INFO-VAX Sat, 07 Jul 2007 Volume 2007 : Issue 367 Contents: Re: Another opportunity Re: Another opportunity Re: Another opportunity Re: Another opportunity Re: Another opportunity Re: Anyone know why the Alpha market is so so quiet? RE: Anyone know why the Alpha market is so so quiet? Re: Anyone know why the Alpha market is so so quiet? Re: Book: Inside the Machine Re: Book: Inside the Machine Re: Book: Inside the Machine Re: Book: Inside the Machine Re: HP "Support" for OpenVMS Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Re: July the 4th Re: July the 4th Re: Memory problem Re: OpenVMS - When downtime is not an option Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Re: WARNING: BSOD (wasSCUP: Another opportunity Re: WARNING: BSOD (wasSCUP: Another opportunity Re: XMODEM for VMS Re: XMODEM for VMS Re: XMODEM for VMS Re: XMODEM for VMS Re: XMODEM for VMS Re: XMODEM for VMS Re: XMODEM for VMS Re: XMODEM for VMS ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 12:50:26 -0600 From: Mark Berryman Subject: Re: Another opportunity Message-ID: <468e2c83$1@mvb.saic.com> David J Dachtera wrote: > Mark Berryman wrote: >> David J Dachtera wrote: >>> If you have to ask, you're not likely to understand the answer. >> Permit me to surprise you. Try me. > > Well, I was rather hoping you would. I honestly didn't expect such challenges > from you, either. Maybe it's just the world environment has us all on edge. > > As I mentioned, providing tools that require something not provided in the base > o.s. installation - whether it's a run-time interpreter, a shareable image > library, etc. - implies acceptance of the requirement to provide the > pre-requisite pieces along with the end-product. > > I know you know that - hence, my surprise at your statement. If HP were the one providing tools that required products not shipped with the OS distribution I might agree with you. But not when others are providing tools, or simply recommending the use of tools, that are available for, but not shipped with, the OS. Let's look at VMS and Windows. Neither ships with either Perl or PHP support. If you get the right flavor of Windows you can get a Web server, but you pay a lot for it. VMS offers a Web server and Perl and PHP interpreters as optional, and free, software. If you have a support contract, they will support all 3 as part of that contract. Windows offers a supported Web server but the Windows vendor neither offers nor supports Perl or PHP. All 3 of these packages are tools that I depend on. I certainly wouldn't object if HP chose to bundle these in the main distribution but I also have no problem with the way they have chosen to provide them. I definitely believe that HP is doing a better job than Microsoft in this case. I also make use of a lot of Perl scripts developed by others. I do not want them to include a Perl distribution with each of their scripts. That would be a maintenance nightmare. They simply indicate that Perl is a prerequisite to run the scripts. That is sufficient as far as I am concerned. Let's see, I believe your current job involves medical software that uses MUMPS, yes? (Or is that used to use?) I have made rather extensive use of MUMPS software from the VA over the years. Not once did they include a MUMPS interpreter with their distribution, nor did one come with the OS of any platform I've ever used (except DSM-11 but that was nothing but MUMPS). I had to provide the MUMPS language myself. I don't think you'll find anyone else that thinks it should have been otherwise. Maybe it is simply the difference between freeware and payware. If I bought a medical application from Cerner, I would expect them to provide everything needed to run the application, including anything that might be considered common on the platform I was using but was not actually distributed with it. On the other hand, I have downloaded and built applications like ImageMagick and MPlayer. Both of these are freeware packages that have many prerequisites, few, if any, of which are included in the base package. I fully expect this to be the way things are in the freeware world. So, either my penultimate paragraph summarizes an opinion we can agree on, or this will apparently be a point where we are going to disagree. Mark Berryman ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 12:59:01 -0600 From: Mark Berryman Subject: Re: Another opportunity Message-ID: <468e2e87$1@mvb.saic.com> David J Dachtera wrote: > Arne Vajhøj wrote: >> David J Dachtera wrote: >>> Arne Vajhøj wrote: >>>> Richard B. Gilbert wrote: >>>>> How would you "improve' DCL. Since they added IF/THEN/ELSE a few years >>>>> ago, it's been just about perfect. :-) >>>> If DCL was to be redone today, then it would be different. >>>> >>>> More and better control structure, more data types, extension >>>> mechanism (read: user defined lexicals) etc.. >>>> >>>> I don't think it will happen. >>>> >>>> A server shell language is not a sales point today. >>>> >>>> If a VMS user wants something else, then they can >>>> look at Perl or Python. >>> Which of those ships as part of the base o.s. and so is guaranteed to be found >>> on every VMS installation, past and present? >> None. >> >> But if you have scripting requirements that are beyond a normal >> level of DCL, then installing something extra should not be a >> problem. > > Never worked in a U.S. Gov't (FDA) regulated industry, have you? I have. It wasn't a problem. It simply required a few more steps to get the necessary software installed. The length and difficulty of those steps was determined mainly by whether or not installing the software involved a cost to the government, secondarily by whether or not they perceived that the software in question imposed a risk. Case in point, the last time I was involved in this, I had no problem getting permission to install ZIP (which was free) but it took considerably longer to get approval to install a TCP/IP stack (which wasn't free). Mark Berryman ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 14:52:29 -0500 From: David J Dachtera Subject: Re: Another opportunity Message-ID: <468E9D7D.AE715B03@spam.comcast.net> Mark Berryman wrote: > [snip] > So, either my penultimate paragraph summarizes an opinion we can agree > on, or this will apparently be a point where we are going to disagree. For my part, I'd like to see supported versions of python, perl, etc. provided and kept current by HP to allow for greater flexibility, and so on. As re: MUMPS, the application ISV provides the relationship with InterSystems for support of Cache' (formerly, ISM). -- David J Dachtera dba DJE Systems http://www.djesys.com/ Unofficial OpenVMS Marketing Home Page http://www.djesys.com/vms/market/ Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/soho/ Unofficial OpenVMS-IA32 Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/ia32/ Unofficial OpenVMS Hobbyist Support Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/support/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 14:54:37 -0500 From: David J Dachtera Subject: Re: Another opportunity Message-ID: <468E9DFD.BE01DDC7@spam.comcast.net> Mark Berryman wrote: > > David J Dachtera wrote: > > Arne Vajhøj wrote: > >> David J Dachtera wrote: > >>> Arne Vajhøj wrote: > >>>> Richard B. Gilbert wrote: > >>>>> How would you "improve' DCL. Since they added IF/THEN/ELSE a few years > >>>>> ago, it's been just about perfect. :-) > >>>> If DCL was to be redone today, then it would be different. > >>>> > >>>> More and better control structure, more data types, extension > >>>> mechanism (read: user defined lexicals) etc.. > >>>> > >>>> I don't think it will happen. > >>>> > >>>> A server shell language is not a sales point today. > >>>> > >>>> If a VMS user wants something else, then they can > >>>> look at Perl or Python. > >>> Which of those ships as part of the base o.s. and so is guaranteed to be found > >>> on every VMS installation, past and present? > >> None. > >> > >> But if you have scripting requirements that are beyond a normal > >> level of DCL, then installing something extra should not be a > >> problem. > > > > Never worked in a U.S. Gov't (FDA) regulated industry, have you? > > I have. It wasn't a problem. It simply required a few more steps to > get the necessary software installed. The length and difficulty of > those steps was determined mainly by whether or not installing the > software involved a cost to the government, secondarily by whether or > not they perceived that the software in question imposed a risk. > > Case in point, the last time I was involved in this, I had no problem > getting permission to install ZIP (which was free) but it took > considerably longer to get approval to install a TCP/IP stack (which > wasn't free). My point centered more on certification than procedure. If, for example, perl were going to be used to extend the application at some level in the back-end server tier, certification issues could easily arise. -- David J Dachtera dba DJE Systems http://www.djesys.com/ Unofficial OpenVMS Marketing Home Page http://www.djesys.com/vms/market/ Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/soho/ Unofficial OpenVMS-IA32 Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/ia32/ Unofficial OpenVMS Hobbyist Support Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/support/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:53:46 -0400 From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Arne_Vajh=F8j?= Subject: Re: Another opportunity Message-ID: <468ee411$0$90271$14726298@news.sunsite.dk> David J Dachtera wrote: > Arne Vajhøj wrote: >> But if you have scripting requirements that are beyond a normal >> level of DCL, then installing something extra should not be a >> problem. > > Never worked in a U.S. Gov't (FDA) regulated industry, have you? No. But if the kit was available official from HP, then I assume that even the FDA could be convinced. Arne ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:39:51 -0400 From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Arne_Vajh=F8j?= Subject: Re: Anyone know why the Alpha market is so so quiet? Message-ID: <468ee0cf$0$90263$14726298@news.sunsite.dk> Main, Kerry wrote: >>> With 50-60% of all security issues being internal related, that >>> is a huge risk. >> I don't think so. > > How can one not think that having important or critical systems with > a huge number of outstanding and documented security patches is not a > risk to the business? Answered twice - you apparently did not read it. >> You seem to think that all security patches apply to all systems >> they do not. > > Arne - with all due respect, you are looking at this from an > individual Developers perspective - not from a practical Operations > view i.e. theoretically, you should be able to ... > > The point is that in a med to large DC, there are very few > environments whereby the OPS folks understand or even know what the > Developers are running on their systems from the point of view of > what each service/app requires. Heck, most environments do not even > know what their prod systems requires from an individual service > perspective as they just follow the installation directions they are > given. And ? A security hole in Apache on a server where Apache is installed does not become a security issue because the OPS guy do not have a clue about what apps are installed. > In addition, most shops try to maintain a std OS image as maintaining > multiple systems with multiple patch versions is almost impossible to > maintain when you have a med-large DC with hundreds of systems (and > some Cust's have thousands of Wintel systems WW). I would say a small > DC is anything less than 100 systems. I think you need to decide what your argument is. Are Linux a mess because companies are running 100's of different versions or is it a problem that all Linux systems within a company has to get the same patches because they only have one image ? > OPS will first introduce the security patches to Dev systems, then QA > and then production. OPS does not apply patches. Systems group or whatever it is called does. >> Systems that live a nice comfortable life far away from internet >> and PC's do not get all those patches. > > Again, remember what analysts state - 50-60% of all security issues > are internally initiated - not from the Internet. Disgruntled > employees are only one source of the problem. I can ask for a third time: how many of those 50-60% uses security holes in software ? > Today, you have almost every Sales, Marketing, Support resources > person their laptops, PDA's, memory sticks, Cell phones back and > forth from external networks (home, airports, hotels, foreign > countries) to internal networks each and every day. > > Each time one of those devices goes home and comes back, there is a > chance that it picked up some self propagating Trojan, worm, virus > etc that is looking for known security holes to exploit on internal > servers. > > How many employees can say their home, hotel or airport networks are > as secure as their work environment? And ? Everybody knows that. But it has really no relevance for the discussion above. Arne ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 21:49:15 -0400 From: "Main, Kerry" Subject: RE: Anyone know why the Alpha market is so so quiet? Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: Arne Vajh=F8j [mailto:arne@vajhoej.dk] > Sent: July 6, 2007 8:40 PM > To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com > Subject: Re: Anyone know why the Alpha market is so so quiet? >=20 > Main, Kerry wrote: > >>> With 50-60% of all security issues being internal related, that > >>> is a huge risk. > >> I don't think so. > > > > How can one not think that having important or critical systems > with > > a huge number of outstanding and documented security patches is > not a > > risk to the business? >=20 > Answered twice - you apparently did not read it. >=20 It just blows me away that anyone with DC or IT experience (that I know = you have) would even attempt to argue that outstanding security patches = are not a risk to the business. Anyway, moving on .. > >> You seem to think that all security patches apply to all systems > >> they do not. > > Ok, so lets assume that you have a well run IT shop that ensures all = applicable security patches are applied asap. Now, lets also assume you = have a well run IT shop that tests all important applications before = they get rolled into production. This likely takes a few days with = setup-scripting etc. Lets also assume your Operations staff is like 99% = of most IT shops that do not really understand what is running on all = your systems in terms of things like Services that require ActiveX or = COM or any other low hanging things that might be open for patching. Now, like any well run shop, you regularly visit the following RH site = to pick up the monthly Linux security patches: https://www.redhat.com/archives/enterprise-watch-list/ (click thread for = each month) Now remember above note about OPS do not know much about any low level = service requirements for most applications and there are hundreds of = services on these many servers.=20 Ok, so looking at this RH web site: In June 2007 alone, RH Linux had 29 *security* patches. In May 2007 alone, RH Linux had 42 *security* patches. So, please explain to me how the typical understaffed IT shop is = expected to follow their normal processes, review these 71 security = patches, test all their important applications with the applicable = patches from this that apply from just this past 2 months. =20 And also do their normal day-to-day support, fire fighting jobs that is = their primary role. > > Arne - with all due respect, you are looking at this from an > > individual Developers perspective - not from a practical > Operations > > view i.e. theoretically, you should be able to ... > > > > The point is that in a med to large DC, there are very few > > environments whereby the OPS folks understand or even know what > the > > Developers are running on their systems from the point of view of > > what each service/app requires. Heck, most environments do not > even > > know what their prod systems requires from an individual service > > perspective as they just follow the installation directions they > are > > given. >=20 > And ? >=20 See above. > A security hole in Apache on a server where Apache is installed > does not become a security issue because the OPS guy do not have > a clue about what apps are installed. >=20 Who says that they even know where or what servers Apache is running on? = Remember there are hundreds of servers in small to medium DC. Developers will spin up all sorts of stuff on their Dev/Test servers = without notifying OPS. Also, remember that many servers use commercial web based mgmt pkgs that = use underlying web servers like IIS and Apache. OPS may or may not know = about these. Also, numerous "appliance" boxes used by storage and = network folks use Apache or IIS behind the scenes in their appliance = server boxes. > > In addition, most shops try to maintain a std OS image as > maintaining > > multiple systems with multiple patch versions is almost > impossible to > > maintain when you have a med-large DC with hundreds of systems > (and > > some Cust's have thousands of Wintel systems WW). I would say a > small > > DC is anything less than 100 systems. >=20 > I think you need to decide what your argument is. >=20 > Are Linux a mess because companies are running 100's of different > versions or is it a problem that all Linux systems within a company > has to get the same patches because they only have one image ? >=20 OPS typically have a common OS image, but then all sorts of additional = App's get layered on top. What the OPS groups want to avoid as much as = possible are multiple OS kernel images all over the place. > > OPS will first introduce the security patches to Dev systems, > then QA > > and then production. >=20 > OPS does not apply patches. Systems group or whatever it is called > does. >=20 OPS or Operations or Systems Group - same thing.=20 > >> Systems that live a nice comfortable life far away from internet > >> and PC's do not get all those patches. > > > > Again, remember what analysts state - 50-60% of all security > issues > > are internally initiated - not from the Internet. Disgruntled > > employees are only one source of the problem. >=20 > I can ask for a third time: how many of those 50-60% uses security > holes in software ? >=20 A good portion. Pick a number between 0 and 100%.=20 > > Today, you have almost every Sales, Marketing, Support resources > > person their laptops, PDA's, memory sticks, Cell phones back and > > forth from external networks (home, airports, hotels, foreign > > countries) to internal networks each and every day. > > > > Each time one of those devices goes home and comes back, there is > a > > chance that it picked up some self propagating Trojan, worm, > virus > > etc that is looking for known security holes to exploit on > internal > > servers. > > > > How many employees can say their home, hotel or airport networks > are > > as secure as their work environment? >=20 > And ? >=20 See above about your comment about security issues in software. =20 > Everybody knows that. But it has really no relevance for the > discussion above. >=20 > Arne Again, with all due respect, it just blows me away that these you do not = see these as major issues. It sounds like you have been bitten by the = hype bug. Sometimes I really wonder how much real med-large Operations experience = really does exist out in the newsgroup world. Some of these issues are = all part of what is known as the hidden IT costs. Anyway, moving on - believe or do not believe. That is the nature of = newsgroups. Regards Kerry Main Senior Consultant HP Services Canada Voice: 613-592-4660 Fax: 613-591-4477 kerryDOTmainAThpDOTcom (remove the DOT's and AT)=20 OpenVMS - the secure, multi-site OS that just works. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 22:25:05 -0500 From: Ron Johnson Subject: Re: Anyone know why the Alpha market is so so quiet? Message-ID: On 07/06/07 20:49, Main, Kerry wrote: >> -----Original Message----- From: Arne Vajhøj >> [mailto:arne@vajhoej.dk] Sent: July 6, 2007 8:40 PM To: >> Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com Subject: Re: Anyone know why the Alpha >> market is so so quiet? >> >> Main, Kerry wrote: >>>>> With 50-60% of all security issues being internal >>>>> related, that is a huge risk. >>>> I don't think so. >>> How can one not think that having important or critical >>> systems >> with >>> a huge number of outstanding and documented security patches >>> is >> not a >>> risk to the business? >> Answered twice - you apparently did not read it. >> > > It just blows me away that anyone with DC or IT experience (that > I know you have) would even attempt to argue that outstanding > security patches are not a risk to the business. Anyway, moving > on .. Because most of those systems are internal and have controlled access? That "they" trust employees not to be malicious might be foolish, but it makes my job easier to have full privs, and not having to fill out a form with 3 paragraphs of justification why I need an extra priv. -- Ron Johnson, Jr. Jefferson LA USA Give a man a fish, and he eats for a day. Hit him with a fish, and he goes away for good! ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 21:52:49 +0100 From: Russell Wallace Subject: Re: Book: Inside the Machine Message-ID: Neil Rieck wrote: > Because of these drawbacks to deep pipelining, many critics of the > Pentium 4's microarchitecture, dubbed NetBurst by Intel, have > suggested that its staggeringly long pipeline was a gimmick - a poor > design choice made for reasons of marketing and not performance and > scalability. > [...snip...] > It's my understanding that this fact was widely known within Intel, > even though it was not, and probably newer will be, publicly > acknowledged. My understanding differs. Analysis (I don't still have the reference handy, sorry) indicates the pipeline has to get much longer than P4's before pipeline length per se starts limiting performance. It may well be that the decision to make a speed demon rather than a brainiac came from marketing, but the engineers didn't say (even to themselves) "oh well, guess we've just got to fool the punters with a crap CPU", they said "fair enough, we'll make a speed demon that'll have such a high clock speed that it really will outperform the brainiac competition". What nobody knew at that point was that the race for higher clock speed was about to hit the heat dissipation wall. P4 was designed to climb past 5 GHz and towards the 10 mark; instead it couldn't even reach 4 GHz without a special cooling system or melting the chip. As confirmation that Intel didn't realize this, look at the Itanium: it has (architectural!) features that only make sense if the designers didn't know performance _per watt_ was about to become a critical figure of merit. -- "Always look on the bright side of life." To reply by email, replace no.spam with my last name. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 14:15:06 -0700 From: Neil Rieck Subject: Re: Book: Inside the Machine Message-ID: <1183756506.533848.63850@n60g2000hse.googlegroups.com> On Jul 6, 4:52 pm, Russell Wallace wrote: [...snip...] > > My understanding differs. Analysis (I don't still have the reference > handy, sorry) indicates the pipeline has to get much longer than P4's > before pipeline length per se starts limiting performance. It may well > be that the decision to make a speed demon rather than a brainiac came > from marketing, but the engineers didn't say (even to themselves) "oh > well, guess we've just got to fool the punters with a crap CPU", they > said "fair enough, we'll make a speed demon that'll have such a high > clock speed that it really will outperform the brainiac competition". > > What nobody knew at that point was that the race for higher clock speed > was about to hit the heat dissipation wall. P4 was designed to climb > past 5 GHz and towards the 10 mark; instead it couldn't even reach 4 GHz > without a special cooling system or melting the chip. > Maybe. Maybe not. Many companies (including my current employer) let marketing call most of the shots. NetBurst had pipelines between 20 and 31 stages which is OK for flat out single-task computing but bad when those pipelines need to be flushed while servicing interrupts etc. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netburst Since Intel got rid of NetBurst when they went to Core and Core2 Duo I can only assume that Intel engineers are back in the driver's seat (I seem to remember a large number of marketing people being fired last fall). Neil Rieck Kitchener/Waterloo/Cambridge, Ontario, Canada. http://www3.sympatico.ca/n.rieck/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 16:26:24 -0500 From: Ron Johnson Subject: Re: Book: Inside the Machine Message-ID: <4syji.1746$JR6.510@newsfe18.lga> On 07/06/07 16:15, Neil Rieck wrote: [snip] > > Maybe. Maybe not. Many companies (including my current employer) let > marketing call most of the shots. > > NetBurst had pipelines between 20 and 31 stages which is OK for flat > out single-task computing but bad when those pipelines need to be > flushed while servicing interrupts etc. Lotus 1-2-3 and Doom would really fly on one of those... > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netburst > > Since Intel got rid of NetBurst when they went to Core and Core2 Duo I > can only assume that Intel engineers are back in the driver's seat (I > seem to remember a large number of marketing people being fired last > fall). Or the marketeers realized that they were getting spanked by a better widget. -- Ron Johnson, Jr. Jefferson LA USA Give a man a fish, and he eats for a day. Hit him with a fish, and he goes away for good! ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 07 Jul 2007 01:36:05 -0400 From: Bill Todd Subject: Re: Book: Inside the Machine Message-ID: Russell Wallace wrote: > Neil Rieck wrote: >> Because of these drawbacks to deep pipelining, many critics of the >> Pentium 4's microarchitecture, dubbed NetBurst by Intel, have >> suggested that its staggeringly long pipeline was a gimmick - a poor >> design choice made for reasons of marketing and not performance and >> scalability. >> [...snip...] >> It's my understanding that this fact was widely known within Intel, >> even though it was not, and probably newer will be, publicly >> acknowledged. > > My understanding differs. Analysis (I don't still have the reference > handy, sorry) indicates the pipeline has to get much longer than P4's > before pipeline length per se starts limiting performance. It may well > be that the decision to make a speed demon rather than a brainiac came > from marketing, but the engineers didn't say (even to themselves) "oh > well, guess we've just got to fool the punters with a crap CPU", they > said "fair enough, we'll make a speed demon that'll have such a high > clock speed that it really will outperform the brainiac competition". > > What nobody knew at that point was that the race for higher clock speed > was about to hit the heat dissipation wall. P4 was designed to climb > past 5 GHz and towards the 10 mark; instead it couldn't even reach 4 GHz > without a special cooling system or melting the chip. > > As confirmation that Intel didn't realize this, look at the Itanium: it > has (architectural!) features that only make sense if the designers > didn't know performance _per watt_ was about to become a critical figure > of merit. I'd be curious to know what those are: while a fair number of bells and whistles got thrown into the pot (my impression is due to design by committee), Itanic's basic premise is all about simplicity and efficiency (let the compiler do most of the work so that out-of-order circuitry won't be necessary for good single-threaded performance). The realization certainly fell far short of that goal (Montecito gains back a good deal of performance-per-Watt ground, but only by use of novel techniques that its competition does not - yet - have), but I'm not sure that's an *architectural* problem (nor even is failure to obtain the full benefits of EPIC, at least in server-style workloads where the processor execution units can be kept busy servicing multiple hardware threads, even if single-threaded performance may not be the best). It's too bad that the former Alpha team's version of Itanic got derailed, since it would have been interesting to see whether a different core design could have done better. The only way the 'heat dissipation wall' that Netburst hit should have been a surprise to Intel's design engineers would have if their process-engineering associates seriously misled them about the anticipated process gains: the more pipeline stages you have the more transistors are involved, and the faster you switch those transistors the more heat each one of them generates, so the power requirements of Netburst at any given frequency should have been fairly easy to anticipate for any well-understood process. It does seem to be true that Netburst's pipeline has come nowhere near the point of marginal returns and that *if* Netburst hadn't been heat-constrained then it might have yielded considerably better performance, but it's still tough to believe that it would have out-classed the new crop of Intel processors which in the same process consume about the same amount of power per clock, can apparently clock almost as fast within the same power envelope (though probably couldn't clock as fast as Netburst if that envelope were significantly expanded), and produce almost the same performance at half the clock rate. So while (had processes been more favorable) Netburst might have been an acceptable design alternative, it's tough to believe that its engineers felt it was the *best* one technically (given its obviously greater appetite for Watts than other at-least-equally-reasonable alternatives). As for Itanic, it has a relatively short pipeline, so whatever appetite it has for power is due to other factors. - bill ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 21:35:37 GMT From: ChrisQuayle Subject: Re: HP "Support" for OpenVMS Message-ID: Bob Koehler wrote: > > Last month I was at the Rational Users Group meeting (open to > non-members) where some of the IBM guys tried to convince us that old > software wears out (my words, they said somethjing like "gets > ratty"). > > I've seen software with time related issues, but I've never seen any > wear out. > It does, but perhaps not in the literal sense. Software systems often start off with the noblest of aims, properly structured, well written, and documented, with a clear big picture view and and robust functionality. Then, over many years, many hands do maintenance, glue on bits of functionality, fix bugs in a hurry etc. This by people who have no clear idea of the original design goals. No global view, since they aren't given enough time to gain detailed knowledge of the whole. If they are lucky, they may have some truthfull docs, but the system may have morphed into something quite different and the docs often don't get completely updated because the programmer gets moved on to the next project as soon as the work is done. The structure suffers, unintended bugs creap in because there's insufficient regression testing, sometime to the point where no-one in the company knows how it all works. It gets to the stage where a complete redesign and rewrite is the only economic answer, since anyone who knew anything about the product has long since moved on or has been made redundant. As a freelance, have seen walked in to quite a few projects like this and not only in small companies... Chris ------------------------------ Date: 6 Jul 2007 13:27:47 -0500 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: In article , "John Vottero" writes: > > Ok, let's see that line. > END (Fortran-77). There are no VMS virii in the wild to search for. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 14:31:28 -0400 From: "Richard B. Gilbert" Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468E8A80.5010005@comcast.net> John Vottero wrote: > "Bob Koehler" wrote in message > news:evvgDjsaLJu4@eisner.encompasserve.org... > >> In article <5f6p5cF3ac9ruU1@mid.individual.net>, bill@cs.uofs.edu >> (Bill Gunshannon) writes: >> >>> >>> So, what, is everything mutually exclusive here? Using anti-virus >>> software (are you aware that you should actually be using at least >>> two different anti-virus prodicts?) and applying patches (as needed >>> based on your system and operational necessity) is part of being a >>> competent sys admin. >> >> >> Not on my VMS systems, it isn't. I could write an anti-virus program >> for VMS in one line. >> > > Ok, let's see that line. > how about: exit(1) :-) ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 14:38:36 -0500 From: David J Dachtera Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468E9A3C.EDD88624@spam.comcast.net> Ron Johnson wrote: > > On 07/05/07 11:34, Main, Kerry wrote: > >> -----Original Message----- > >> From: JF Mezei [mailto:jfmezei.spamnot@vaxination.ca] > >> Sent: July 5, 2007 11:19 AM > >> To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com > >> Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? > >> > >> Main, Kerry wrote: > >>> Because having servers > >>> running in peak time with > >> >only 5-15% peak utilization is > >>> not only embarrassing, but financially > >> > unjustifiable. > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> 1- Please fix your client so it abides by internet standard instead of > >> Microsoft standard and breaks lines at between 72 and 78 characters > >> per > >> line. Having to break your lines because your use Microsoft isn't > >> pleasant. > >> > > > > I have now set my client to break at 72 characters (it was 75). Is this > > what you were referring to? > > > > Other than setting the line break, there are no other email options that > > I have. > > But Outlook is still breaking threads. It's called, "LookOut!" for a reason! -- David J Dachtera dba DJE Systems http://www.djesys.com/ Unofficial OpenVMS Marketing Home Page http://www.djesys.com/vms/market/ Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/soho/ Unofficial OpenVMS-IA32 Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/ia32/ Unofficial OpenVMS Hobbyist Support Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/support/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 14:46:25 -0500 From: David J Dachtera Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468E9C11.C6B6D3CC@spam.comcast.net> JF Mezei wrote: > > David J Dachtera wrote: > > http://www.cerner.com/ for one. We are a Cerner customer. Our database is > > approaching 4TB, 5-node cluster of GS1280s, storage is EMC DMX-II. I'm sure > > others here can testify about their installation's size. > > Just for my education, could you describe the scope that this > installation covers ? A single doctor's office ? A single hospital ? A > group of hospitals &? (if so, how many) ? > > Or is this used by some insurance company to manage thir clients's > medical records and is accessed by any hospital that has a relationship > with that insurance company/HMO/whatever ? I replied to JF privately. -- David J Dachtera dba DJE Systems http://www.djesys.com/ Unofficial OpenVMS Marketing Home Page http://www.djesys.com/vms/market/ Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/soho/ Unofficial OpenVMS-IA32 Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/ia32/ Unofficial OpenVMS Hobbyist Support Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/support/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:05:43 +0000 From: "Paul Raulerson" Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: ----=_vm_0011_W5122116998_26069_1183752343 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Unfortunately, the message you sent arrived in HTML format, and to take i= t to text means I have to do exactly as you did - cut and paste. Netscape= doesn't do HTML or RTF? Let me introduce you to Safari... Anyway, if I d= id screw up on the cut/paste job below, it wasn't intentional. :) >Please don't post HTML to a text-only newsgroup. Having to cut-and-paste= >manually since Netscrape didn't see anything quotable. >> How do you think? The same way anybody sells anything. Know your >> product, know your customer needs, find the right fit, and the sell it= >> to your customer. It is hard work! > >...and my motivation to do what HP doesn't want done is ... what? You keep insisting you know what HP does an does not want done. Are you t= hen on HP's board or something? (I'm about half serious about that, do yo= u have some inside knowledge?) One of my customers called up HP and they were eager as puppies to put hi= m in touch with a partner to sell him OpenVMS. Yes, they also mentioned t= hey have Windows and Linux and HP-UX on the Itanium box, but who wouldn't= ? He called me to say he liked the idea of being a little special - as in= VMS. And he had a great comfort in it being HP. That's your average joe out there who runs a shoe factory of all things. = >> Gad's man - they already HAVE, or have you not noticed them trying to = >> breath life into through the DSPP? > >Visibility factor again. Open VMS marketing is mentioned all through their web pages. You call the= m you get put through to a sales person quick, you call with a technical = issue, they get you to someone who can answer it almost as quickly. In th= e "real" world, you post a question a many "real world" VMS savvy enginee= rs/programmers/system programmers answer you. No nonsense. >> Well, convince me of that. I sure don't see it historically being used= >> in large shops - only mid-sized shops. > >http://www.cerner.com/ for one. We are a Cerner customer. Our database i= s >approaching 4TB, 5-node cluster of GS1280s, storage is EMC DMX-II. I'm s= ure >others here can testify about their installation's size. I looked breifly at the website, especially thier hosting link, but not s= urprisingly, did not discern many details of their operations. I will men= tion in passing that a 4TB central data store is not very large. Right th= ere in the lower range of medium sized shops. (We are a medium/small size= d shop and have 6 terabytes online. There is an Apple solution that puts = I think 11 terabytes online for $13K or thereabouts. Large data centers tend to occupy entire buildings, and have a lot of sys= tems or system capacity in them. Think it terms of several hundred teraby= tes of data today, and that will expand exponentionally in the next few y= ears. This is actually what I meant; VMS is not present in those size data cent= ers, to the best of my knowledge, and the question of "why" really has no= thing to do with HP. It has to do with whether or not VMS can scale to ha= ndle that kind of load. Here, try this. What VMS system would you configure, with what DASD capab= ility, to have an Online Analytical Data Warehouse of 100 Terabytes of im= mediate storage? The projected growth rate of the warehouse is about 500 = gigabytes per month of sanitized and processed data, driven from a raw in= put of 2.6 terabytes of raw data per month. That's from a real spec by the way, though obviously about 40 pages of it= are missing from the above description. I kinda boiled it down. Now don'= t worry about all the things I left out, just assume whatever you like an= d try to image a VMS configuration. I cannot do it, but that *could* be f= rom unfamiliarity with the hardware/software suites. This is what I mean by VMS being primarily a midrange solution. >> HP primarily wants to sell hardware, and only secondly operating >> systems. HP-UX scales well, but not into the mainframe range. Tandem >> scales into the mainframe range though. Itanium has the capability to = >> do so, I believe. > >Itanic SuperDomes are out there, but lack the CPU horsepower to overcome= >memory >latency issues in large RAM (64GB+) configurations. Intel will tell you different, but who knows what to belive from those fo= lks? >> Know anyone who does not know who HP is? > >Knowing who HP is is not the issue, knowing what they sell is the issue.= Oh! But it IS. Knowing what they sell is OUR job, not the CUSTOMERS. >> Talking to people in the real world of course... most of them think of= >> HP as a very high technology company, and a builder of products that >> "just work." > >So long as those products are not running WhineBloze, yes that's a fair >statement, although even their printer division has made their share of = >firmware >missteps. I admit to a bit of a bias against Windows. It is useful, fun, sometimes = cost competitive, and well supported by vendors like Cisco, IBM, and HP. = So I cannot help but agree with you here. However, there are those that r= ather vigorously disagree with that sentiment. :) >> Good heavens man - they are not insane. > >Available evidence does not support that claim. Only something like 5 or 6 percent (maybe a little more) if HP's total re= venue comes from software. Secondly, HP has a broad penetration into the = consumer market, with something like 40% of their revenue coming frmo con= sumer sales. This makes them a VERY diffrent animal from say, IBM. HP als= o has a revemu stream from business, but it is historically weighted towa= rds the scientific processing side. This is even more so with their inher= itance from DEC. Only a fraction of those business sales are into corpora= te data processing, as in insurance, banking, and so forth. IBM has a hug= e market lead there, not only over HP, but over everyone else too. Of that five or six percent, I do not know how much of the software reven= ue comes from OpenVMS, but I would be surprised indeed it it were more th= an 1%. Their business behavior is quite sensible, given how very different HP's = business model is from IBM or Sun, neither of which has signifigant comsu= mer market penetration. What is *amazing* is how tenanciously HP has supported VMS. That indeed, = means they see value in it, and if the right conditions come to be, then = wham - if OpenVMS can provide 2 to 4 percent of the company revenue- then= you can bet it will get all the support you want. The only way to make that happen is to sell it, and write for it, and put= it in front of customers and then wake up the next day and do it all ove= r again. I'm impressed by VMS - even if trying to get it to do simple things can b= e - complex. For example, talk to a laserjet out a parallel port, and com= press the print so as to print 132 column listings in the right size. Or = better yet, HOW do you tell initialize to make four or five identical dri= ves into a RAID-0 array and write 64mb stripes on each drive? This is idiotically simple in say, Linux or Windows. And painfully diffic= ult to dig out of the manuals. Mostly because the manauals seem to assume= that *everyone* knows how to do that anyway... >> They certainly want 1000 people out here selling products. They don't = >> care if it is OpenVMS or HP-UX- > >Well, actually, yes they do, or they wouldn't be working so hard to rid >themselves of VMS. Appearances can be deceiving - see above rock. >> This is actually the core of my disagreement with you, you know. HP is= >> basically a well run company > >You're joking, right? Nope. Dead serious. They are a well run company, despite the recent nonse= nse that went on. > and deals more with facts than with "wants." .. a paradigm which clearly has no grasp of marketing, customer focus, e= tc. > Can VMS compete in this market? Who knows, I sure don't. >VMS *WAS* competing in that market prior to The Alphacide back in 2001. = Even >unto its premature death without a suitable replacement platform, Alpha = was a >contender, and will be long after the bulk of this group has migrated aw= ay from >it. I just have my experience to draw upon, but I never saw Alpha machines pr= oposed against PowerPC or Mainframes, or even AS/400 machines. Heck, I ne= ver saw em proposed against *windows* machines. And this is in over 300 p= roposals dealth with in the past 28 years. [snipped a lot of stuff I basically tend to agree with here... PR] Port to Intel/PowerPC etc. I just don't know. It is possible that HP woul= d sell VMS to a consortium, or turn it into a "free" OS like Sun has done= to Solaris. I do not see where that would sell more machines though. Wha= t will sell more machines, and thus grab HP's corporate interest is just = that - selling more machines with OpenVMS on 'em. -Paul -- David J Dachtera dba DJE Systems http://www.djesys.com/ Unofficial OpenVMS Marketing Home Page http://www.djesys.com/vms/market/ Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/soho/ Unofficial OpenVMS-IA32 Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/ia32/ Unofficial OpenVMS Hobbyist Support Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/support/ ----=_vm_0011_W5122116998_26069_1183752343 Content-Type: text/html; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

Unfortunately, the message you sent arrived in HTML format, and = to take it to text means I have to do exactly as you did - cut and paste.= Netscape doesn't do HTML or RTF? Let me introduce you to Safari... Anywa= y, if I did screw up on the cut/paste job below, it wasn't intentional. := )

>Please don't post HTML to a text-only newsgroup. Having to = cut-and-paste
>manually since Netscrape didn't see anything quotabl= e.

>> How do you think? The same way anybody sells anything.= Know your
>> product, know your customer needs, find the right= fit, and the sell it
>> to your customer. It is hard work!
= >
>...and my motivation to do what HP doesn't want done is ... w= hat?

You keep insisting you know what HP does an does not want don= e. Are you then on HP's board or something? (I'm about half serious about= that, do you have some inside knowledge?)

One of my customers cal= led up HP and they were eager as puppies to put him in touch with a partn= er to sell him OpenVMS. Yes, they also mentioned they have Windows and Li= nux and HP-UX on the Itanium box, but who wouldn't? He called me to say h= e liked the idea of being a little special - as in VMS. And he had a grea= t comfort in it being HP.

That's your average joe out there who r= uns a shoe factory of all things.


>> Gad's man - they a= lready HAVE, or have you not noticed them trying to
>> breath l= ife into through the DSPP?
>
>Visibility factor again.
Open VMS marketing is mentioned all through their web pages. You call t= hem you get put through to a sales person quick, you call with a technica= l issue, they get you to someone who can answer it almost as quickly. In = the "real" world, you post a question a many "real world" VMS savvy engin= eers/programmers/system programmers answer you. No nonsense.


= >> Well, convince me of that. I sure don't see it historically bein= g used
>> in large shops - only mid-sized shops.
>
>= ;http://www.cerner.com/ for one. We are a Cerner customer. Our database i= s
>approaching 4TB, 5-node cluster of GS1280s, storage is EMC DMX-I= I. I'm sure
>others here can testify about their installation's siz= e.

I looked breifly at the website, especially thier hosting link,= but not surprisingly, did not discern many details of their operations. = I will mention in passing that a 4TB central data store is not very large= Right there in the lower range of medium sized shops. (We are a medium/= small sized shop and have 6 terabytes online. There is an Apple solution = that puts I think 11 terabytes online for $13K or thereabouts.

La= rge data centers tend to occupy entire buildings, and have a lot of syste= ms or system capacity in them. Think it terms of several hundred terabyte= s of data today, and that will expand exponentionally in the next few yea= rs.

This is actually what I meant; VMS is not present in those si= ze data centers, to the best of my knowledge, and the question of "why" r= eally has nothing to do with HP. It has to do with whether or not VMS can= scale to handle that kind of load.

Here, try this. What VMS syst= em would you configure, with what DASD capability, to have an Online Anal= ytical Data Warehouse of 100 Terabytes of immediate storage? The projecte= d growth rate of the warehouse is about 500 gigabytes per month of saniti= zed and processed data, driven from a raw input of 2.6 terabytes of raw d= ata per month.

That's from a real spec by the way, though obvious= ly about 40 pages of it are missing from the above description. I kinda b= oiled it down. Now don't worry about all the things I left out, just assu= me whatever you like and try to image a VMS configuration. I cannot do it= , but that *could* be from unfamiliarity with the hardware/software suite= s.

This is what I mean by VMS being primarily a midrange solution=

>> HP primarily wants to sell hardware, and only secondly= operating
>> systems. HP-UX scales well, but not into the main= frame range. Tandem
>> scales into the mainframe range though. = Itanium has the capability to
>> do so, I believe.
>
&= gt;Itanic SuperDomes are out there, but lack the CPU horsepower to overco= me >memory
>latency issues in large RAM (64GB+) configurations.<= BR>
Intel will tell you different, but who knows what to belive from t= hose folks?


>> Know anyone who does not know who HP is?<= BR>>
>Knowing who HP is is not the issue, knowing what they sell= is the issue.

Oh! But it IS. Knowing what they sell is OUR job, n= ot the CUSTOMERS.

>> Talking to people in the real world of= course... most of them think of
>> HP as a very high technolog= y company, and a builder of products that
>> "just work."
&= gt;
>So long as those products are not running WhineBloze, yes that= 's a fair
>statement, although even their printer division has made= their share of >firmware
>missteps.

I admit to a bit of = a bias against Windows. It is useful, fun, sometimes cost competitive, an= d well supported by vendors like Cisco, IBM, and HP. So I cannot help but= agree with you here. However, there are those that rather vigorously dis= agree with that sentiment. :)


>> Good heavens man - the= y are not insane.
>
>Available evidence does not support that= claim.

Only something like 5 or 6 percent (maybe a little more) i= f HP's total revenue comes from software. Secondly, HP has a broad penetr= ation into the consumer market, with something like 40% of their revenue = coming frmo consumer sales. This makes them a VERY diffrent animal from s= ay, IBM.  HP also has a revemu stream from business, but it is histo= rically weighted towards the scientific processing side. This is even mor= e so with their inheritance from DEC. Only a fraction of those business s= ales are into corporate data processing, as in insurance, banking, and so= forth. IBM has a huge market lead there, not only over HP, but over ever= yone else too.

Of that five or six percent, I do not know how much of the software re= venue comes from OpenVMS, but I would be surprised indeed it it were more= than 1%.

Their business behavior is quite sensible, given how very different HP= 's business model is from IBM or Sun, neither of which has signifigant co= msumer market penetration.

What is *amazing* is how tenanciously HP has supported VMS. That indee= d, means they see value in it, and if the right conditions come to be, th= en wham - if OpenVMS can provide 2 to 4 percent of the company revenue- t= hen you can bet it will get all the support you want.

The only way to make that happen is to sell it, and write for it, and = put it in front of customers and then wake up the next day and do it all = over again.

I'm impressed by VMS - even if trying to get it to do simple things ca= n be - complex. For example, talk to a laserjet out a parallel port, and = compress the print so as to print 132 column listings in the right size. = Or better yet, HOW do you tell initialize to make four or five identical = drives into a RAID-0 array and write 64mb stripes on each drive? 

This is idiotically simple in say, Linux or Windows. And painfully dif= ficult to dig out of the manuals. Mostly because the manauals seem to ass= ume that *everyone* knows how to do that anyway... <grin>


>> They certainly want 1000 people out here selling products= They don't
>> care if it is OpenVMS or HP-UX-
>
>= Well, actually, yes they do, or they wouldn't be working so hard to rid>themselves of VMS.

Appearances can be deceiving - see above rock.


>> This is actually the core of my disagreement with you, yo= u know. HP is
>> basically a well run company
>
>Yo= u're joking, right?

Nope. Dead serious. They are a well run company, despite the recent no= nsense that went on.


> and deals more with facts than with "wants."

... a par= adigm which clearly has no grasp of marketing, customer focus, etc.

> Can VMS compete in this market? Who knows, I sure don't.
>VMS *WAS* competing in that market prior to The Alphacide back in 2= 001. Even
>unto its premature death without a suitable replacement = platform, Alpha was a
>contender, and will be long after the bulk o= f this group has migrated away from
>it.

I just have my experience to draw upon, but I never saw Alpha machines= proposed against PowerPC or Mainframes, or even AS/400 machines. Heck, I= never saw em proposed against *windows* machines. And this is in over 30= 0 proposals dealth with in the past 28 years.
[snipped a lot of stuff= I basically tend to agree with here... PR]

Port to Intel/PowerPC etc. I just don't know. It is possible that HP w= ould sell VMS to a consortium, or turn it into a "free" OS like Sun has d= one to Solaris. I do not see where that would sell more machines though. = What will sell more machines, and thus grab HP's corporate interest is ju= st that - selling more machines with OpenVMS on 'em.

-Paul


--
David J Dachtera
dba DJE Systems
http://www.djesys.co= m/

Unofficial OpenVMS Marketing Home Page
http://www.djesys.com= /vms/market/

Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page:
http://ww= w.djesys.com/vms/soho/

Unofficial OpenVMS-IA32 Home Page:
http:= //www.djesys.com/vms/ia32/

Unofficial OpenVMS Hobbyist Support Pag= e:
http://www.djesys.com/vms/support/

----=_vm_0011_W5122116998_26069_1183752343-- ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:29:37 +0000 From: "Paul Raulerson" Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: ----=_vm_0011_W5369831033_19600_1183753777 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="--=_vm_0016_W5369831033_19600_1183753777" ----=_vm_0016_W5369831033_19600_1183753777 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Gads ... I *can* spell, but typing is beyond me. I will try to spell chec= k messages better in the future. I must admit, I get far more interesting= in the comversations, and what people are saying, that in checking my ty= ping is not chock full of stupid typos. Apologies... -Paul ----=_vm_0016_W5369831033_19600_1183753777 Content-Type: text/html; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

Gads ... I *can* spell, but typing is beyond me. I will try to s= pell check messages better in the future. I must admit, I get far more in= teresting in the comversations, and what people are saying, that in check= ing my typing is not chock full of stupid typos. Apologies...

-Paul

 

