[HECnet] Slightly OT: DECTape support in SIMH VMS?

[Johnny Billquist]

On 2013-09-29 15:25, Sampsa Laine wrote:
VMS have never supported DECtape, as far as I know...


Oh, bummer, always wanted to play around with DECtape :)

So, get a real computer. :-)
And simh is not a DECtape.

The easiest way to transfer files between a PDP-11 and VAX would of course be DECnet, but in case you wanted to do it on a physical storage medium, the popular choices were RL02 or 9-track tape.

But potentially, RK06, RK07, RM02, RM03, RM05, RP04, RP05, RP06 and RA60 were also pretty usable.


Let's say I run RSX-11 on the PDP-11, what file system (I believe the PDP supports some level of Files-11) should I INIT the disks to? Can I INIT the disk on the RSX side and write to it on the VMS box?

I don't remember the invocations in VMS, but yes, RSX uses Files-11, just like VMS. But more specifically, RSX uses ODS-1, while VMS uses ODS-2 or ODS-5. I think only VMS on VAX supported volumes using ODS-1. But pretty much all you need is for the volume to have the file system set up. Once that it done, you just mount it like any other volume in VMS, and away you go.

You can initialize the file system on either RSX or VMS.

As for DECNET: Yes, that's obviously the sane way to do it. This is more of a "do it for the sake of doing it" type of an idea..

:-)

And don't forget floppies...

True. Are there any 8" floppy emulators available on SIMH? :) I don't want to use anything boring..

No idea. I don't really get the point if you are just going to simulate the hardware anyway. But that is just me. :-)

	Johnny

-- 
Johnny Billquist                                   || "I'm on a bus
                                                                  ||   on a psychedelic trip
email: bqt at softjar.se                         ||   Reading murder books
pdp is alive!                                         ||   tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol