Re: PDP-11/45 RSTS/E boot problem
> On Jan 7, 2019, at 10:02 PM, Fritz Mueller wrote: > >> On Jan 7, 2019, at 12:56 PM, Noel Chiappa via cctalk >> wrote: >> >> Well, there are single-RK05 images up already: >> >> http://www.tuhs.org/Archive/PDP-11/Distributions/research/Ken_Wellsch_v6/ > > ...which directory contains several file system images and one tape image, > “v6.tape”. When I mount that on a virtual TU10 under SIMH and key in the > bootstrap from you linked doc, I get: > > "Unexpected internal error while processing event for TM0 which returned 102 > - Invalid magtape record length" > > Is that tape image maybe not compatible with SIMH’s tape format? Oh: http://decuser.blogspot.com/2015/11/installing-and-using-research-unix.html
Re: PDP-11/45 RSTS/E boot problem
> On Jan 7, 2019, at 12:56 PM, Noel Chiappa via cctalk > wrote: > > Well, there are single-RK05 images up already: > > http://www.tuhs.org/Archive/PDP-11/Distributions/research/Ken_Wellsch_v6/ Hmm, this link didn’t work for me; I found I think equivalent mirrored at: https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Distributions/Research/Ken_Wellsch_v6/ ...which directory contains several file system images and one tape image, “v6.tape”. When I mount that on a virtual TU10 under SIMH and key in the bootstrap from you linked doc, I get: "Unexpected internal error while processing event for TM0 which returned 102 - Invalid magtape record length" Is that tape image maybe not compatible with SIMH’s tape format? thanks, --FritzM.
Re: so far off topic - capatob - saratov2 computer Russsian pdp8?
On 01/07/2019 07:51 PM, allison via cctalk wrote: I still want to make a stretched 8, PDP8 ISA with 16 bits and faster. No good reason save for it wold be fun. Umm, I think that is called a Data General Nova! Jon
Re: so far off topic - capatob - saratov2 computer Russsian pdp8?
On 01/07/2019 07:25 PM, ben via cctalk wrote: > On 1/7/2019 8:20 AM, allison via cctalk wrote: > snip... >> made though more likely 74F, AS, or LS variant and of course CMOS 74ACT >> (and cmos friends) as I just bought a bunch. Dip is getting harder to >> get but >> the various SMT packages are easy. Prices for 10 or more of a part are >> cheap to cheaper from primary suppliers. The second tier suppliers are >> often several times that. > > I got ebay... The bottom of the heap. > >> I figure most of what I did back then is years before many here were >> born. >> >> However I have enough NOS TTL 74LS, 74AS, 74F series to build several >> machines. > > I have been playing around with a early 70's TTL computer design > and 74LS181's are too slow by 30 ns. Using a BLACK BOX model for core > memory, I can get a 1.2us memory cycle using a 4.912 MHz raw clock > but I need a few 74Hxx's in there. Proms are 256x4 60 ns and 32x8 50 ns. > > Do you have your 74Hxx spares? Eastern Europe still has a few on ebay > with reasonable shipping for 100% American Russian parts. > No use for 74H parts though I have a bunch. the 74LS are slow you are paying for lower power with speed. tHe 74181 and 74S181 were far faster. Proms are small and slow, last time I used them was for the address decode used on the Northstar* MDS-A controller. I built the last big machine with ram back 1980 and was in the 1us instruction cycle time for single cycle instructions without pipelines. Core was never considered. Trick is throw hardware at it. Adding adders to the address calculation rather than reuse the ALU saves a lot of time and wires. Not like it was for manufacture or anything like that. More of an exercise. I still want to make a stretched 8, PDP8 ISA with 16 bits and faster. No good reason save for it wold be fun. >> I'm still building, current project is a very compact Z80 CP/M system >> using CF >> for disk. Mine uses all Zilog CMOS for very low power. Its a variant of >> the >> Grant Searle Z80 with memory management added to utilize all of the >> 124k ram and eeprom. If you want go look there. > > What do you use all that memory for? > CP/M the allocation block store for each drive and deblocking buffers for performance can be large plus its easy to hide part of the Bios in banked ram. Background processes are easier when you have lots of ram for that. Most of the larger aps like C compilers and such run better with more than 48K, 56k is easy, and 60k is doable with the right memory map. For EEprom its more than boot, the system is in EEprom (about 8K) and with 32K or more things like romdisks and utilities are easily parked there. I've been building nonstandard CP/M systems since 79. In all cases he aps think it is standard CP/M but the bios and such have been tuned even CP/M Bdos it self. Though I often use ZRdos or ZSdos as they are very good. Not much you cant do to it. Allison >> > > The Chinese elves have been busy, My 5V 15 amp $20 power supply arrived > in the mail today. I have power to spare for my BUS and blinking lights. > So long as you load it at least 10% it will be good. > Ben. > >
Re: so far off topic - capatob - saratov2 computer Russsian pdp8?
On 1/7/2019 8:20 AM, allison via cctalk wrote: snip... made though more likely 74F, AS, or LS variant and of course CMOS 74ACT (and cmos friends) as I just bought a bunch. Dip is getting harder to get but the various SMT packages are easy. Prices for 10 or more of a part are cheap to cheaper from primary suppliers. The second tier suppliers are often several times that. I got ebay... The bottom of the heap. I figure most of what I did back then is years before many here were born. However I have enough NOS TTL 74LS, 74AS, 74F series to build several machines. I have been playing around with a early 70's TTL computer design and 74LS181's are too slow by 30 ns. Using a BLACK BOX model for core memory, I can get a 1.2us memory cycle using a 4.912 MHz raw clock but I need a few 74Hxx's in there. Proms are 256x4 60 ns and 32x8 50 ns. Do you have your 74Hxx spares? Eastern Europe still has a few on ebay with reasonable shipping for 100% American Russian parts. I'm still building, current project is a very compact Z80 CP/M system using CF for disk. Mine uses all Zilog CMOS for very low power. Its a variant of the Grant Searle Z80 with memory management added to utilize all of the 124k ram and eeprom. If you want go look there. What do you use all that memory for? Allison The Chinese elves have been busy, My 5V 15 amp $20 power supply arrived in the mail today. I have power to spare for my BUS and blinking lights. Ben.
Re: PDP-11/45 RSTS/E boot problem
> From: Fritz Mueller > Thanks, Noel -- I'll give that a try! Sure - always glad to help with anything V6 related - that's my chief technical amusement, now that I'm retired! :-) Any questions/issues, let me know, and I'll try and get right back. When booting UNIX, remember make sure the switches on your /45 are set to 0173030, so it comes up single-user! (Might we worth checking to see if all the bits in the SR are working, but you've probably already done that as part of bringing the machine up? I wonder if a failure there could cause the RSTS issue? It's so cool that you have a working /45! I have yet to start on mine...) And do icheck/dcheck every time you bring it up, and make sure to 'sync' before halting... These old systems are not as robust in terms of the file system! And when it gets to putting together a /45 version of the OS, that new page I just did should help. Noel
Re: VueSCAN
I wonder if there were ever any TWAIN drivers for Win 3.x. Yes, but I think that you needed WIN32S installed. On Tue, 8 Jan 2019, Liam Proven wrote: Ah, could be. 16-bit TWAIN was supported in version 1.9 of the specification, apparently eliminated by 2.2 Other than a 16 bit version, that may or may not have existed?, the TWAIN drivers would be same/similar to WIN95. http://www.neosys.si/download/TWAIN/dsminst32.txt But few pay any attention to any technology without an interesting name. Well, quite. And of those who do and the rest, never the twain shall meet. I think we've all missed that twain now. To misquote Leah Hager Cohen, "Twain go sorry."
Re: PDP-11/45 RSTS/E boot problem
> I guess I'll do up a cheat sheet. OK, first crack here: http://gunkies.org/wiki/Upgrading_UNIX_Sixth_Edition If there are any improvement I can/should make, please let me know. Thanks! Noel
Re: VueSCAN
On Mon, 7 Jan 2019 at 22:11, Fred Cisin via cctalk wrote: > > > On Thu, 20 Dec 2018 at 02:39, Ali via cctalk wrote: > >> I wonder if there were ever any TWAIN drivers for Win 3.x. > > Yes, but I think that you needed WIN32S installed. Ah, could be. > But few pay any attention to any technology without an interesting name. Well, quite. > And of those who do and the rest, never the twain shall meet. I think we've all missed that twain now. -- Liam Proven - Profile: https://about.me/liamproven Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk - Google Mail/Hangouts/Plus: lpro...@gmail.com Twitter/Facebook/Flickr: lproven - Skype/LinkedIn: liamproven UK: +44 7939-087884 - ČR (+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal): +420 702 829 053
Re: VueSCAN
no only hp scan jets no other brands and only the first few models. thanks though. Sent from AOL Mobile Mail On Monday, January 7, 2019 Fred Cisin via cctalk wrote: On Mon, 7 Jan 2019, ED SHARPE via cctalk wrote: > my foggy brain remembers them as I retied the biz end of > things before win 95 came out. About 1992. After Windoze 3.00 (I got "beta" Windoze 3.10 in August 1991, public release soon after?), and about the time of 3.11 I have a couple of parallel/SCSI scanners new? in box to get rid of. I don't know if their drivers were TWAIN.