----=_vm_0016_W5369831033_19600_1183753777-- ----=_vm_0011_W5369831033_19600_1183753777-- ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 16:49:11 -0500 From: Ron Johnson Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: On 07/06/07 15:05, Paul Raulerson wrote: > Unfortunately, the message you sent arrived in HTML format, and to take > it to text means I have to do exactly as you did - cut and paste. > Netscape doesn't do HTML or RTF? Let me introduce you to Safari... > Anyway, if I did screw up on the cut/paste job below, it wasn't > intentional. :) And this email that you sent was also HTML. (Netscape has been doing HTML mail since at least v2.) [snip] > > I'm impressed by VMS - even if trying to get it to do simple things can > be - complex. For example, talk to a laserjet out a parallel port, and > compress the print so as to print 132 column listings in the right size. Do Alphas and VAXes (much less Itaniacs) even *have* parallel ports? We plugged our laser printers into LAT servers. > Or better yet, HOW do you tell initialize to make four or five identical > drives into a RAID-0 array and write 64mb stripes on each drive? Easy: MOUNT/BIND. VMS has had it since at least 1989, and probably earlier. > This is idiotically simple in say, Linux or Windows. And painfully > difficult to dig out of the manuals. Mostly because the manauals seem to > assume that *everyone* knows how to do that anyway... $ HELP MOUNT/BIND -- Ron Johnson, Jr. Jefferson LA USA Give a man a fish, and he eats for a day. Hit him with a fish, and he goes away for good! ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 22:39:06 +0000 From: "Paul Raulerson" Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: ----=_vm_0011_W615054879_20935_1183761546 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable >[snip] >> >> I'm impressed by VMS - even if trying to get it to do simple things ca= n >> be - complex. For example, talk to a laserjet out a parallel port, and= >> compress the print so as to print 132 column listings in the right siz= e. > >Do Alphas and VAXes (much less Itaniacs) even *have* parallel ports? >We plugged our laser printers into LAT servers. Ah yep.. and if not, there are always USB converters. I did not have a Je= tDirect to spare, and in truth, there are some places where a good old fa= shioned parallel (or at least USB) connection work really well. Fast, lit= tle or no configuration, and easy to replace. :) >> Or better yet, HOW do you tell initialize to make four or five identic= al >> drives into a RAID-0 array and write 64mb stripes on each drive? > >Easy: MOUNT/BIND. > >VMS has had it since at least 1989, and probably earlier. MMM- this is about as intuitive as ICKDSF... initialize a small raid arra= y with MOUNT... makes perfect sense to someone! >> This is idiotically simple in say, Linux or Windows. And painfully >> difficult to dig out of the manuals. Mostly because the manauals seem = to >> assume that *everyone* knows how to do that anyway... > >$ HELP MOUNT/BIND Is there more detailed information in one of the manuals (System Utilitie= s?) that describes how to manipulate the volume to detail stripping? -Paul -- Ron Johnson, Jr. Jefferson LA USA Give a man a fish, and he eats for a day. Hit him with a fish, and he goes away for good! ----=_vm_0011_W615054879_20935_1183761546-- ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 18:45:12 -0400 From: "Richard B. Gilbert" Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468EC5F8.7040206@comcast.net> Ron Johnson wrote: > On 07/06/07 15:05, Paul Raulerson wrote: > >> Unfortunately, the message you sent arrived in HTML format, and to >> take it to text means I have to do exactly as you did - cut and paste. >> Netscape doesn't do HTML or RTF? Let me introduce you to Safari... >> Anyway, if I did screw up on the cut/paste job below, it wasn't >> intentional. :) > > > And this email that you sent was also HTML. (Netscape has been doing > HTML mail since at least v2.) > > [snip] > >> >> I'm impressed by VMS - even if trying to get it to do simple things >> can be - complex. For example, talk to a laserjet out a parallel port, >> and compress the print so as to print 132 column listings in the right >> size. > > > Do Alphas and VAXes (much less Itaniacs) even *have* parallel ports? We > plugged our laser printers into LAT servers. > Well, my Alphastation 200 has a parallel port, LRA0, but no device driver was ever written for it AFAIK. It's one of those things like the VAXstation 4000 (I forget the model: 60?, 90?, 90A?) that had ISDN built in to the hardware but again no driver. It has not been an issue since I installed a JetDirect card in my HP LaserJet. VAXen had parallel ports; the DMF32, for example, had a parallel port that could be used to connect a printer. I wouldn't know about the Itanic, I wouldn't have one in the house! ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 19:13:27 -0400 From: "Main, Kerry" Subject: RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: Rm9ybWF0dGluZyBnb3QgdG90YWxseSBtZXNzZWQgdXAgaW4geW91ciByZXBseSwgc28gSSBkaWQg bWFqb3Igc25pcCAuLi4NCisrKysNCg0KRnJvbTogUGF1bCBSYXVsZXJzb24gW21haWx0bzpwYXVs QHJhdWxlcnNvbnMuY29tXSANClNlbnQ6IEp1bHkgNiwgMjAwNyA0OjA2IFBNDQpUbzogSW5mby1W QVhATXZiLlNhaWMuQ29tDQpTdWJqZWN0OiBSZTogSXMgVk1TIGxvc2luZyB0aGUgRmluYW5jaWFs IFNlY3RvciwgYWxzbz8NCg0KSSBsb29rZWQgYnJlaWZseSBhdCB0aGUgd2Vic2l0ZSwgZXNwZWNp YWxseSB0aGllciBob3N0aW5nIGxpbmssIGJ1dCBub3Qgc3VycHJpc2luZ2x5LCBkaWQgbm90IGRp c2Nlcm4gbWFueSBkZXRhaWxzIG9mIHRoZWlyIG9wZXJhdGlvbnMuIEkgd2lsbCBtZW50aW9uIGlu IHBhc3NpbmcgdGhhdCBhIDRUQiBjZW50cmFsIGRhdGEgc3RvcmUgaXMgbm90IHZlcnkgbGFyZ2Ug UmlnaHQgdGhlcmUgaW4gdGhlIGxvd2VyIHJhbmdlIG9mIG1lZGl1bSBzaXplZCBzaG9wcy4gKFdl IGFyZSBhIG1lZGl1bS9zbWFsbCBzaXplZCBzaG9wIGFuZCBoYXZlIDYgdGVyYWJ5dGVzIG9ubGlu ZS4gVGhlcmUgaXMgYW4gQXBwbGUgc29sdXRpb24gdGhhdCBwdXRzIEkgdGhpbmsgMTEgdGVyYWJ5 dGVzIG9ubGluZSBmb3IgJDEzSyBvciB0aGVyZWFib3V0cy4gDQoNCkxhcmdlIGRhdGEgY2VudGVy cyB0ZW5kIHRvIG9jY3VweSBlbnRpcmUgYnVpbGRpbmdzLCBhbmQgaGF2ZSBhIGxvdCBvZiBzeXN0 ZW1zIG9yIHN5c3RlbSBjYXBhY2l0eSBpbiB0aGVtLiBUaGluayBpdCB0ZXJtcyBvZiBzZXZlcmFs IGh1bmRyZWQgdGVyYWJ5dGVzIG9mIGRhdGEgdG9kYXksIGFuZCB0aGF0IHdpbGwgZXhwYW5kIGV4 cG9uZW50aW9uYWxseSBpbiB0aGUgbmV4dCBmZXcgeWVhcnMuIA0KDQpUaGlzIGlzIGFjdHVhbGx5 IHdoYXQgSSBtZWFudDsgVk1TIGlzIG5vdCBwcmVzZW50IGluIHRob3NlIHNpemUgZGF0YSBjZW50 ZXJzLCB0byB0aGUgYmVzdCBvZiBteSBrbm93bGVkZ2UsIGFuZCB0aGUgcXVlc3Rpb24gb2YgIndo eSIgcmVhbGx5IGhhcyBub3RoaW5nIHRvIGRvIHdpdGggSFAuIEl0IGhhcyB0byBkbyB3aXRoIHdo ZXRoZXIgb3Igbm90IFZNUyBjYW4gc2NhbGUgdG8gaGFuZGxlIHRoYXQga2luZCBvZiBsb2FkLiAN Cg0KSGVyZSwgdHJ5IHRoaXMuIFdoYXQgVk1TIHN5c3RlbSB3b3VsZCB5b3UgY29uZmlndXJlLCB3 aXRoIHdoYXQgREFTRCBjYXBhYmlsaXR5LCB0byBoYXZlIGFuIE9ubGluZSBBbmFseXRpY2FsIERh dGEgV2FyZWhvdXNlIG9mIDEwMCBUZXJhYnl0ZXMgb2YgaW1tZWRpYXRlIHN0b3JhZ2U/IFRoZSBw cm9qZWN0ZWQgZ3Jvd3RoIHJhdGUgb2YgdGhlIHdhcmVob3VzZSBpcyBhYm91dCA1MDAgZ2lnYWJ5 dGVzIHBlciBtb250aCBvZiBzYW5pdGl6ZWQgYW5kIHByb2Nlc3NlZCBkYXRhLCBkcml2ZW4gZnJv bSBhIHJhdyBpbnB1dCBvZiAyLjYgdGVyYWJ5dGVzIG9mIHJhdyBkYXRhIHBlciBtb250aC4gDQoN ClRoYXQncyBmcm9tIGEgcmVhbCBzcGVjIGJ5IHRoZSB3YXksIHRob3VnaCBvYnZpb3VzbHkgYWJv dXQgNDAgcGFnZXMgb2YgaXQgYXJlIG1pc3NpbmcgZnJvbSB0aGUgYWJvdmUgZGVzY3JpcHRpb24u IEkga2luZGEgYm9pbGVkIGl0IGRvd24uIE5vdyBkb24ndCB3b3JyeSBhYm91dCBhbGwgdGhlIHRo aW5ncyBJIGxlZnQgb3V0LCBqdXN0IGFzc3VtZSB3aGF0ZXZlciB5b3UgbGlrZSBhbmQgdHJ5IHRv IGltYWdlIGEgVk1TIGNvbmZpZ3VyYXRpb24uIEkgY2Fubm90IGRvIGl0LCBidXQgdGhhdCAqY291 bGQqIGJlIGZyb20gdW5mYW1pbGlhcml0eSB3aXRoIHRoZSBoYXJkd2FyZS9zb2Z0d2FyZSBzdWl0 ZXMuIA0KDQpUaGlzIGlzIHdoYXQgSSBtZWFuIGJ5IFZNUyBiZWluZyBwcmltYXJpbHkgYSBtaWRy YW5nZSBzb2x1dGlvbiANCisrKysNCg0KUGF1bCwgdGhlcmUgYXJlIGV4aXN0aW5nIE9wZW5WTVMg c29sdXRpb25zIHRoYXQgaGF2ZSBQQiBvZiBzdG9yYWdlLiBUeXBpY2FsbHkgdXNlZCBpbiBhY3Rp dmUtYWN0aXZlIGNsdXN0ZXIgZW52aXJvbm1lbnRzIG9mIGxhcmdlIEdTMTI4MCBBbHBoYSAoYW5k IG1vcmUgcmVjZW50bHkpIFN1cGVyZG9tZSB0eXBlIGNvbmZpZ3VyYXRpb25zLiANCg0KTWFueSBz dG9jayBleGNoYW5nZXMsIGJhbmtzLCBUZWxlY29tbXVuaWNhdGlvbiAoY2FsbCBoYW5kbGluZyBs aWtlIHJlY2VudCBBbWVyaWNhbiBJZG9sIGV2ZW50cyksIG1hbnVmYWN0dXJpbmcgKHRoaW5rIDQg b3IgNSBvZiB0b3AgNiBjaGlwIG1hbnVmYWN0dXJpbmcpLCBpbnN1cmFuY2UgY29tcGFuaWVzIGV0 YyBydW4gdGhlaXIgbW9zdCBjcml0aWNhbCBhcHBsaWNhdGlvbnMgb24gT3BlblZNUyBhbmQgdGhl eSBoYXZlIHZlcnkgSU8gaW50ZW5zaXZlIGFuZCBoaWdoIGRhdGEgZ3Jvd3RoIHJlcXVpcmVtZW50 cy4gDQoNClNvLCBJIHdvdWxkIHNheSB0aGVzZSBhcmUgbXVjaCBtb3JlIHRoYW4gbWlkIHJhbmdl IGVudmlyb25tZW50cy4NCg0KOi0pDQoNClJlZ2FyZHMNCg0KDQpLZXJyeSBNYWluDQpTZW5pb3Ig Q29uc3VsdGFudA0KSFAgU2VydmljZXMgQ2FuYWRhDQpWb2ljZTogNjEzLTU5Mi00NjYwDQpGYXg6 IDYxMy01OTEtNDQ3Nw0Ka2VycnlET1RtYWluQVRocERPVGNvbQ0KKHJlbW92ZSB0aGUgRE9UJ3Mg YW5kIEFUKSANCg0KT3BlblZNUyAtIHRoZSBzZWN1cmUsIG11bHRpLXNpdGUgT1MgdGhhdCBqdXN0 IHdvcmtzLg0KDQoNCg0KDQoNCg== ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 07 Jul 2007 01:01:06 +0200 From: "P. Sture" Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: In article , Ron Johnson wrote: > On 07/06/07 15:05, Paul Raulerson wrote: [snip] > > > > I'm impressed by VMS - even if trying to get it to do simple things can > > be - complex. For example, talk to a laserjet out a parallel port, and > > compress the print so as to print 132 column listings in the right size. > > Do Alphas and VAXes (much less Itaniacs) even *have* parallel ports? > We plugged our laser printers into LAT servers. > The Alpha PWS models have an parallel port. However, parallel ports aren't supported by DCPS, which is what you really want to use (DCPS used to be separately licensable; for several years it's included in the VMS base license). > > Or better yet, HOW do you tell initialize to make four or five identical > > drives into a RAID-0 array and write 64mb stripes on each drive? > > Easy: MOUNT/BIND. > > VMS has had it since at least 1989, and probably earlier. > VAX/VMS Version V3.0 26-APR-1982 16:21 ... $ help mount/bind MOUNT /BIND /BIND=volume-set-name Creates a volume set of one or more disk volumes or adds one or more volumes to an existing volume set. The volume-set-name specifies a 1- through 12-alphanumeric character name. When you create a volume set, the volumes specified in the volume-label list are assigned relative volume numbers based on their position in the label list. The first volume specified becomes the root volume of the set. > > This is idiotically simple in say, Linux or Windows. And painfully > > difficult to dig out of the manuals. Mostly because the manauals seem to > > assume that *everyone* knows how to do that anyway... > > $ HELP MOUNT/BIND -- Paul Sture ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:49:33 -0400 From: JF Mezei Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: David J Dachtera wrote: > I replied to JF privately. > I can confirm receiving a private reply to my question. Out of curiosity though, what determines the computing capacity needed for a hospital ? I take it no hospital is large enough to have "transactions per second" in the X-ray department ? Nor would they have stadium style turnstyles at the admissions office processing patients per second ? Now do they measure surgeries in "surgeries per second"... Or is this really a question of having many many smaller "applications" (from admissions to medication inventories), none of which require great amounts of CPU horsepower, but when put together they do ? ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:56:28 -0400 From: JF Mezei Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <4d894$468ed6dd$cef8887a$14999@TEKSAVVY.COM> Main, Kerry wrote: > Formatting got totally messed up in your reply, so I did major snip ... And your major snip would have been totally, absolutely unreadable to many here, except for those who have a rare gift of being to do base64 decoding in their heads. Really, base64 encoding is not for text/plain. Don't know why your news/email client would insist in this. BUt Mr Main, if I were you, I would find some software that is standards-abiding for internet. > From: "Main, Kerry" > Newsgroups: comp.os.vms > Subject: RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? > Message-ID: > Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 19:13:27 -0400 > Organization: Info-VAX<==>comp.os.vms Gateway > X-Gateway-Source-Info: Mailing List > Lines: 48 > Content-Class: urn:content-classes:message > Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64 > Content-Type: text/plain; > charset="utf-8" > Mime-Version: 1.0 > Path: beE1!out04a.usenetserver.com!news.usenetserver.com!in01.usenetserver.com!news.usenetserver.com!in03.usenetserver.com!news.usenetserver.com!wn13feed!worldnet.att.net!204.71.34.3!newsfeed.cwix.com!mvb.saic.com!info-vax > Xref: usenetserver.com comp.os.vms:441739 > X-Received-Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:15:17 EDT (beE1) > > Rm9ybWF0dGluZyBnb3QgdG90YWxseSBtZXNzZWQgdXAgaW4geW91ciByZXBseSwgc28gSSBkaWQg > bWFqb3Igc25pcCAuLi4NCisrKysNCg0KRnJvbTogUGF1bCBSYXVsZXJzb24gW21haWx0bzpwYXVs > QHJhdWxlcnNvbnMuY29tXSANClNlbnQ6IEp1bHkgNiwgMjAwNyA0OjA2IFBNDQpUbzogSW5mby1W > QVhATXZiLlNhaWMuQ29tDQpTdWJqZWN0OiBSZTogSXMgVk1TIGxvc2luZyB0aGUgRmluYW5jaWFs > IFNlY3RvciwgYWxzbz8NCg0KSSBsb29rZWQgYnJlaWZseSBhdCB0aGUgd2Vic2l0ZSwgZXNwZWNp > YWxseSB0aGllciBob3N0aW5nIGxpbmssIGJ1dCBub3Qgc3VycHJpc2luZ2x5LCBkaWQgbm90IGRp > c2Nlcm4gbWFueSBkZXRhaWxzIG9mIHRoZWlyIG9wZXJhdGlvbnMuIEkgd2lsbCBtZW50aW9uIGlu > IHBhc3NpbmcgdGhhdCBhIDRUQiBjZW50cmFsIGRhdGEgc3RvcmUgaXMgbm90IHZlcnkgbGFyZ2Ug ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 20:41:08 -0400 From: "Main, Kerry" Subject: RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: JF Mezei [mailto:jfmezei.spamnot@vaxination.ca] > Sent: July 6, 2007 7:56 PM > To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com > Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? >=20 > Main, Kerry wrote: > > Formatting got totally messed up in your reply, so I did major > snip ... >=20 > And your major snip would have been totally, absolutely unreadable > to > many here, except for those who have a rare gift of being to do > base64 > decoding in their heads. >=20 > Really, base64 encoding is not for text/plain. Don't know why your > news/email client would insist in this. BUt Mr Main, if I were you, > I > would find some software that is standards-abiding for internet. >=20 >=20 JF, Not sure what is wrong with your client or my client, but others have reported being able to read my responses with no issues. Wrapping included. The Outback 2007 client I use says Internet plain text format. What client do you use? Regards Kerry Main Senior Consultant HP Services Canada Voice: 613-592-4660 Fax: 613-591-4477 kerryDOTmainAThpDOTcom (remove the DOT's and AT)=20 OpenVMS - the secure, multi-site OS that just works. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:44:37 -0400 From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Arne_Vajh=F8j?= Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468ee1ed$0$90263$14726298@news.sunsite.dk> Main, Kerry wrote: >> The patch problem is not really a problem. So do not expect that to >> have any effect. > > You are looking at this from a developer who wants to believe this > perspective - not from a reality Operations view. No I am looking at reality. The number of Linux systems in production are growing fast. >> And as I have already asked in another thread without getting an >> answer: how many of those 50-60% uses security holes in software ? > > As I mentioned in another thread, disgruntled employees using known > passwords is only one small part of the problem. [Course, the > password issues are worse on platforms that have all or user type > environments, but that is another discussion.] Feel free to imagine that the majority of internal fraud is done utilizing buffer overflow sin this and that app. But there is a reality out here. Arne ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:48:16 -0400 From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Arne_Vajh=F8j?= Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468ee2c8$0$90271$14726298@news.sunsite.dk> Main, Kerry wrote: >> There are nothing preventing them from doing the same thing on >> Linux. > > Because having servers running in peak time with only 5-15% peak > utilization is not only embarrassing, but financially unjustifiable. > Same issue with Windows and why VMware is so hot these days. > > But like VMware, Xen only addresses HW consolidation - not OS > consolidation. Yes, it does have some benefits in terms of HW (power, > cooling, space etc) savings. However, OS maintenance (managing, > patching, licensing, upgrading) is where the big cost savings are as > this directly relates to FTE staffing counts - by far the biggest > slice of any IT budget. OS maintenance big savings ???? In small departmental wintel file and print servers maybe. Not in the data centers. Automated. And not that many systems gets patched anyway. Arne ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:49:56 -0500 From: David J Dachtera Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468EE334.9F164A55@spam.comcast.net> JF Mezei wrote: > > David J Dachtera wrote: > > I replied to JF privately. > > > > I can confirm receiving a private reply to my question. > > Out of curiosity though, what determines the computing capacity needed > for a hospital ? > > I take it no hospital is large enough to have "transactions per second" > in the X-ray department ? Nor would they have stadium style turnstyles > at the admissions office processing patients per second ? > > Now do they measure surgeries in "surgeries per second"... > > Or is this really a question of having many many smaller "applications" > (from admissions to medication inventories), none of which require great > amounts of CPU horsepower, but when put together they do ? Mostly, it comes from experience, unfortunately. There are some rough benchmarks that can be applied based on transaction counts and the data volume of those transactions. The rest, however, is largely a matter of measuring and monitoring. I'll refrain from commenting on the quality of ISV code, as this is a well known issue internally; however, that also figures into the process. Maybe I can get permission to post some T4 graphs on my freeware site to show how the Alphas are currently doing - no promises. -- David J Dachtera dba DJE Systems http://www.djesys.com/ Unofficial OpenVMS Marketing Home Page http://www.djesys.com/vms/market/ Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/soho/ Unofficial OpenVMS-IA32 Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/ia32/ Unofficial OpenVMS Hobbyist Support Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/support/ ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 07 Jul 2007 00:54:34 GMT From: "John Vottero" Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: "Ron Johnson" wrote in message news:sNyji.1747$JR6.878@newsfe18.lga... > On 07/06/07 15:05, Paul Raulerson wrote: >> Unfortunately, the message you sent arrived in HTML format, and to take >> it to text means I have to do exactly as you did - cut and paste. >> Netscape doesn't do HTML or RTF? Let me introduce you to Safari... >> Anyway, if I did screw up on the cut/paste job below, it wasn't >> intentional. :) > > And this email that you sent was also HTML. (Netscape has been doing HTML > mail since at least v2.) > > [snip] >> >> I'm impressed by VMS - even if trying to get it to do simple things can >> be - complex. For example, talk to a laserjet out a parallel port, and >> compress the print so as to print 132 column listings in the right size. > > Do Alphas and VAXes (much less Itaniacs) even *have* parallel ports? We > plugged our laser printers into LAT servers. > >> Or better yet, HOW do you tell initialize to make four or five identical >> drives into a RAID-0 array and write 64mb stripes on each drive? > > Easy: MOUNT/BIND. > > VMS has had it since at least 1989, and probably earlier. > MOUNT/BIND creates a bound volume set which is NOT the same as RAID0. Creating a RAID0 array from two disks will give you a volume with twice the space and roughly twice the transfer rate of a single disk. A bound volume set will give you twice the space but very little (if any) performance improvement. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 21:06:16 -0400 From: "Richard B. Gilbert" Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468EE708.8080904@comcast.net> JF Mezei wrote: > David J Dachtera wrote: > >> I replied to JF privately. >> > > I can confirm receiving a private reply to my question. > > Out of curiosity though, what determines the computing capacity needed > for a hospital ? > > I take it no hospital is large enough to have "transactions per second" > in the X-ray department ? Nor would they have stadium style turnstyles > at the admissions office processing patients per second ? > > Now do they measure surgeries in "surgeries per second"... > > Or is this really a question of having many many smaller "applications" > (from admissions to medication inventories), none of which require great > amounts of CPU horsepower, but when put together they do ? I think it's mostly medical and business records and the two might not go on the same computer. The billing department needs to know that you had an X-ray but not the radiologist's findings. The medical staff needs access to the patient's medical history and records but is not concerned with how much the patient is charged for each medication or procedure. A hospital system might have anywhere from several dozen to several hundred simultaneous users. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 21:17:31 -0400 From: "Richard B. Gilbert" Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468EE9AB.9000200@comcast.net> John Vottero wrote: > "Ron Johnson" wrote in message > news:sNyji.1747$JR6.878@newsfe18.lga... > >> On 07/06/07 15:05, Paul Raulerson wrote: >> >>> Unfortunately, the message you sent arrived in HTML format, and to >>> take it to text means I have to do exactly as you did - cut and >>> paste. Netscape doesn't do HTML or RTF? Let me introduce you to >>> Safari... Anyway, if I did screw up on the cut/paste job below, it >>> wasn't intentional. :) >> >> >> And this email that you sent was also HTML. (Netscape has been doing >> HTML mail since at least v2.) >> >> [snip] >> >>> >>> I'm impressed by VMS - even if trying to get it to do simple things >>> can be - complex. For example, talk to a laserjet out a parallel >>> port, and compress the print so as to print 132 column listings in >>> the right size. >> >> >> Do Alphas and VAXes (much less Itaniacs) even *have* parallel ports? >> We plugged our laser printers into LAT servers. >> >>> Or better yet, HOW do you tell initialize to make four or five >>> identical drives into a RAID-0 array and write 64mb stripes on each >>> drive? >> >> >> Easy: MOUNT/BIND. >> >> VMS has had it since at least 1989, and probably earlier. >> > > MOUNT/BIND creates a bound volume set which is NOT the same as RAID0. > Creating a RAID0 array from two disks will give you a volume with twice > the space and roughly twice the transfer rate of a single disk. A bound > volume set will give you twice the space but very little (if any) > performance improvement. > $ MOUNT /BIND does create RAID sets. It needs more qualifiers; e.g. $ MOUNT /BIND DSA123 /SHADOW=(......) ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:29:33 -0500 From: David J Dachtera Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468EEC7D.C45EBF93@spam.comcast.net> Paul Raulerson wrote: > > Unfortunately, the message you sent arrived in HTML format, Not possible. Netscrape won't send HTML unless configured to do so. This one is configured for plain text only, even when replying to HTML or "quoted printable" (hint: turn off MIME). and to take it to > text means I have to do exactly as you did - cut and paste. Netscape doesn't > do HTML or RTF? Let me introduce you to Safari... Make sure it's not configured to change the format of an incoming message the way LookOut! can. > Anyway, if I did screw up on > the cut/paste job below, it wasn't intentional. :) > > >Please don't post HTML to a text-only newsgroup. Having to cut-and-paste > >manually since Netscrape didn't see anything quotable. > > >> How do you think? The same way anybody sells anything. Know your > >> product, know your customer needs, find the right fit, and the sell it > >> to your customer. It is hard work! > > > >...and my motivation to do what HP doesn't want done is ... what? > > You keep insisting you know what HP does an does not want done. Are you then > on HP's board or something? No; however, I'm neither blind nor stupid, either. > (I'm about half serious about that, do you have > some inside knowledge?) Even if I did, I couldn't breach those confidences. > One of my customers called up HP and they were eager as puppies to put him in > touch with a partner to sell him OpenVMS. Please attempt to recreate this most exceptional experience so we can tell others how to do it and make the exception become the rule rather than the other way around. > Yes, they also mentioned they have > Windows and Linux and HP-UX on the Itanium box, but who wouldn't? He called me > to say he liked the idea of being a little special - as in VMS. And he had a > great comfort in it being HP. The reason why would be fodder for a multi-prong success story. Please correspond with Sue Skonetski. > That's your average joe out there who runs a shoe factory of all things. Hhmmm... An "average joe" running a shoe factory. The word "paradox" comes to mind. Still, maybe HP needs a few "average joe"s to help them get back in touch with their customer base. > >> Gad's man - they already HAVE, or have you not noticed them trying to > >> breath life into through the DSPP? > > > >Visibility factor again. > > Open VMS marketing is mentioned all through their web pages. You call them you > get put through to a sales person quick, you call with a technical issue, they > get you to someone who can answer it almost as quickly. In the "real" world, > you post a question a many "real world" VMS savvy engineers/programmers/system > programmers