Here's another idea for Glen, upon further reflection. For some period of time IBM offered a System/360 Model 20 emulator. The emulator was marketed as an optional feature available on the System/370 Models 115 and 125, as examples. The Model 20 emulator may have been packaged (or at least available with) Model 20 RPG for CPS. If one of today's z/OS customers goes digging through ancient datasets, it just might be possible that someone has that old Model 20 emulator lying around. Then digging through the emulator might bear fruit.
Unfortunately I haven't been able to find the IBM program number for that particular emulator nor any documentation on it, and I haven't been able to find the index to Model 20 publications for that matter (IBM Publication GA26-3568). Though in searching for the program number, I learned something new (to me): IBM offered emulators for RCA 301 and Honeywell systems for a period of time. Yet another forensic approach would be to contact still living authors of early RPG-related books to check if they have any ideas, leads, contacts, etc. Here are some names based on a Library of Congress search with some sensible date filtering applied: Solomon Martin Bernard Richard W. Brightman (*1) John R. Clark Edward L. Essick (*2) Robert A. Fisher Antonín Fořt Rochelle Gershon Willard R. Jarchow (*2) Marvin Kushner Thomas Edward Lewis Peter Liebetanz I︠U︡zefa Mechislavovna Lipenʹ Joyce Currie Little (*3) Richard F. Loschetter (*2) Peter March Mike Murach Jerome T. Murray Aloyse P. Oberle Peter Pfeiffer Harice L. Seeds Gary B. Shelly Georg Wadehn (*1) I found Richard Brightman on LinkedIn. At last report he is still employed as an RPG programmer. John R. Clark was his coauthor. (*2) Probably deceased. (*3) Professor emerita at Towson University. I'm also finding some references in old IBM publications that microfiche copies of early compiler source code made have existed and been publicly available in some fashion. For example, I found a reference to microfiche for the ANS COBOL compiler source. Obviously if a microfiche copy of the compiler could be located that'd do nicely. Maybe one of these individuals (or others) would have some ideas about that. Glen, you've embarked on a fascinating detective project. I hope I gave you some useful leads, and please keep us posted. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Timothy Sipples IT Architect Executive, Industry Solutions, IBM z Systems, AP/GCG/MEA -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: [email protected] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