Re: PDP-11/45 RSTS/E boot problem
> On Jan 7, 2019, at 12:56 PM, Noel Chiappa via cctalk > wrote: > > ...there are single-RK05 images up already: > > http://www.tuhs.org/Archive/PDP-11/Distributions/research/Ken_Wellsch_v6/ > > but they only include binary for /40’s ... but really, it's drop-dead simple > to build a /45 version if you have the /40 version running. Thanks, Noel -- I’ll give that a try! > ...at least you have something to go back to; the spousal unit works for > NASA, and they're all getting an enforced extended break (much to her > annoyance). My day gig is NSF funded, but we’ve got about a month or so of pre-fetch before things start to get “interesting”... :-( cheers, --FritzM.
Re: VueSCAN
On Mon, 7 Jan 2019, ED SHARPE via cctalk wrote: my foggy brain remembers them as I retied the biz end of things before win 95 came out. About 1992. After Windoze 3.00 (I got "beta" Windoze 3.10 in August 1991, public release soon after?), and about the time of 3.11 I have a couple of parallel/SCSI scanners new? in box to get rid of. I don't know if their drivers were TWAIN.
Re: VueSCAN
my foggy brain remembers them as I retied the biz end of things before win 95 came out. and I seem to remember twain as a term used with hp scanjets before retirement.\ when i left scanjet 2c was current color product.]anyone coming thou az with a scanjet iic in the car... it would be welcome here..we have an orig hpscanjet b/w but can use another one for an offsite display also. ed sharpe archivist for smecc In a message dated 1/7/2019 2:11:37 PM US Mountain Standard Time, cctalk@classiccmp.org writes: > On Thu, 20 Dec 2018 at 02:39, Ali via cctalk wrote:>> > I wonder if there were ever any TWAIN drivers for Win 3.x. Yes, but I think that you needed WIN32S installed. On Mon, 7 Jan 2019, Liam Proven via cctalk wrote:> This is stretching my powers of recollection -- and in my world, back> then, if you could afford (and wanted) a scanner, you used a Mac --> but I think so, yes. 1) some could not afford Mac (rarely any in the skip)2) some did not have control over employer's purchasing decisions3) depending on what was being scanned, other factors influenced platform > We are all aware of what that acronym means, yes? But few pay any attention to any technology without an interesting name.And of those who do and the rest, never the twain shall meet. --Grumpy Ol' Fred ci...@xenosoft.com
Re: VueSCAN
On Thu, 20 Dec 2018 at 02:39, Ali via cctalk wrote: I wonder if there were ever any TWAIN drivers for Win 3.x. Yes, but I think that you needed WIN32S installed. On Mon, 7 Jan 2019, Liam Proven via cctalk wrote: This is stretching my powers of recollection -- and in my world, back then, if you could afford (and wanted) a scanner, you used a Mac -- but I think so, yes. 1) some could not afford Mac (rarely any in the skip) 2) some did not have control over employer's purchasing decisions 3) depending on what was being scanned, other factors influenced platform We are all aware of what that acronym means, yes? But few pay any attention to any technology without an interesting name. And of those who do and the rest, never the twain shall meet. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred ci...@xenosoft.com
Re: PDP-11/45 RSTS/E boot problem
> From: Fritz Mueller > I've thought about that; Unix V6 is actually next on my list of OS's to > try. I think I have seen a fairly detailed set of instructions on > building an image from this from the commonly available distribution > tape. Yeah, one comes with the V6 distribution: http://gunkies.org/wiki/Setting_up_UNIX_-_Sixth_Edition (That's just a 'do this and then do that' list - if you want to know what it's actually _doing_, this: http://gunkies.org/wiki/Installing_UNIX_Sixth_Edition gives the technical details.) Alas, the instructions don't have a lot of detail on how to create the /45 version (it's quite simple - basically one just includes m45.s instead of m40.s in the linker command line :-); I guess I'll do up a cheat sheet. > But if you have an RK05 image already ready to go, go ahead and send it > over and I'll give it a try! Well, there are single-RK05 images up already: http://www.tuhs.org/Archive/PDP-11/Distributions/research/Ken_Wellsch_v6/ but they only include binary for /40's (which will run on a /45 of course; they distributed only the lowest-common-denominator binary, to make their life simple; people have to build their own binary - system and commands - if they want to upgrade). But if you'd like me to make up an RK05 image with a /45 system on it too (one gets to specify what one wants to load at boot time); let me know, and I can whip it up - but really, it's drop-dead simple to build a /45 version if you have the /40 version running. Note: the pack images on the distribution tape _do not_ include the bootstrap in block 0; use the one I linked to above. > It wasn't clear to me last time I looked that I could build V6 to run > off a single pack without having a second RK05 drive and pack available > for swap? No, the image above is for a single RK drive machine; it will run that way, albeit things are a bit cramped. What it does is put a file system in blocks 1-4000, and it uses blocks 4000 and up as the swap area (I forget which one block 4000 itself goes with :-). > Day gig starts back up today after winter break, so less bandwidth for > PDP-11 hacking now unfortunately! :-( Well, at least you have something to go back to; the spousal unit works for NASA, and they're all getting an enforced extended break (much to her annoyance). Noel
Re: Microcode, which is a no-go for modern designs
Few people (but most are right here) can recite PI to enough digits to reach the level of inaccuracy. And those who believe that PI is exactly 22/7 are unaffected by FDIV. (YES, some schools do still teach that!) On Mon, 7 Jan 2019, Johnny Eriksson via cctalk wrote: Why remember the digits, when a small program can provide them? +0un qn"E20Un' 0Uh 0uv HK Qn Qq/10Ut Qh+Qt+48Uw Qw-58"E48Uw %v' Qv"N:Qv,1^T' QwUv Qq-(Qt*10)Uh> :Qv,1^T !Can you figure out what this macro does before running it? It was written by Stan Rabinowitz with modifications by Mark Bramhall and appeared as the Macro of the Month in the Nov. 1977 issue of the TECO SIG newsletter, the "Moby Munger". For information on the TECO Special Interest Group, write to Stan at P.O. Box 76, Maynard, Mass. 01754! Interesting bit! Why remember the digits, when a small program can provide them? Maybe, because remembering the first 80 or 90 digits is half as much work to remember or type in, as that macro. The current state of computer "science" "education" fails to even get the students to understand that floating point is a rounded off approximation. FDIV merely added a small unexpected further degradation to a representation that was already inaccurate, and was explicitly an approximation. They often represent a dollar and cents amount as floating point, just to avoid figuring out how to insert the PERIOD delimiter. Use of FDIV is inappropriate for calculating sales tax. NOT because of the FDIV errors, which are well within the portion that will be discarded in roundoff. It should not take until a third semester "Data Structures And Algorithms" class, or beyond, for them to learn to not use floating point for cash transaction processing. People who use 3.1416 or 22/7 for PI are not in a position to gripe as much as they did, about inaccuracies caused by FDIV. The point was that people were screaming about errors that were already irrelevant to the level of accuracy that they were using, in uses that were explicitly NOT INTENDED to be exact. I am building a base to make a patio table out of a CRASHED 24" RAMAC platter, that had been banged around with no effort to store properly for half a century. (Is there a better use for a CRASHED platter?, or a better way to display it than under glass as a rustic table top?) Neither a value of 3.14 for PI, nor FDIV, will further degrade my level of carpentry skills. I'm considering printing out and including a copy of the RAMAC plaque http://www.ed-thelen.org/RAMAC/RAMAC_Plaque_v40.pdf
Re: PDP-11/45 RSTS/E boot problem
Hi Paul, > On Jan 7, 2019, at 7:40 AM, Paul Koning wrote: > >> On Jan 6, 2019, at 5:58 PM, Paul Koning wrote: >> >> I'd have to refresh my memory on how but it's clearly possible to force a >> crash dump. That would allow us to dig into exactly what went wrong, >> provided you can read the dump file (or the whole disk). > > Here is the procedure... Thanks, I’ll give that a go! --FritzM.
