; the menu items claiming this are only able to create WPS-specific disks, they are not general-purpose copying programs, etc. However, the WPS hard disk install floppy includes a diskette copying routine that is actually general-purpose, so a WPS user can use this routine to copy an arbitrary RX50, such as an OS/278 diskette.) b) A replacement program is being written by someone that is RX50-only and thus avoids most of the TELEDISK problems. Since it knows already what the disk format is, it can reread questionable sectors until a read error clears. Also, this program will be able to format RX50 disks. (This is not a unique idea. Indeed, TELEDISK is formatting the disk as it copies the data out of the MS-DOS file. There are several other PC-based utilities that deal with other data structures on RX50, and all of them can low-level physically format RX50's.) The program will likely include a few extensions that are useful to OS/278 specifically, such as the ability to access the directory of the disk should it be a valid OS/278 diskette. In any case, the handling of RX50 diskette will be quite generic for all other functions. Most importantly, this program will be PD and likely available in source form. c) Of course you need all of the more "standard" stuff related to file transfer, such as .BOO encoders/decoders or uuencoders/uudecoders to actually get the binary MS-DOS files from the far end, etc. I distribute PDP-8 ENCODE and DECODE programs, but these aren't useful for this purpose because the only known versions of utilities for the format only run on OS/278 you already must have (catch-22). It would be nice if someone wrote a PC utility that used ENCODE format as an intermediary, and produced RX50 diskettes as the OS/278 programs would, etc. (Any takers? Specs on the ENCODE format itself are available; it includes 12-bit-oriented compression, etc.) 3) Certain of our readers may be able to send you copied of the relevant diskettes. Once you have the basics (OS/278, Kermit-12, DECODE) you can acquire copies of all of the other diskettes for OS/278, etc. (Note, due to current limitations of OS/278, ENCODE/DECODE can only transmit either OS/278 files or images of OS/278 diskettes, *not* other RX50 formats such as CP/M, MS-DOS, WPS. I believe that COS-310 diskettes can be accomodated, as well as certain install disks for some of the DECmate systems, which are actually OS/278 systems stripped down, etc., but the "slushware" tracks will not be copied by this method, etc. Thus, it's also necessary to have a copy of the System Test Diskette (Version 4.5 is the latest) to complete the diskette copying process currently by this method. I am working on some convoluted upgrades to OS/278 that will get around this problem, which is actually a limitation of OS/278 handlers, not the O/S in general or any aspect of ENCODE/DECODE, etc. ENCODE is designed to deal with OS/8 data, either whole disk images or individual files. The definition of a whole disk image is controlled entirely by the OS/8 handlers used, not the program. Current OS/278 handlers can only address the non-slushware tracks, and only in current OS/278 format. Replacement handlers can obviate this problem, etc.) There are a few PDP-8 oriented sites now. They should be reachable by anonymous ftp, etc. Copies of OS/278 disk images will be placed there in at least TELEDISK format for the present, and later in the format of the PD program for PC's now currently being developed, etc. (PDP-8 ENCODE format will also be used for certain additional diskettes.) (As an aside, OS/278 with ENBOO and DEBOO, which are available as part of the Kermit-12 package, can interchange binary files with MS-DOS systems and other systems that can run the MSBPCT and MSBMKB programs. This has so far been used to exchange TECO macros on these systems, since TECO macro files aren't quite "ASCII" to certain systems, and TECO exists on both the PDP-8 and MS-DOS among other systems, etc. While not useful for acquiring an initial copy of OS/278, this represents another alternative way to acquire PDP-8/DECmate-relevant files using formats more "native" to other systems.) cjl From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!agate!doc.ic.ac.uk!uknet!pipex!sunic!news.lth.se!news.lu.se!magnus Sun Apr 18 21:37:48 EDT 1993 Article: 234 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!agate!doc.ic.ac.uk!uknet!pipex!sunic!news.lth.se!news.lu.se!magnus From: magnus@thep.lu.se (Magnus Olsson) Subject: A silly question Message-ID: <1993Apr18.180604.1814@nomina.lu.se> Sender: news@nomina.lu.se (USENET News System) Nntp-Posting-Host: carsten.thep.lu.se Organization: Theoretical Physics, Lund University, Sweden Date: Sun, 18 Apr 1993 18:06:04 GMT Lines: 9 How are you supposed to pronounce "P?S/8"? And what is the '?' doing there anyway? Magnus Olsson | \e+ /_ Department of Theoretical Physics | \ Z / q University of Lund, Sweden | >----< magnus@thep.lu.se, thepmo@selund.bitnet | / \===== g PGP key available via finger or on request | /e- \q From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Sun Apr 18 22:42:32 EDT 1993 Article: 235 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: Re: A silly question Message-ID: <1993Apr19.024204.13722@news.columbia.edu> Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University References: <1993Apr18.180604.1814@nomina.lu.se> Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1993 02:42:04 GMT In article <1993Apr18.180604.1814@nomina.lu.se> magnus@thep.lu.se (Magnus Olsson) writes: > >How are you supposed to pronounce "P?S/8"? And what is the '?' doing >there anyway? I hope other members of the Poly Question Society (P?S) aren't reading this, but I am going to reveal the information without anyone first filling out the 30-page Request-for-Information form. The Poly Question Society (P?S) is a loose affiliation of hackers from the old days. The only common link they have is that all of them (me included) attended the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn. (The name is some variant on this today, probably Polytechnic University or something. Back then, one of our ongoing puns was the current tentative new name for the place. Someone suggested Polytechnic Engineering of New York State - PENYS for short :-).) (Note: The organization is *not* known as the Polytechnic Question Society as is suggested by some uninformed individual.) All P?S members are known for their expertise on some random computer system of the time, some for multiple systems. Many P?S members have contributed to P?S/8 for the PDP-8, etc. (At present, I am the largest, by lines of code, etc. My weight has little to do with this :-).) Many P?S members are or were employees of Digital. Some have gone onto newer startup companies attempting to relive the old exciting days of when a company is doing something new, not stagnating on VMS, etc. The proper pronunciation for P?S/8 is therefore Pee Que Ess Ate. Any further informat will definitely require filling out the 30-page Request for Information form. (Note: to date, no one has ever successfully done so.) cj "Questionably yours" l From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!math.ohio-state.edu!not-for-mail Mon Apr 19 12:38:58 EDT 1993 Article: 236 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:236 comp.sys.dec.micro:2151 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!math.ohio-state.edu!not-for-mail From: dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Date: 15 Apr 1993 02:21:15 -0400 Organization: Department of Mathematics, The Ohio State University Lines: 85 Message-ID: <1qiusr$f2u@math.mps.ohio-state.edu> References: <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr8.203720.18115@news.columbia.edu> <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr11.144129.1133@news.columbia.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: math.mps.ohio-state.edu In article <1993Apr11.144129.1133@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: > >In article <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: >>In article <1993Apr8.203720.18115@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: >>>In article <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: >>>> >>>>I was approached for help this week by a user who has a DecMate II and >>>>about 100 RX50 floppies with years of his work on them. > >It would seem that what follows is based on the user not wanting to spend any >money whatsoever since I offered to act as a consultant, etc. (Others exist >who could also help out, etc.) Thus, the response is tailored to a total >do-it-yourself approach, even though this will perhaps be false economy, etc. False economy or not, Univerity users are unwilling to spend money on just about anything. I was approached in the first place (even though I do not work for Ohio State) because no one who does work here knows what a DecMate is, let alone knows how to extract data from it. BTW, the destination of the data is Microsoft WORD for Macintosh. >>>Several paths to go here: >>> >>>1) Easy way: >>> >>>Convert the WPS documents to ASCII TEXT files and lose all WPS "isms" in the >>>process [...] >>> >>>To turn it into text, use either OS/278 WPFLOP to make OS/278 text files > >This path requires OS/278 which can be purchased from DECUS or it can be >acquired as a disk image using PC's. There are various programs available >to accomplish this. The currently most popular one is a former shareware >program called TELEDISK. > >To use TELEDISK, you have to have a PC with a good quality 1.2 Meg floppy disk >preferably a TEAC FD55GFR. I can remove the FD55GFR from my uVAX 2000 (RX33 clone)... > Using TELEDISK, the entire diskette can >be turned into an MS-DOS file. Do copies of OS/278 exist as TELEDISK archives? >OS/278 consists of three binary diskettes and also five source diskettes >(optional). I have a .tar.Z archive of OS/287 source. Is this the same stuff as the 5 diskettes? >So, after all of this is accomplished, the user will have OS/278 on his >DECmate, with the ability to create (using WPFLOP) descendants of his WPS >documents reduced down to hard-return ASCII text files... Where is WPFLOP available? OS/278? watsun.cc.columbia.edu? DECUS? >>>2) Harder: >> >>Until informed otherwise, as far as I know, the DECMateII in question is >>bare bones - no hard disk, no APU, no XPU. > >You are placing an unfair burden on us, since the more options in the machine, >the more the "rules" change regarding what you are requesting. Please make an >effort to find out! OS/278 on hard disk is something quite different from >OS/278 on floppy. Unfair or not, what pecentage of DecMates were sold with hard drives? I find out that the DecMate in question is as vanilla as the day it was made: no extra options of any kind. The user is checking for the existence of self-test or utility diskettes. I will have a DecMate on loan for a while. As a result, I myself wouldn't mind having a copy of OS/278 around. Also, the HamFest in Dayton, OH is coming up in about a week and I might be able to pick up a DecMate of my own there for ($10 < x < $50), then I really would need OS/278. Thanks, -ethan -- dicks@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu -or- erd@kumiss.cmhnet.org From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!oz.plymouth.edu!oddjob Mon Apr 19 12:39:19 EDT 1993 Article: 237 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:237 comp.sys.dec.micro:2152 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!oz.plymouth.edu!oddjob From: oddjob@oz.plymouth.edu (Andrew C. Stoffel) Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Message-ID: <1993Apr19.140231.11358@oz.plymouth.edu> Organization: Plymouth State College - Plymouth, NH. References: <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr11.144129.1133@news.columbia.edu> <1qiusr$f2u@math.mps.ohio-state.edu> Date: Mon, 19 Apr 93 14:02:31 GMT Lines: 29 In article <1qiusr$f2u@math.mps.ohio-state.edu> dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: >Unfair or not, what pecentage of DecMates were sold with hard drives? I Based on marketing info or empiricle evidence ? I have a hard drive on the DECMate III+ in my office & one on the II I have at home and 70% of the ones still in use around here (15 or so) have hard drives.... >I will have a DecMate on loan for a while. As a result, I myself wouldn't >mind having a copy of OS/278 around. Also, the HamFest in Dayton, OH is >coming up in about a week and I might be able to pick up a DecMate of my >own there for ($10 < x < $50), then I really would need OS/278. Way too much for a DECmate... the II I have at home cost me $8 US dollars while I was able to pick up one with a dead monitor (for parts) for free... -- |E-mail --> un*x: oddjob@oz.plymouth.edu |vms: andys@psc.plymouth.edu | |Disclaimer > Any "end-user" software that provides NO avenue for user | |of the week> modification or programmability is NOT user friendly. | From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Mon Apr 19 12:39:35 EDT 1993 Article: 238 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:238 comp.sys.dec.micro:2153 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Message-ID: <1993Apr19.163809.19934@news.columbia.edu> Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University References: <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr11.144129.1133@news.columbia.edu> <1qiusr$f2u@math.mps.ohio-state.edu> Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1993 16:38:09 GMT In article <1qiusr$f2u@math.mps.ohio-state.edu> dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: >In article <1993Apr11.144129.1133@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: >> >>In article <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: >>>In article <1993Apr8.203720.18115@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: >>>>In article <1q1t5g$ba8@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> dicks@math.ohio-state.edu (Ethan Dicks) writes: >>>>> >>>>>I was approached for help this week by a user who has a DecMate II and >>>>>about 100 RX50 floppies with years of his work on them. >> >>It would seem that what follows is based on the user not wanting to spend any >>money whatsoever since I offered to act as a consultant, etc. (Others exist >>who could also help out, etc.) Thus, the response is tailored to a total >>do-it-yourself approach, even though this will perhaps be false economy, etc. > >False economy or not, Univerity users are unwilling to spend money on >just about anything. I was approached in the first place (even though I >do not work for Ohio State) because no one who does work here knows what >a DecMate is, let alone knows how to extract data from it. So, then they have to do more legwork. It's just that even at "college student rates" it may still be false economy :-). In any case, the path is viable, although arduous. > >BTW, the destination of the data is Microsoft WORD for Macintosh. A minor bump in the road. Read on for the whole path. > >>>>Several paths to go here: >>>> >>>>1) Easy way: >>>> >>>>Convert the WPS documents to ASCII TEXT files and lose all WPS "isms" in the >>>>process [...] >>>> >>>>To turn it into text, use either OS/278 WPFLOP to make OS/278 text files >> >>This path requires OS/278 which can be purchased from DECUS or it can be >>acquired as a disk image using PC's. There are various programs available >>to accomplish this. The currently most popular one is a former shareware >>program called TELEDISK. >> >>To use TELEDISK, you have to have a PC with a good quality 1.2 Meg floppy disk >>preferably a TEAC FD55GFR. > >I can remove the FD55GFR from my uVAX 2000 (RX33 clone)... RX33 clone? DEC uses real TEAC FD55GFR/GFV drives, not clones. A good choice indeed. Note: there is a one-jumper change required sometimes; perhaps two jumpers: All PC's select on DS1 (note DS is origin zero; there have been sloppy discussions that would say this is select jumper "#2", but the point is that they are labeled DS0-DS3.) The TEAC drives have a semi-unique feature in that the speed they run at can be defaulted to either 360 RPM or 300 RPM, and additionally, the default can be overridden by a suitable controller. DECmate III+ usage demands 300 RPM and PC's demand 360 RPM. Neither attempt to change the speed, so the drive has to be configured so that the no-connection to pin 2 default is appropriate to the system. (Compaticard controllers *do* adjust the speed this way!) A question about the RX33: Can anyone confirm/deny whether RX33 *always* has the locking option? Everyone I have ever seen (all 4 of them) has the optional TEAC locking feature where the handle cannot be turned unless the media is present, and turning the handle unlocks the drive, but also ejects the media using some spring, etc. This is a standard option of TEAC, but mostly obscure outside of the DEC version. (BTW, someone else claims to have seen an alternate TEAC option using a release button like some earlier designs, which lacked the locking function. Anyone ever seen that one either?) > >> Using TELEDISK, the entire diskette can >>be turned into an MS-DOS file. > >Do copies of OS/278 exist as TELEDISK archives? There are two PDP-8 archives (at least :-)) I am currently semi-maintaining one of them. (I am not part of the group that actually maintains the machine, just the PDP-8 archive itself. It's up to them to provide the overall anonymous ftp access, but it's definitely intended.) The ultimate goal is to not use TELEDISK images because of the problems with TELEDISK's author, and the fact that the thing is commercial, not shareware currently, due to the author's (perhaps somewhat misguided) problems with some commercial operators, etc. (Note that RX50 handling is actually a frill of what TELEDISK does. Most of the actual TELEDISK problems revolve around problems with 1.44 MByte standard or semi-standard PC diskettes. It appears that the shareware version is fine for RX50 usage, but that version is no longer being supported, etc. However, there are copies floating around the net. Moreover, no one can stop users from copying clearly marked shareware merely because it is no longer supported by the original author who now sells an undesirable high-ticket commercial version differing from the old shareware version merely in bug fixes, etc. There is a wrinkle about TELEDISK that should be noted: Someone observed in the last shareware version that 1.44 Meg disk images with the compression enabled generates corrupted useless image files, i.e., the program fails miserably but only sometimes, presumably in a data-dependent way. The next version of TELEDISK, which is the first of the "commercial" ones seems to be virtually the same program, but has a companion utility that can check to see if an image file actually is valid without having to go through the motions to see if it's actually writing a descendent disk without error, etc. The author seems to have released this verification utility as shareware to at least contain this problem, so it's perfectly OK to have the last unsupported shareware version, and also the TDCHECK program, as long as you acquire it in the intended way. I can personally report that that version that is one level into being commercial does have the bug, and also can't properly handle certain 3.5" formats at all. (Writing FDFORMAT-created diskettes with 1.72 MBytes capacity, TELEDISK creates a disk in the proper format, but every sector has the wrong data in it. Apparently, the bug has to do with losing track of the correct track/sector where to write the data to, etc. Also, the direct copy function seems to flunk often, regardless of disk type/format, etc. The function we need is RX50 support without compression. Compression utilities such as PKZIP are more suited to the task. There doesn't seem to be any problems with the function of RX50 -> uncompressed file and uncompressed file -> RX50 regardless of version. The TDCHECK program can confirm that the data file is valid, etc. (The direct copy of RX50 is best done on another machine; it may not work in TELEDISK anyway.) > >>OS/278 consists of three binary diskettes and also five source diskettes >>(optional). > >I have a .tar.Z archive of OS/287 source. Is this the same stuff as the >5 diskettes? By definition not quite. I don't think there is anything important on the "slushware" portion of these five diskettes, and I don't believe there's a system on any of them either. Thus, it's a collection of files. However, OS/278 files on the three binary diskettes are *not* translateable; the disks must be in image format (the second disk is files-only; the first and third are systems, and the third has a kludged 8-bit file that OS/278 is incapable of moving). In any case, the sources don't match the binaries exactly, and without a running system, you can't recreate it anyway. > >>So, after all of this is accomplished, the user will have OS/278 on his >>DECmate, with the ability to create (using WPFLOP) descendants of his WPS >>documents reduced down to hard-return ASCII text files... > >Where is WPFLOP available? OS/278? watsun.cc.columbia.edu? DECUS? WPFLOP is standard part of OS/278 in the release. The only documentation is the HELP WPFLOP command in OS/278 itself as well. > > >>>>2) Harder: >>> >>>Until informed otherwise, as far as I know, the DECMateII in question is >>>bare bones - no hard disk, no APU, no XPU. >> >>You are placing an unfair burden on us, since the more options in the machine, >>the more the "rules" change regarding what you are requesting. Please make an >>effort to find out! OS/278 on hard disk is something quite different from >>OS/278 on floppy. > >Unfair or not, what pecentage of DecMates were sold with hard drives? I >find out that the DecMate in question is as vanilla as the day it was >made: no extra options of any kind. The user is checking for the existence >of self-test or utility diskettes. The utility diskettes are as available as OS/278 disks, and also have to be TELEDISK'ed for the present. A lot of machines did have options. Generally you find APU boards where hard disks are all ready present, though there are no rules of any option interdependency, etc. (Just can't have the RX78 or extra RX50 options with a hard disk present.) In any case, the more options, the more needed diskettes. > >I will have a DecMate on loan for a while. As a result, I myself wouldn't >mind having a copy of OS/278 around. Also, the HamFest in Dayton, OH is >coming up in about a week and I might be able to pick up a DecMate of my >own there for ($10 < x < $50), then I really would need OS/278. Good luck. The basic machine can do some things; the more options the better, especially the hard disk. > > >Thanks, >-ethan > >-- >dicks@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu -or- erd@kumiss.cmhnet.org > cjl From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!hellgate.utah.edu!cc.usu.edu!ivie Tue Apr 20 11:39:07 EDT 1993 Article: 239 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:239 comp.sys.dec.micro:2155 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!hellgate.utah.edu!cc.usu.edu!ivie From: ivie@cc.usu.edu Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Message-ID: <1993Apr19.160653.66465@cc.usu.edu> Date: 19 Apr 93 16:06:53 MDT References: <1q7skd$pqb@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr11.144129.1133@news.columbia.edu> <1qiusr$f2u@math.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr19.163809.19934@news.columbia.edu> Organization: Utah State University Lines: 33 In article <1993Apr19.163809.19934@news.columbia.edu>, lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: > > A question about the RX33: Can anyone confirm/deny whether RX33 *always* has > the locking option? Everyone I have ever seen (all 4 of them) has the optional > TEAC locking feature where the handle cannot be turned unless the media is > present, and turning the handle unlocks the drive, but also ejects the media > using some spring, etc. This is a standard option of TEAC, but mostly obscure > outside of the DEC version. (BTW, someone else claims to have seen an > alternate TEAC option using a release button like some earlier designs, which > lacked the locking function. Anyone ever seen that one either?) Every one that I have seen also has this feature. DEC also seems to like to omit the eject spring; none of the drives that I have here will kick the disk out. >>I have a .tar.Z archive of OS/287 source. Is this the same stuff as the >>5 diskettes? > > By definition not quite. I don't think