I have a few more additions:

1. These Japanese operating systems are probably worth mentioning:

Hitachi VOS3
Fujitsu MSP
Fujitsu XSP

VOS3 and MSP are proven forks of IBM MVS/XA (at least, and likely also
MVS/ESA). XSP might be a fork of DOS/VSE. (I'm less familiar with that
one.) If you want to hang your hat on supported compatibility with real
world IBM machines then VOS3 probably wins. As I recall, VOS3 officially
runs on z800 and z890 machines, at least. Hitachi built the z800 in a
collaboration with IBM, and also for its own domestic sales in Japan, so
that one is not a great surprise.

To my knowledge, Fujitsu is still nominally in the mainframe business in
Japan, and their machines are basically ESA/390 machines. Both MSP and XSP
remain ESA (31-bit), as far as I know. Hitachi's Japanese domestic market
machines are ESA/390 machines with very modest, non-z/Architecture 64-bit
extensions that VOS3 only lightly exploits.

Speaking of related machines, did RCA's operating systems like VMOS and
TSOS ever run on IBM System/360 machines?

2. TCSC's EDOS/VS and EDOS/VSE were interesting forks of DOS/VS Release 34.
EDOS/VS and EDOS/VSE were compatible with machines that did not have
virtual storage support, including System/360 machines. That's why they
enjoyed some popularity. NCSC produced a UNIX subsystem for EDOS called
PWS, inspired by Coherent UNIX. I'm not sure if NCSC ever made PWS
available for IBM DOS/VSE and its successors.

3. I don't think anybody mentioned IBM's OS/44 and PS/44 yet. Those were
operating systems for the System/360 Model 44, a scientific market machine.

4. I don't think anybody mentioned VM/IX and IX/370 yet, from Interactive
Systems Corporation (ISC). Those were different than AIX/370 and AIX/ESA,
based on Locus Computing's work. Bell Labs had a UNIX operating system for
System/370 even before ISC's products, but I don't know much about that.
MVS OpenEdition was the successor to these efforts, although with yet
another, different, much better technology base. MVS OpenEdition begat z/OS
UNIX System Services.

5. Boston University's VPS/VM traced its roots to McGill University's RACS
(later RAX, then MUSIC/SP) operating system. As far as I know VPS/VM always
ran under IBM's VM, but perhaps that wasn't required. VPS/VM and MUSIC/SP
are thus "cousins," one could argue.

6. TELPAR dates to the early 1970s, but I don't know much about it. I think
it's available in open source (PL/360) form, though. Has anybody tried
compiling and running it?

7. VP/CSS, developed by National CSS, was an evolution of CP/CMS. VP/CSS
had some efficiency advantages back in the 1970s.

8. Some people might classify Jan Jaeger's ZZSA as an operating system, a
very basic one.

9. Did the UCSD p-System ever end up on System/370 or System/390 machines?
It ended up on almost every other processor.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Timothy Sipples
IT Architect Executive, Industry Solutions, IBM z Systems, AP/GCG/MEA
E-Mail: [email protected]

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