Re: PDP-11/45 RSTS/E boot problem
> On Jan 7, 2019, at 6:29 AM, Noel Chiappa via cctalk > wrote: > > Try running your RSTS image on Ersatz-11, see if it's a simulator issue. I’ll give that a go. > And try bringing up Unix V6 on your machine ... I can help with providing the > image, if needed. I’ve thought about that; Unix V6 is actually next on my list of OS’s to try. I think I have seen a fairly detailed set of instructions on building an image from this from the commonly available distribution tape. But if you have an RK05 image already ready to go, go ahead and send it over and I’ll give it a try! It wasn’t clear to me last time I looked that I could build V6 to run off a single pack without having a second RK05 drive and pack available for swap? Day gig starts back up today after winter break, so less bandwidth for PDP-11 hacking now unfortunately! cheers, --FritzM.
Re: PDP-11/45 RSTS/E boot problem
> On Jan 7, 2019, at 10:40 AM, Paul Koning via cctalk > wrote: > > ... > 5. You should now have the crash dump in [0,1]CRASH.SYS, so you can either > extract that file and the OS image (the RSTS "SIL" file), or the whole disk. > To analyze it, you can use the standard utility ANALYS, or the unsupported > SDA Forth program. I haven't tried SDA on a V6C image, though; it will > probably work but no guarantees. I just tried it. While FORTH works, SDA from the V10 kit does not because it expects to see V10 kernel data structures and the ones in V6 are quite different. So much of the benefit of SDA in that it knows how to pick apart kernel data structures goes away, leaving you with little more than what ANALYS does. It would be possible to update (downdate?) it for V6C, but that's not a small job. paul
Re: Want/Available list
On Fri, 21 Dec 2018 at 04:51, Eric Christopherson via cctalk wrote: > > OK, so it's down *to* the bunker or down *in* the bunker. I'm just asking > because of my language geekery. I still don't know, though, whether "down > the bunker" without a preposition is idiomatic in some dialect of English I > don't speak fluently. You do not specify what *your* native dialect is, so it's hard to say. In much of the UK, probably most, yes, "down the /x/" is idiomatic. "I was talking to this bloke down the pub..." "There's a great offer down the computer market on Tottenham Court Road..." "I was down the gym last night and I saw..." It means "at the", roughly, I'd say. "Down the bunker" parses fine for me. > I just know some UK English speakers pronounce "down > to the/down at the" ALMOST the same as "down the", but I believe there's > still a glottal stop in the former but not the latter. Not that I am aware of, no. However, Yorkshire and Lancashire English tend to reduce the definite article to a prefixed /t/ sound, e.g. "t'pub". See the unofficial Yorkshire national anthem: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Ilkla_Moor_Baht_%27at "Baht 'at" means "bar t'hat". "Bar" as in "all bar one" -- "without" or "except". In other words, the singer was on Ilkley Moor without his hat. This t' prefix is jocularly used for the Internet, for instance: "t'Internet". https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/t%27internet Those who do not understand the reference reduce this to the meaningless "tinternet". As certain successive consonants without an intervening vowel sound are uncommon in English, those who don't know what this "t'" sound means can fail to distinguish it. Compare with the Hindi (I yhink) words "bindi" and "bhindi". The former is a forehead adornment. The latter is the vegetable, okra. Many Indian restaurants serve bhindi bhaji, but because Anglophones mostly can't pronounce /b/ followed by /h/, if you ask for "bindi baji" instead of "bhindi bhaji" you do not get a forehead jewel shaped like an okra pod. So you could say "I'm going down t'bunker" and to the untrained ear it would sound like "down the bunker". But I doubt this is what was meant. -- Liam Proven - Profile: https://about.me/liamproven Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk - Google Mail/Hangouts/Plus: lpro...@gmail.com Twitter/Facebook/Flickr: lproven - Skype/LinkedIn: liamproven UK: +44 7939-087884 - ČR (+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal): +420 702 829 053
Re: Want/Available list
On Fri, 21 Dec 2018 at 02:59, Zane Healy via cctalk wrote: > > Websites are a huge inconvenience or imposition, email lists are not. Agreed. However, for a lot of younger people and those to whom "email" just means "MS Outlook", it's hard work. They do not understand complexities such as filtering, rules, quoting, signatures etc. For them, web fora are easier. Personally, I find web fora almost totally unusable and treat them as a last resort. -- Liam Proven - Profile: https://about.me/liamproven Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk - Google Mail/Hangouts/Plus: lpro...@gmail.com Twitter/Facebook/Flickr: lproven - Skype/LinkedIn: liamproven UK: +44 7939-087884 - ČR (+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal): +420 702 829 053
Re: VueSCAN
On Thu, 20 Dec 2018 at 02:39, Ali via cctalk wrote: > I wonder if there were ever any TWAIN drivers for Win 3.x. This is stretching my powers of recollection -- and in my world, back then, if you could afford (and wanted) a scanner, you used a Mac -- but I think so, yes. We are all aware of what that acronym means, yes? -- Liam Proven - Profile: https://about.me/liamproven Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk - Google Mail/Hangouts/Plus: lpro...@gmail.com Twitter/Facebook/Flickr: lproven - Skype/LinkedIn: liamproven UK: +44 7939-087884 - ČR (+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal): +420 702 829 053
Re: off topic - capatob - saratov2 computer Russsian pdp8
On 01/06/2019 11:24 PM, Dave Wade via cctalk wrote: I am also pretty sure that prior to S/360 the term "character" was generally used for non 8-bit character machines. I am not familiar with the IBM 70xx series machines The IBM 7070 (business machine) was a word-addressed machine, but all decimal. The IBM 709x series (scientific machine) was also word addressed, but binary. I seem to recall that some IBM machines also had facilities to read all 9 bits from a 9-track tape as data so 9-bit bytes but I can't find references. I also feel the use of the term Octet was more marketing to distance ones machines from IBM. Dave The earlier machines were mostly using 7 track tape, not 9 track. You did have your choice of even or odd parity. I'm pretty sure that the 360 tape controls did not support any handling of the 9th track other than parity, and odd parity was the only option. Jon
Re: PDP-11/45 RSTS/E boot problem
> On Jan 6, 2019, at 9:34 PM, Fritz Mueller via cctalk > wrote: > > Hi Paul, > >> On Jan 6, 2019, at 5:58 PM, Paul Koning wrote: >> >> Hm. Can you read data back from the RK05 pack? I'd have to refresh my >> memory on how but it's clearly possible to force a crash dump. That would >> allow us to dig into exactly what went wrong, provided you can read the dump >> file (or the whole disk). > > Yes, I can read back, either by sector or the whole pack. Do let me know if > you find a way to trigger a crash dump, and I’ll give it a go! > > thanks, > --FritzM. Here is the procedure. 1. Make sure crash dump is enabled (in the "default" option). Start the system. Let it run for at least one minute. (I'm not entirely sure about older versions, but I think that a crash within one minute of startup is handled differently and doesn't do all the usual dump and restart machinery.) 2. Set the data switches all UP. (In SIMH, enter "D SR 17".) 3. Set a breakpoint. 4. When you hit the breakpoint, change the PC to 52, like this: 0B:055244 _$7/055244 52 _P (you enter only "$7/" and "52" and "P", the rest is output from ODT.) The system will write the crashdump and then automatically restart. 5. You should now have the crash dump in [0,1]CRASH.SYS, so you can either extract that file and the OS image (the RSTS "SIL" file), or the whole disk. To analyze it, you can use the standard utility ANALYS, or the unsupported SDA Forth program. I haven't tried SDA on a V6C image, though; it will probably work but no guarantees. ANALYSIS needs to be the version that came with that particular OS release, so probably the best way to do it is to boot your system disk image copy on SIMH and run it there. The key question in this instance is who called LOG$CK, the "RTS originated" log call. The stack should help answer that, through tracing through it is a bit painful since there are no explicit stack frames so the equivalent to "print me the call stack" does not exist. If the error originated in a .ERLOG user mode EMT, that means the RTS was unhappy. The RTS itself isn't included in the crash dump, but the saved user mode PC will indicate where the error came from and looking at the BASIC.RTS image will indicate what it was doing at the time. paul
Re: so far off topic - capatob - saratov2 computer Russsian pdp8?
On 01/07/2019 09:51 AM, Peter Corlett via cctalk wrote: > On Sun, Jan 06, 2019 at 02:54:08PM -0700, ben via cctalk wrote: >> On 1/6/2019 12:24 PM, allison via cctalk wrote: >>> The small beauty of being there... FYI back then (1972) a 7400 was about >>> 25 cents and 7483 adder was maybe $1.25. Least that's what I paid. >> Checks my favorite supplier. >> $1.25 for 7400 and $4.00 for a 7483. >> It has gone up in price. > Thanks to inflation, $0.25 in 1972 is worth $1.51 now. Likewise, $1.25 has > inflated to $7.54. So they're cheaper in real terms than they used to be. > > However, it's still not entirely comparable, as I suspect nobody's making > 74-series chips any more so you're buying NOS. A modern equivalent would be a > microcontroller, which start at well under a dollar. > First I wasn't guessing back. I was building and buying back then. So that was what I actually paid in 1972, I've been at it since RTL hit the streets. The 74 series still made though more likely 74F, AS, or LS variant and of course CMOS 74ACT (and cmos friends) as I just bought a bunch. Dip is getting harder to get but the various SMT packages are easy. Prices for 10 or more of a part are cheap to cheaper from primary suppliers. The second tier suppliers are often several times that. I figure most of what I did back then is years before many here were born. However I have enough NOS TTL 74LS, 74AS, 74F series to build several machines. I'm still building, current project is a very compact Z80 CP/M system using CF for disk. Mine uses all Zilog CMOS for very low power. Its a variant of the Grant Searle Z80 with memory management added to utilize all of the 124k ram and eeprom. If you want go look there. Allison
Re: off topic - capatob - saratov2 computer Russsian pdp8? HELP
On Mon, Jan 7, 2019 at 8:51 AM Peter Corlett via cctalk < cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote: > Thanks to inflation, $0.25 in 1972 is worth $1.51 now. Likewise, $1.25 has > inflated to $7.54. So they're cheaper in real terms than they used to be. > > However, it's still not entirely comparable, as I suspect nobody's making > 74-series chips any more so you're buying NOS. A modern equivalent would > be a > microcontroller, which start at well under a dollar. > Logic chips still have their uses, and are most certainly still being made. You can still get 74LS parts, in a DIP package even: https://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/texas-instruments/SN74LS00N/296-1626-5-ND/277272 Note: it's an active production part, too. Kyle
Re: off topic - capatob - saratov2 computer Russsian pdp8? HELP
On Sun, Jan 06, 2019 at 02:54:08PM -0700, ben via cctalk wrote: > On 1/6/2019 12:24 PM, allison via cctalk wrote: >> The small beauty of being there... FYI back then (1972) a 7400 was about >> 25 cents and 7483 adder was maybe $1.25. Least that's what I paid. > Checks my favorite supplier. > $1.25 for 7400 and $4.00 for a 7483. > It has gone up in price. Thanks to inflation, $0.25 in 1972 is worth $1.51 now. Likewise, $1.25 has inflated to $7.54. So they're cheaper in real terms than they used to be. However, it's still not entirely comparable, as I suspect nobody's making 74-series chips any more so you're buying NOS. A modern equivalent would be a microcontroller, which start at well under a dollar.
Re: off topic - capatob - saratov2 computer Russsian pdp8
> On Jan 7, 2019, at 12:24 AM, Dave Wade via cctalk > wrote: > > ... > I am also pretty sure that prior to S/360 the term "character" was generally > used for non 8-bit character machines. I am not familiar with the IBM 70xx > series machines but certainly on the 1401 and 1620 the term byte was never > used. The 1620 is a decimal machine, with digit-addressed memory. It has a number of instructions that operate on digit pairs, for I/O, so those pairs are called "characters". > Also the Honeywell H3200 which was an IBM1401 "clone" (sort of). The only > machine I know where a "byte" is not eight bits is the Honeywell L6000 and > its siblings These machines had 36 bit works which were originally divided > into 6 six bit characters. Others have already pointed out there are plenty of other examples, with other definitions. I mentioned the CDC 6000 series mainframes. Just to make sure of my memory, I searched some documentation. Here is a quote from the CDC Cyber 170 series Hardware Reference Manual (section "Input/output multiplexor - Model 176"): "During communications between the PPUs and CM, the I/O MUX disassembles 60-bit transmissions from CM to 12-bit bytes." But here's one I had not seen before: in the 7600 Preliminary System Description, the section that describes the PPU I/O machinery has the same sort of wording as above, but then on the next page the discussion of the drum memory says: "A 16 bit cyclic parity byte is generated by the controller for the data field of each record written on the peripheral unit." And the CDC 6000 series Sort-Merge utility has a "BYTESIZE" control card, which in PDP-10 fashion allows "byte" to be any length up to 60 bits (the word size) -- the default is 6 bits, which is character length for the basic character set but other examples show 12 and 60 bit "bytes". In the same way, a TUTOR language manual from 1978 describes bytes as being any size, in a description of the language feature for what C calls bit-field variables. I didn't realize that term was used for that feature, though. paul
