[HECnet] Running the RSX-11 MAIL-11 client on VAX VMS with the RSX emulation installed
Mark Matlock
mark at matlockfamily.com
Sun Sep 6 08:21:12 PDT 2015
Johnny,
Good point on the VF: driver, I've started to use it more and more but before that I happened to Include those things in the SYSGEN. You mentioned the Baseline RSX11M+ V4.6 .DSK image on bitsavers and it is the best place to start, however the image is short on file headers and needs to be BRUed to a new disk to expand the headers.
I agree with your comments on disk space below, but I use the RD54 sized images as a minimum that is easily moved around between the various BeagleBone, PI, OSX and other computers. Then the large disk that I typically choose is the RA92 at -1.5 GB which can also be moved between systems. You need that kind of space to play with DECUS Sig tapes and disks.
In the future, if you do start working on a dual DECNet - TCP/IP mail system for RSX, I would love to act as a beta tester.
Mark
> On Sep 6, 2015, at 9:40 AM, Johnny Billquist <bqt at softjar.se> wrote:
>
>> On 2015-09-06 16:29, Mark Matlock wrote:
>> Samosa,
>> Johnny is right that RSX is typically customized for a particular set of hardware but with Simh and DU disk drives it is pretty easy to set up a fairly generic system that will run under Simh on PC Linux, BeagleBones, Raspberry PI or Windows.
>
> Yes, if you just configure a system with lots of stuff in there, you can pretty much just run with it.
>
>> I can send you a generic image that is configured for a PDP a-11/93 (has TOY clock that saves some typing at boot) with a DU (4 units), DL (you will want this RL02) to load updates of Johnny's BQTCP/IP), an MS, MU, and DY (to access floppy images). I usually use a RD54 image (~154MB) as a nice size for RSX. I am travelling today and tomorrow, but if you have an anonymous FTP somewhere I can upload a RSX11M+ V4.6 (with DECnet, F77, BP2 V2.5, DTR, APL, etc) .DSK file.
>
> Mark. 11/93 is indeed a very good choice. Have all the hardware features you might want, and with Qbus you also do not have a resource bottleneck with Unibus map registers. Not that it actually matters much these days with the speed of things, but anyway.
> One MSCP controller with four or more disks is also good. You do not need MS, DL or DY however. If you have RL images, or floppy images, you can just download them directly into RSX, and use the VF: driver to access them all.
>
> For tapes, you can either deal with images and the MU driver, or else either download directly between RSX systems, or else using some trickery when downloading .TAP files from other systems, and then access these too using the VF: device driver.
>
> I would never go as low as an RD54 for my actual disks, though. Disks are cheap.
>
> On MAGICA, which is a real PDP-11/70, I have RA73 disks now (2G each). For my home 11/93, I have some RZ disk. (4G and 8G disks.)
>
> For my emulated systems, I usually go for 8G disks if I can.
>
>> I don't have Mail-11 on it but now I want to figure out how.
>
> It is a rather nice mail system. But it only speaks DECnet. I am so tempted to start working on something that will speak both DECnet and TCP/IP... But I'm short on time, as always. Anyone else interested? :-)
>
> Johnny
>
>>
>>
>> Mark
>>
>>> On Sep 6, 2015, at 9:00 AM, Sampsa Laine <sampsa at mac.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> BTW, this is the RSX mail client I was talking about:
>>>
>>> http://sampsa.com/decmail11.png
>>>
>>> I'm sure there must be SOMEONE with a fairly easy to use RSX image for SIMH on this list? :)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>>> On 6 Sep 2015, at 14:22, Johnny Billquist <bqt at softjar.se> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> On 2015-09-06 15:18, Sampsa Laine wrote:
>>>>> Bummer.
>>>>>
>>>>> Does anyone have a nice turnkey image of RSX (with DECNET) that I could run this on?
>>>>
>>>> RSX and "turnkey" do not really mesh that well in a sentence... :-)
>>>> DEC did try it. It was called MicroRSX. I do not want to play with that. But it might work for you if you actually prefer something you can't customize... :-)
>>>> Afraid I don't have it, though.
>>>>
>>>>> I've been itching to run a PDP-11 OS for a while now but am a total n00b..
>>>>
>>>> You should. PDP-11s are fun. However, it all depends on your definition of fun.
>>>>
>>>> Johnny
>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Sampsa
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>>> On 6 Sep 2015, at 13:29, Johnny Billquist <bqt at softjar.se> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On 2015-09-06 04:53, Mark Matlock wrote:
>>>>>>> Samosa,
>>>>>>> The RSX-11 Mail system consists of 4 tasks as I recall. The ...MAI task that does most of the interaction with the user is a pretty straight forward Fortran program. Then the actually task that sends mail ...SEN is also a Fortran program. It communicates with the MAL$$$ task which is written in BasicPlus2 and this is the most complicated program as it accepts the various DECnet connections and stores the messages for retrieval by the ...MAI task. Lastly, the MAL$$$ program connects to a MAL... task written in Fortran whose sole job is to notify the user if they are logged in that they just got mail. This system was written by DEC and put on one of the early RSX SIG tapes, but I remember seeing the files also in a folder on ftp.update.uu.se which may be a better place to get the files as I'm sure Johnny has updated and improved them.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> As far as running on VMS, I would think it could be done. I don't know that you would have to run RSX compatibility, but that might be easiest. With out it there are probably a number of date/time routines that would need to be modified to work with VMS time formats. The Fortran is probably quite easy to port but I don't know about the Basic part. That said the RSX task sends email to VMS fine as I recall, but this is the area I would think would be most difficult. Also, the way RSX stores in the email files different than VMS a.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Johnny could probably provide a much better overview however.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Yes, as I suspect Sampsa is talking about the mail program on MIM, which is not the thing you are talking about, Mark.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> DEC actually made a product called MAIL-11, which is what I have installed.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> It's mostly written in BASIC+2, and have a slightly different set of tasks with responsibilities. And it has way more features than the DECUS MAIL-11.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> But I do not think it is possible to run under VMS. However, it might be that it is possible to use just the client, since I believe it can talk to a mail server on another machine. But I have never looked how that work in DECnet.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Johnny
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Mark
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On Sep 5, 2015, at 5:13 PM, Sampsa Laine <sampsa at mac.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Guys,
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Is it possibles to run the RSX-11 MAIL client on a VAX that has the RSX compatibility module installed?
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Will it work alongside the normal VMS MAIL client?
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I'm asking because frankly the mail client on MIM is much nicer to use than the standard VMS mail client..
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Sampsa
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> --
>>>>>> 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
>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>> Hecnet-list mailing list
>>>>>> Hecnet-list at lists.sonic.net
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>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> 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
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> Hecnet-list mailing list
>>>> Hecnet-list at lists.sonic.net
>>>> https://lists.sonic.net/mailman/listinfo/hecnet-list
>
>
> --
> 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
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