there is anything important on > the "slushware" portion of these five diskettes, and I don't believe there's > a system on any of them either. There is no system on the five diskettes, so there should be nothing in the slushware area (what's the point of putting slushware on non-bootable disks?). > In any case, the sources don't match the binaries exactly, and without a > running system, you can't recreate it anyway. Ya gotta love DEC. On the other hand, at least we got _something_ out of them... Roger Ivie ivie@cc.usu.edu From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Tue Apr 20 14:05:06 EDT 1993 Article: 240 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.sys.pdp8:240 comp.sys.dec.micro:2160 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8,comp.sys.dec.micro Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: Re: Help needed extracting WPS/8 files from RX50 Message-ID: <1993Apr20.180356.5575@news.columbia.edu> Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University References: <1qiusr$f2u@math.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1993Apr19.163809.19934@news.columbia.edu> <1993Apr19.160653.66465@cc.usu.edu> Date: Tue, 20 Apr 1993 18:03:56 GMT In article <1993Apr19.160653.66465@cc.usu.edu> ivie@cc.usu.edu writes: >In article <1993Apr19.163809.19934@news.columbia.edu>, lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes: >> >> A question about the RX33: Can anyone confirm/deny whether RX33 *always* has >> the locking option? Everyone I have ever seen (all 4 of them) has the optional >> TEAC locking feature where the handle cannot be turned unless the media is >> present, and turning the handle unlocks the drive, but also ejects the media >> using some spring, etc. This is a standard option of TEAC, but mostly obscure >> outside of the DEC version. (BTW, someone else claims to have seen an >> alternate TEAC option using a release button like some earlier designs, which >> lacked the locking function. Anyone ever seen that one either?) > >Every one that I have seen also has this feature. DEC also seems to like to >omit the eject spring; none of the drives that I have here will kick the >disk out. Yes, each of these is an option, and is why there is a sub-option to the TEAC model number, such as 149-U. The locking mechanism demands an alternate bezel, and the DM III+ front panel accomodates this larger bezel cutout. You can use the standard disk, but then it looks a little funny as to why the strange shaped cutout. BTW, the DM III+ requires the use of the drive skids with the 8 holes so that you can move the drives slightly to the rear of the case. That way the "PLUS" nameplate bezel can go over the TEAC drive front. The Seagate drive is used without a front as often happens in PC's as well. I put together a "quick change" version of a III+ from a former III: You start with a stock III, and then throw away the motherboard, keeping the little buss board. You replace it with a two-layer DM III+ motherboard and hard disk daughterboard. You have to ensure there is insulation on the metalwork above the boards to prevent shorts. The real III+ chassis has a piece of that same insulation that is found on the inside surface of the chassis top cover glued on it. The III+ needs a dual power connector, so you just add a Y-cable to the single connector. (Why does DEC bother with all of these power-supply variants: 1) 78W 110 volts one connector 2) 78W 220 volts one connector 3) 150W 110 volts one connector 4) 150W 220 volts one connector 5) 160W 110 volts two connectors 6) 160W 220 volts two connectors Can't they get it right? The DM II didn't have any of this grief!) Anyway, a Y-cable solves most of the problem :-). Then you eliminate the RX50 and cable. You replace it with the metalwork that stacks the TEAC drive atop the Seagate hard disk. The 8-hole skid is placed on the bottom of the Seagate drive. Actually, the Y-cable is more convenient than the original to pull out the power plugs from, and additionally, you get more cable length than the two plugs in the stock DM III+ where all cables are short, including the floppy and hard disk cables. If you put on a Seagate bezel on the drive and use the 4-hole skid pattern you can have a machine that was appearing this way, but looks fine since this is PC-normal, or you can use the rear holes in the 8-hole skid, and then attach the "PLUS" plate over the TEAC bezel on top, and over nothing on the bottom (where the HD is) and achieve a case that is identical to the original III+. I was even given the III+ stick-on label, so you can't even tell it from the original :-). > >>>I have a .tar.Z archive of OS/287 source. Is this the same stuff as the >>>5 diskettes? >> >> By definition not quite. I don't think there is anything important on >> the "slushware" portion of these five diskettes, and I don't believe there's >> a system on any of them either. > >There is no system on the five diskettes, so there should be nothing in the >slushware area (what's the point of putting slushware on non-bootable disks?). Besides, OS/278 uses obsolete slushware. As is always the case, just upgrade to newer slushware, such as is found on newer versions of MM, test diskette, or WPS. This is a requirement to boot these disks to a DM III or III+ anyway. > >> In any case, the sources don't match the binaries exactly, and without a >> running system, you can't recreate it anyway. > >Ya gotta love DEC. On the other hand, at least we got _something_ out of >them... Yes, but not enough :-(. I have already confirmed an interesting difference between the system handler source and binary for the hard disk: The binary depends on the fact that the device is already mounted. This is the case if OS/278 is the startup volume or if Master Menu loads it. The handler is designed to have once-only code within it to ensure that sacred named volumes are being attempted to be mounted. After successful mounting, the handler self-modifies so subsequent calls don't attempt the mount, etc. There is a lot of overhead in the handler to deal with this, etc. Yet, the running copy has the status flags patched so that this mount operation never occurs. (A good thing, since the sacred names of the volumes that apply to RD50: and RD51: are obsolete names we never use, certainly not anything like OS278SYS or whatever that default installation volume is named.) Thus, the sources are for the version before they patched out this defective conceptual feature. To access RD51, you have to first mount it with a MOUNT command, or have Master Menu do it for you before loading OS/278. This is far preferable to sacred fixed names because it allows you to change the mount settings. But the sources are still wrong, and worse, the handler design suffers from having to support an unnecessary tradeoff. A possible issue: There is a "penalty" within OS/8 for two-page system handlers (and also two-page non-system handlers) in that certain programs have to deal with the two-page kludge (such as BASIC and FORTRAN 4, etc.) This also means that programs can never quite be sure as to the disposition of X7600-X7777 where X is 2 or 3 and up to 7, since under some circumstances, the handler code will be moved there, etc. Thus, the "clean" environment of 8K isn't used. It is conceivable that by downsizing the functionality of this handler, it could be made to fit in one page without the unneeded mounting code, etc. > >Roger Ivie >ivie@cc.usu.edu cjl From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!bogus.sura.net!udel!news.intercon.com!psinntp!juno.measurex.com!can047 Tue Apr 20 23:59:11 EDT 1993 Article: 241 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!bogus.sura.net!udel!news.intercon.com!psinntp!juno.measurex.com!can047 From: can047@measurex.com (Charles K. Neuberg) Subject: Floppy Disk Speeds Message-ID: <1993Apr20.205454.5079@measurex.com> Organization: Measurex Corporation "The Results Company" Date: Tue, 20 Apr 1993 20:54:54 GMT Lines: 16 Hi, and forgive the intrusion but you folks seem like real hackers and should know this one off the top of your heads. How fast does a floppy spin? Typical speeds for 8", 5.25", 3.5". Don't need any specific brand names...somebody asked me and I just don't know. email is great unless you think everyone should know. Thanks. Chuck can047@measurex.com From news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner Wed Apr 21 00:17:38 EDT 1993 Article: 242 of alt.sys.pdp8 Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!watsun.cc.columbia.edu!lasner From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Subject: Re: Floppy Disk Speeds Message-ID: <1993Apr21.041713.11200@news.columbia.edu> Sender: usenet@news.columbia.edu (The Network News) Nntp-Posting-Host: watsun.cc.columbia.edu Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) Organization: Columbia University References: <1993Apr20.205454.5079@measurex.com> Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1993 04:17:13 GMT In article <1993Apr20.205454.5079@measurex.com> can047@measurex.com (Charles K. Neuberg) writes: > >Hi, and forgive the intrusion but you folks seem like real hackers and >should know this one off the top of your heads. > >How fast does a floppy spin? Typical speeds for 8", 5.25", 3.5". >Don't need any specific brand names...somebody asked me and I just >don't know. 8" floppies are typically 360 RPM and 500 KHz recording regardless of format. Either FM or later MFM is used. 5.25" early floppies are 250 KHz 300 RPM. Later ones are the same as the 8" drives. Very early drives were usually FM. Most are MFM. On an IBM PC-AT, 250 KHz 300 RPM-written media is accessed at 360 RPM using a 300 KHz clock. TEAC FD55GFV/GFR drives can be selected at either speed. In the DECmate III+ the drive is permanently slowed to 300 RPM to replace the similar RX50. In other applications it's left at 360 RPM. There exists a PC option called Compaticard that can change the speed as needed. In some machines, the speed is varied using unusual drives. This is used to create "zones" on the disk, thus there are a variable number of sectors on a track. The Victor 9000 is an example of such a machine. Most drive aren't capable of this many steps of speed, etc. and the drives are essentially custom models. cjl From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!usc!nic.csu.net!csusb!mcgee Mon Apr 26 16:01:41 EDT 1993 Article: 243 of alt.sys.pdp8 Xref: news.columbia.edu alt.folklore.computers:42397 alt.sys.pdp8:243 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!usc!nic.csu.net!csusb!mcgee Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.sys.pdp8 Subject: WS211 (PDP-8/?) Free! Message-ID: <1993Apr26.090626.1@csusb> From: mcgee@csusb Date: 26 Apr 93 09:06:26 PST Organization: California State University, San Bernardino Nntp-Posting-Host: csusb Nntp-Posting-User: mcgee Lines: 26 Greetings! I find myself in the posession of a DEC WS211 word processor. It is based on some flavor of PDP-8 (8/A, 8/E?). It is in a chest-high DEC cabinet with two RX02 subsystems. There are some CPU cards, a memory card, two RL8s, and an LP8 in it---stuff that should be of value to PDP-8 users. I also have some print sets for it, a handfull of floppys, and an OS/8 handbook. I do not know anything about this machine. I DO NOT WANT TO KNOW ABOUT IT, so here is the deal. I would like to keep one or both of the RX02s, but if you want the rest of it, come and get it FREE. This will become a disk drive cabinet if noone wants it. I live about 35 miles east of Los Angeles. I am only going to say this once: I WILL NOT SHIP THIS THING ANYWHERE, YOU MUST PICK IT UP. I do not really have the time to part it out either. Please email to one of the addresses below or call if you are interested. Jeff. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Jeff Shirley jshirley@gdwest.gd.com Home: (714)981-5855 mcgee%csusb@csus.edu Work: (714)868-6793 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - From news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!usc!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!caen!batcomputer!munnari.oz.au!bruce.cs.monash.edu.au!monu6!vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au!decus!geremin Mon Apr 26 16:03:05 EDT 1993 Article: 244 of alt.sys.pdp8 Path: news.columbia.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!usc!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!caen!batcomputer!munnari.oz.au!bruce.cs.monash.edu.au!monu6!vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au!decus!geremin Newsgroups: decus.general,decus.nop,decus.pdp11,aus.general,alt.sys.pdp8 Subject: DECUS NOP SIG old floppy roundup & Meeting. Message-ID: <1993Apr26.120959.14562@decus.com.au> From: geremin@decus.com.au Date: 26 Apr 93 12:09:59 AEST Organization: DECUS, South Pacific Chapter Lines: 51 D E C U S O L D F L O P P Y R O U N D U P T I M E Now is the time to clean out the computer room cupboards and send all your old floppies off to the NOP SIG Library. We are looking for any old RX01, RX02, RX180, RX31, RX33 and RX50 floppies to help complete the DECUS collection of DEC Software. We want any system - any version. Documentation is also wanted. All old floppies can be recycled, even if they are only old document or data floppies (they can be erased or reformatted to provide working copies of Library Software for home users). Dont think that your floppies are useless if you do not have a complete set, we already have lots of partial sets of floppies and the more we get the better. Please send parcels to: W. Faets, Digital Centre, 35 Sydenham Road, Brookvale NSW 2100, or call Cameron on 872 4728, or John on 764 4855 to arrange for a pick-up. Dont forget the matching manuals and documentation. Popular third-party products are also very welcome. DECUS NOP DECUS NOP DECUS NOP DECUS NOP DECUS NOP NOP SIG Meeting - Floppy Sorting and Cataloguing Party. ======================================================== Mike Chevallier has offered to host the fourth meeting on Tuesday 18th May, 1993 at 6pm, at 23 Wattle Street, Killara. Primary business will be a report from Max Burnet on his recent museum acquisitions. Second part of the meeting will be a short talk from Mike Chevallier from Ramparts (suppliers of TIMS systems) on "how my boss made a simple PDP-11 real time task nearly impossible by putting it on a PC box". This will be followed by refreshments (courtesy of Mike C.), BYOG. A special presentation of a set of cards is to be made to Max Burnet for the Museum. RSVP:- All network users are to reply via e-mail to IN%"gayford@decus.com.au". Others to John at Megatronics on 02-764 4855. Tom Gayford and Cameron Manson for the local NOP activists, on behalf of Chester WILSON, NOP SIG Chairman. --------------------------------