Re: PDP-11/45 RSTS/E boot problem
> From: Fritz Mueller > Oh, one last thing: if anybody else out there has a real working '11/45 > + RK05 and wants to try this RSTS image, let me know, and I'll send you > a copy (all 2.5MB of it, hah). It'd be interesting to see if this a > really just limited to my machine? Good idea. Two more along the same lines: Try running your RSTS image on Ersatz-11, see if it's a simulator issue. And try bringing up Unix V6 on your machine; if it's a hardware issue with your machine, it might show with that, too. (I can help with fault analysis on V6, if _anything_ doesn't work properly.) It will need a single RK pack, I can help with providing the image, if needed. Noel
Re: Microcode, which is a no-go for modern designs
> On Jan 7, 2019, at 3:20 AM, Johnny Eriksson via cctalk > wrote: > >> Few people (but most are right here) can recite PI to enough digits to >> reach the level of inaccuracy. And those who believe that PI is exactly >> 22/7 are unaffected by FDIV. (YES, some schools do still teach that!) > > Why remember the digits, when a small program can provide them? > > +0un qn"E20Un' 0Uh 0uv HK > Qn Qi<\+2*10+(Qq*qi)Ua 0LK Qi*2-1Uj Qa/QjUq Qa-(Qq*Qj)-2\10I$ Qi-1ui> > Qq/10Ut Qh+Qt+48Uw Qw-58"E48Uw %v' Qv"N:Qv,1^T' QwUv Qq-(Qt*10)Uh> > :Qv,1^T > !Can you figure out what this macro does before running it? It was > written by Stan Rabinowitz with modifications by Mark Bramhall and > appeared as the Macro of the Month in the Nov. 1977 issue of the TECO > SIG newsletter, the "Moby Munger". For information on the TECO Special > Interest Group, write to Stan at P.O. Box 76, Maynard, Mass. 01754! > > --Johnny See also "A spigot algorithm for the digits of pi", American Mathematical Monthly, 102 (1995), 195-203. For extra credit, find and fix the bug in Stan's program. (Run it to 1000 digits or so to see the bug.) paul
Re: off topic - capatob - saratov2 computer Russsian pdp8
> From: Dave Wade > The only machine I know where a "byte" is not eight bits is the > Honeywell L6000 and its siblings I'm not sure why I bother to post to this list, since apparently people don't bother to read my messages. >From the "pdp10 reference handbook", 1970, section 2.3, "Byte Manipulation", page 2-15: "This set of five instructions allows the programmer to pack or unpack bytes of any length from anywhere within a word. ... The byte manipulation instructions have the standard memory reference format, but the effective address E is used to retrieve a pointer, which is used in turn to locate the byte ... The pointer has the format 0 5 6 11 12 13 14 17 18 35 P S I X Y where S is the size of the byte as a number of bits, and P as its position as the number of bits remaining at the right of the byte in the word ... To facilitate processing a series of bytes, several of the byte instructions increment the pointer, ie modify it so that it points to the next byte position in a set of memory locations. Bytes are processed from left to right in a word, so incrementing merely replaces the current value of P by P-S, unless there is insufficient space in the present location [i.e. 'word' - JNC] for another byte of the specified size (P-S < 0). In this case Y is increased by one to point at the next consecutive location, and P is set to 36 - S to point to the first byte at the left in the new location." Now imagine implementing all that in FLIP CHIPs which held transistors (this is before ICs)! Anyway, like I said, at least ITS (of the PDP-10 OS's) used this to store ASCII in words which contain five 7-bit _bytes_. I don't know if TENEX did. > I also feel the use of the term Octet was more marketing to distance > ones machines from IBM. Huh? Which machine used the term 'octet'? Like I said, we adapted and used the term 'octet' in TCP/IP documentation (and that's definite - go check out historical documents, e.g. RFC-675 from 1974) because 'byte' was at the time ambiguous - the majority of machines on the ARPANET at that point were PDP-10's (see above). Interestingly, I see it's not defined in that document (or in the earlier RFC-635), so it must have already been in use for an 8-bit quantity? Doing a little research, there is a claim that Bob Bemer independently invented the term in 1965/66. Perhaps someone subconciously remembered his proposal, and that's the ultimate source? The term is also long used in chemistry and music, of course, so perhaps that's where it came from. Noel