answer you. No nonsense. This is on this planet, right? ...within the last 6 months, right? Starting to sound "too good to be true - probably isn't". > >> Well, convince me of that. I sure don't see it historically being used > >> in large shops - only mid-sized shops. > > > >http://www.cerner.com/ for one. We are a Cerner customer. Our database is > >approaching 4TB, 5-node cluster of GS1280s, storage is EMC DMX-II. I'm sure > >others here can testify about their installation's size. > > I looked breifly at the website, especially thier hosting link, but not > surprisingly, did not discern many details of their operations. I will mention > in passing that a 4TB central data store is not very large Right there in the > lower range of medium sized shops. (We are a medium/small sized shop and have > 6 terabytes online. There is an Apple solution that puts I think 11 terabytes > online for $13K or thereabouts. We actually have over 54TB of storage on-line in the DMX-II, before mirroring and tactics for redundancy and protection. We are one of Cerner's three largest sites, at last tally, though I believe that status is in flux as various other healthcare concerns undergo consolidation. > Large data centers tend to occupy entire buildings, I'd clasify that as a "mega" datacenter, far more the expcetion than the rule among "large" sites. Multi-tier likewise tends to reduce the size of individual clusters in the various tiers. ...and yes, there are those here who - even today - run VMS clusters on that scale, and have done so for many years. > and have a lot of systems > or system capacity in them. Think it terms of several hundred terabytes of > data today, and that will expand exponentionally in the next few years. Rough guess time: we probably have upwards of 450TB of storage total between all of our DAS and SAN storage (raw capacity, before redundancy), estimating to reach the petabyte boundary within two more fiscal years. > This is actually what I meant; VMS is not present in those size data centers, > to the best of my knowledge, Well, actually it is. > and the question of "why" really has nothing to > do with HP. It has to do with whether or not VMS can scale to handle that kind > of load. It can and it does. > Here, try this. What VMS system would you configure, with what DASD > capability, to have an Online Analytical Data Warehouse of 100 Terabytes of > immediate storage? The projected growth rate of the warehouse is about 500 > gigabytes per month of sanitized and processed data, driven from a raw input > of 2.6 terabytes of raw data per month. Depends on the levels of redunancy desired, the compute power required to run the application with acceptable performance and many, many other factors. > [snip] > This is what I mean by VMS being primarily a midrange solution It isn't. Hasn't been since the dawn of the big Alpha machines. > >> HP primarily wants to sell hardware, and only secondly operating > >> systems. HP-UX scales well, but not into the mainframe range. Tandem > >> scales into the mainframe range though. Itanium has the capability to > >> do so, I believe. > > > >Itanic SuperDomes are out there, but lack the CPU horsepower to overcome > >memory > >latency issues in large RAM (64GB+) configurations. > > Intel will tell you different, but who knows what to belive from those folks? How would Intel know? Does Intel design/build/sell machines on the scale of 32-core, 500GB-1TB I64 SuperDomes? > >> Know anyone who does not know who HP is? > > > >Knowing who HP is is not the issue, knowing what they sell is the issue. > > Oh! But it IS. Knowing what they sell is OUR job, not the CUSTOMERS. Our job is to explain to the customers what they've seen in HP ads that never air/appear. > [snip] > Of that five or six percent, I do not know how much of the software revenue > comes from OpenVMS, but I would be surprised indeed it it were more than 1%. That makes them diversified, not posessed of any unusual acumen. > Their business behavior is quite sensible, given how very different HP's > business model is from IBM or Sun, neither of which has signifigant comsumer > market penetration. > > What is *amazing* is how tenanciously HP has supported VMS. Excuse me? Google this group for "Support issue" and see what comes up. > That indeed, means > they see value in it, and if the right conditions come to be, then wham What, "wham"? You mean someone running and hot cold upside their collective head? The "right conditions" would be a port to the most ubiquitous processor on the planet. > - if > OpenVMS can provide 2 to 4 percent of the company revenue- then you can bet it > will get all the support you want. We'd have to convince them to bring support back on-shore, re-hire everyone they laid off and put the whole organization back on track to where it was before HP derailed it. > The only way to make that happen is to sell it, ...which just about brings us full-circle back to where we started: if HP will allow it. > and write for it, and put it > in front of customers and then wake up the next day and do it all over again. > > I'm impressed by VMS - even if trying to get it to do simple things can be - > complex. For example, talk to a laserjet out a parallel port, Not really part of VMS's primary focus, but a good point, none the less. > and compress the > print so as to print 132 column listings in the right size. I find setting the orientation to landscape, selecting fixed-pitch font such as Courier and pitch to circa 12cpi to be rather effective. > Or better yet, HOW > do you tell initialize to make four or five identical drives into a RAID-0 > array and write 64mb stripes on each drive? Better to be done on the array than via the host, really. INITIALIZE will set up RAID-1 (shadow-)sets for you so they don't do a full-copy when first MOUNTed, but does not provide for striping (RAID-0) "out of the box". > This is idiotically simple in say, Linux or Windows. And painfully difficult > to dig out of the manuals. Mostly because the manauals seem to assume that > *everyone* knows how to do that anyway... Well, again, it can be possible, but recommendable is another issue. > >> They certainly want 1000 people out here selling products They don't > >> care if it is OpenVMS or HP-UX- > > > >Well, actually, yes they do, or they wouldn't be working so hard to rid > >themselves of VMS. > > Appearances can be deceiving - see above rock. Actions speak louder than words. > >> This is actually the core of my disagreement with you, you know. HP is > >> basically a well run company > > > >You're joking, right? > > Nope. Dead serious. They are a well run company, despite the recent nonsense > that went on. How 'bout the on-going nonsense (outright refusal to advertise VMS in the mainstream media)? > > and deals more with facts than with "wants." > > ... a paradigm which clearly has no grasp of marketing, customer focus, etc. > > > Can VMS compete in this market? Who knows, I sure don't. > > >VMS *WAS* competing in that market prior to The Alphacide back in 2001. Even > >unto its premature death without a suitable replacement platform, Alpha was a > >contender, and will be long after the bulk of this group has migrated away > from > >it. > > I just have my experience to draw upon, but I never saw Alpha machines > proposed against PowerPC or Mainframes, or even AS/400 machines. Heck, I never > saw em proposed against *windows* machines. And this is in over 300 proposals > dealth with in the past 28 years. How many of those applications were actually AVAILABLE on OpenVMS? ...on Tru64? > Port to Intel/PowerPC etc. I just don't know. It is possible that HP would > sell VMS to a consortium, Would require the negotiation skills of one who is no longer with us, and who would have to be sold on the merits of it. > or turn it into a "free" OS like Sun has done to > Solaris. Not likely due to licensing issues for software obtained from other parties. > I do not see where that would sell more machines though. What will > sell more machines, and thus grab HP's corporate interest is just that - > selling more machines with OpenVMS on 'em. ...and fully configured as turn-key replacements for the virus/trojan/worm-riddled platforms they'd need to replace. -- David J Dachtera dba DJE Systems http://www.djesys.com/ Unofficial OpenVMS Marketing Home Page http://www.djesys.com/vms/market/ Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/soho/ Unofficial OpenVMS-IA32 Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/ia32/ Unofficial OpenVMS Hobbyist Support Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/support/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:30:30 -0500 From: David J Dachtera Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468EECB6.523E2544@spam.comcast.net> Ron Johnson wrote: > > $ HELP MOUNT/BIND That's VOLUME-sets, not stripe-sets. -- David J Dachtera dba DJE Systems http://www.djesys.com/ Unofficial OpenVMS Marketing Home Page http://www.djesys.com/vms/market/ Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/soho/ Unofficial OpenVMS-IA32 Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/ia32/ Unofficial OpenVMS Hobbyist Support Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/support/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:31:27 -0500 From: David J Dachtera Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468EECEF.992F4D1C@spam.comcast.net> "P. Sture" wrote: > > In article , > Ron Johnson wrote: > > > On 07/06/07 15:05, Paul Raulerson wrote: > > [snip] > > > > > > > I'm impressed by VMS - even if trying to get it to do simple things can > > > be - complex. For example, talk to a laserjet out a parallel port, and > > > compress the print so as to print 132 column listings in the right size. > > > > Do Alphas and VAXes (much less Itaniacs) even *have* parallel ports? > > We plugged our laser printers into LAT servers. > > > > The Alpha PWS models have an parallel port. However, parallel ports > aren't supported by DCPS, which is what you really want to use (DCPS > used to be separately licensable; for several years it's included in the > VMS base license). > > > > Or better yet, HOW do you tell initialize to make four or five identical > > > drives into a RAID-0 array and write 64mb stripes on each drive? > > > > Easy: MOUNT/BIND. > > > > VMS has had it since at least 1989, and probably earlier. > > > > VAX/VMS Version V3.0 26-APR-1982 16:21 > > ... > > $ help mount/bind > > MOUNT > > /BIND > > /BIND=volume-set-name ^^^^^^^^^^ He wants stripe-sets (RAID-0). -- David J Dachtera dba DJE Systems http://www.djesys.com/ Unofficial OpenVMS Marketing Home Page http://www.djesys.com/vms/market/ Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/soho/ Unofficial OpenVMS-IA32 Home Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/ia32/ Unofficial OpenVMS Hobbyist Support Page: http://www.djesys.com/vms/support/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 21:57:39 -0400 From: "Main, Kerry" Subject: RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: Arne Vajh=F8j [mailto:arne@vajhoej.dk] > Sent: July 6, 2007 8:45 PM > To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com > Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? >=20 > Main, Kerry wrote: > >> The patch problem is not really a problem. So do not expect that > to > >> have any effect. > > > > You are looking at this from a developer who wants to believe > this > > perspective - not from a reality Operations view. >=20 > No I am looking at reality. >=20 > The number of Linux systems in production are growing fast. >=20 At the expense of security and risk to the business. How many of those = current RH Linux servers have reviewed the 71 security patches released = in the last 2 months alone to see which ones they need to test their = important apps against? How many have tested their important apps against those applicable = patches? > >> And as I have already asked in another thread without getting an > >> answer: how many of those 50-60% uses security holes in software > ? > > > > As I mentioned in another thread, disgruntled employees using > known > > passwords is only one small part of the problem. [Course, the > > password issues are worse on platforms that have all or user type > > environments, but that is another discussion.] >=20 > Feel free to imagine that the majority of internal fraud > is done utilizing buffer overflow sin this and that app. >=20 Which is what I said, password issues are a small part of the problem. = Bigger issue is OS and LP software issues - buffer overflows being only = one of the typical issues. And that is what the trojans, viruses, worms = etc are all looking for on servers when brought in from the outside = world by employees plugging in their laptops, PDAs, memory sticks = directly to the local network etc. > But there is a reality out here. >=20 > Arne Regards Kerry Main Senior Consultant HP Services Canada Voice: 613-592-4660 Fax: 613-591-4477 kerryDOTmainAThpDOTcom (remove the DOT's and AT)=20 OpenVMS - the secure, multi-site OS that just works. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 22:06:44 -0400 From: "Main, Kerry" Subject: RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: Arne Vajh=F8j [mailto:arne@vajhoej.dk] > Sent: July 6, 2007 8:48 PM > To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com > Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? >=20 > Main, Kerry wrote: > >> There are nothing preventing them from doing the same thing on > >> Linux. > > > > Because having servers running in peak time with only 5-15% peak > > utilization is not only embarrassing, but financially > unjustifiable. > > Same issue with Windows and why VMware is so hot these days. > > > > But like VMware, Xen only addresses HW consolidation - not OS > > consolidation. Yes, it does have some benefits in terms of HW > (power, > > cooling, space etc) savings. However, OS maintenance (managing, > > patching, licensing, upgrading) is where the big cost savings are > as > > this directly relates to FTE staffing counts - by far the biggest > > slice of any IT budget. >=20 > OS maintenance big savings ???? >=20 > In small departmental wintel file and print servers maybe. >=20 > Not in the data centers. >=20 Arne - a bit more background for you.=20 By far the biggest slice of any IT budget is staffing. From an = Operations perspective, the number of staff you have is directly related = to the number of OS images you need to support - not the number of = servers. Remember the FTE per server ratio? Ask any outsourcer for the price of managing 10 physical servers vs 10 = OS images on one physical server and the number for the 10 OS images on = one physical server will be approx 85% of the cost of the 10 physical = servers. Its because they know the work is in managing, monitoring, = licensing, patching and upgrading all of the OS images. > Automated. >=20 > And not that many systems gets patched anyway. >=20 > Arne Wow - now that is a scary point to make. Perhaps that is in the case of = where you are currently working. Is it a small (less than 100 servers), = medium (100-500 servers) or large (500-10,000) server environment that = you are working in? For any med-large DC, that is certainly not the case as OPS folks are = constantly struggling with keeping servers up to date. Remember that = before they roll these patches out, important apps need to be tested = which requires App / BU approvals. Regards Kerry Main Senior Consultant HP Services Canada Voice: 613-592-4660 Fax: 613-591-4477 kerryDOTmainAThpDOTcom (remove the DOT's and AT)=20 OpenVMS - the secure, multi-site OS that just works. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 22:17:27 -0400 From: "Richard B. Gilbert" Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <468EF7B7.40300@comcast.net> David J Dachtera wrote: > Ron Johnson wrote: > >>$ HELP MOUNT/BIND > > > That's VOLUME-sets, not stripe-sets. > But MOUNT /BIND DSA123 /SHADOW= is?????? ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 21:48:05 -0500 From: "Paul Raulerson" Subject: RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <004b01c7c041$3e6d0d90$bb4728b0$@com> Darn that formatting, I was trying to turn it into plain text and just = purely muffed it. That is very good news Kerry, I have been able to = identify those kinds of installations. Plenty of IBM installations that = big, a few Unisys, a few AIX and an unconfirmed Windows 2003 server = install. But no VMS. :)=20 Can you provide any public information on those sites? And better yet, = are there any of those sites, or even an HP demo site configured that = large with publically available documentation of how they did it?=20 I know of a few sites that large that I have personal experience with, = but I cannot for various reasons, identify them, so if you can't say = anything more than that, that's okay.=20 -Paul > -----Original Message----- > From: Main, Kerry [mailto:Kerry.Main@hp.com] > Sent: Friday, July 06, 2007 6:13 PM > To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com > Subject: RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? >=20 > Formatting got totally messed up in your reply, so I did major snip = .. > ++++ >=20 > From: Paul Raulerson [mailto:paul@raulersons.com] > Sent: July 6, 2007 4:06 PM > To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com > Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? >=20 > I looked breifly at the website, especially thier hosting link, but = not > surprisingly, did not discern many details of their operations. I will > mention in passing that a 4TB central data store is not very large > Right there in the lower range of medium sized shops. (We are a > medium/small sized shop and have 6 terabytes online. There is an Apple > solution that puts I think 11 terabytes online for $13K or = thereabouts. >=20 > Large data centers tend to occupy entire buildings, and have a lot of > systems or system capacity in them. Think it terms of several hundred > terabytes of data today, and that will expand exponentionally in the > next few years. >=20 > This is actually what I meant; VMS is not present in those size data > centers, to the best of my knowledge, and the question of "why" really > has nothing to do with HP. It has to do with whether or not VMS can > scale to handle that kind of load. >=20 > Here, try this. What VMS system would you configure, with what DASD > capability, to have an Online Analytical Data Warehouse of 100 > Terabytes of immediate storage? The projected growth rate of the > warehouse is about 500 gigabytes per month of sanitized and processed > data, driven from a raw input of 2.6 terabytes of raw data per month. >=20 > That's from a real spec by the way, though obviously about 40 pages of > it are missing from the above description. I kinda boiled it down. Now > don't worry about all the things I left out, just assume whatever you > like and try to image a VMS configuration. I cannot do it, but that > *could* be from unfamiliarity with the hardware/software suites. >=20 > This is what I mean by VMS being primarily a midrange solution > ++++ >=20 > Paul, there are existing OpenVMS solutions that have PB of storage. > Typically used in active-active cluster environments of large GS1280 > Alpha (and more recently) Superdome type configurations. >=20 > Many stock exchanges, banks, Telecommunication (call handling like > recent American Idol events), manufacturing (think 4 or 5 of top 6 = chip > manufacturing), insurance companies etc run their most critical > applications on OpenVMS and they have very IO intensive and high data > growth requirements. >=20 > So, I would say these are much more than mid range environments. >=20 > :-) >=20 > Regards >=20 >=20 > Kerry Main > Senior Consultant > HP Services Canada > Voice: 613-592-4660 > Fax: 613-591-4477 > kerryDOTmainAThpDOTcom > (remove the DOT's and AT) >=20 > OpenVMS - the secure, multi-site OS that just works. >=20 >=20 >=20 >=20 ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 21:51:25 -0500 From: "Paul Raulerson" Subject: RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <004c01c7c041$b5de4b00$219ae100$@com> I wonder - are you reading this as e-mail or as a newsgroup? It is coming in perfectly clear as e-mail. The newsgroup transition might be causing you some problems... -Paul > -----Original Message----- > From: JF Mezei [mailto:jfmezei.spamnot@vaxination.ca] > Sent: Friday, July 06, 2007 6:56 PM > To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com > Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? > > Main, Kerry wrote: > > Formatting got totally messed up in your reply, so I did major snip > ... > > And your major snip would have been totally, absolutely unreadable to > many here, except for those who have a rare gift of being to do base64 > decoding in their heads. > > Really, base64 encoding is not for text/plain. Don't know why your > news/email client would insist in this. BUt Mr Main, if I were you, I > would find some software that is standards-abiding for internet. > > > > From: "Main, Kerry" > > Newsgroups: comp.os.vms > > Subject: RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? > > Message-ID: > > > > Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 19:13:27 -0400 > > Organization: Info-VAX<==>comp.os.vms Gateway > > X-Gateway-Source-Info: Mailing List > > Lines: 48 > > Content-Class: urn:content-classes:message > > Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64 > > Content-Type: text/plain; > > charset="utf-8" > > Mime-Version: 1.0 > > Path: > beE1!out04a.usenetserver.com!news.usenetserver.com!in01.usenetserver.co > m!news.usenetserver.com!in03.usenetserver.com!news.usenetserver.com!wn1 > 3feed!worldnet.att.net!204.71.34.3!newsfeed.cwix.com!mvb.saic.com!info- > vax > > Xref: usenetserver.com comp.os.vms:441739 > > X-Received-Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:15:17 EDT (beE1) > > > > > Rm9ybWF0dGluZyBnb3QgdG90YWxseSBtZXNzZWQgdXAgaW4geW91ciByZXBseSwgc28gSSB > kaWQg > > > bWFqb3Igc25pcCAuLi4NCisrKysNCg0KRnJvbTogUGF1bCBSYXVsZXJzb24gW21haWx0bzp > wYXVs > > > QHJhdWxlcnNvbnMuY29tXSANClNlbnQ6IEp1bHkgNiwgMjAwNyA0OjA2IFBNDQpUbzogSW5 > mby1W > > > QVhATXZiLlNhaWMuQ29tDQpTdWJqZWN0OiBSZTogSXMgVk1TIGxvc2luZyB0aGUgRmluYW5 > jaWFs > > > IFNlY3RvciwgYWxzbz8NCg0KSSBsb29rZWQgYnJlaWZseSBhdCB0aGUgd2Vic2l0ZSwgZXN > wZWNp > > > YWxseSB0aGllciBob3N0aW5nIGxpbmssIGJ1dCBub3Qgc3VycHJpc2luZ2x5LCBkaWQgbm9 > 0IGRp > > > c2Nlcm4gbWFueSBkZXRhaWxzIG9mIHRoZWlyIG9wZXJhdGlvbnMuIEkgd2lsbCBtZW50aW9 > uIGlu > > > IHBhc3NpbmcgdGhhdCBhIDRUQiBjZW50cmFsIGRhdGEgc3RvcmUgaXMgbm90IHZlcnkgbGF > yZ2Ug ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 22:13:28 -0500 From: Ron Johnson Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: On 07/06/07 20:31, David J Dachtera wrote: [snip] >> >> $ help mount/bind >> >> MOUNT >> >> /BIND >> >> /BIND=volume-set-name > ^^^^^^^^^^ > > He wants stripe-sets (RAID-0). Close enough for government work? -- Ron Johnson, Jr. Jefferson LA USA Give a man a fish, and he eats for a day. Hit him with a fish, and he goes away for good! ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 22:19:07 -0500 From: Ron Johnson Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: On 07/06/07 19:41, Main, Kerry wrote: >> -----Original Message----- >> From: JF Mezei [mailto:jfmezei.spamnot@vaxination.ca] >> Sent: July 6, 2007 7:56 PM >> To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com >> Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? >> >> Main, Kerry wrote: >>> Formatting got totally messed up in your reply, so I did major >> snip ... >> >> And your major snip would have been totally, absolutely unreadable >> to >> many here, except for those who have a rare gift of being to do >> base64 >> decoding in their heads. >> >> Really, base64 encoding is not for text/plain. Don't know why your >> news/email client would insist in this. BUt Mr Main, if I were you, >> I >> would find some software that is standards-abiding for internet. >> >> > > JF, > > Not sure what is wrong with your client or my client, but others have > reported being able to read my responses with no issues. Wrapping > included. > > The Outback 2007 client I use says Internet plain text format. And "quoted-printable". You *really* should choose a better news reader. -- Ron Johnson, Jr. Jefferson LA USA Give a man a fish, and he eats for a day. Hit him with a fish, and he goes away for good! ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 22:28:24 -0500 From: "Paul Raulerson" Subject: RE: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? Message-ID: <004e01c7c046$e06bbfb0$a1433f10$@com> > -----Original Message----- > From: David J Dachtera [mailto:djesys.no@spam.comcast.net] > Sent: Friday, July 06, 2007 8:30 PM > To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com > Subject: Re: Is VMS losing the Financial Sector, also? > > Paul Raulerson wrote: > > > > Unfortunately, the message you sent arrived in HTML format, > > Not possible. Netscrape won't send HTML unless configured to do so. > This one is > configured for plain text only, even when replying to HTML or "quoted > printable" Ah- I think I discern the issue. I am not sending to a newsgroup, rather to a mailing list. It is quite inconvenient for me to access a newsgroup in many locations, while my e-mail follows me around like a loyal puppy. I strongly suspect something in the gateway is causing you grief. > > >...and my motivation to do what HP doesn't want done is ... what? > > > > You keep insisting you know what HP does an does not want done. Are > you then > > on HP's board or something? > > No; however, I'm neither blind nor stupid, either. > > > (I'm about half serious about that, do you have > > some inside knowledge?) > > Even if I did, I couldn't breach those confidences. Never suggested you were stupid. Perhaps a little tunnel vision though. Most people are allowed to say they are under non-disclosure or have other reasons they cannot discuss confidential material. I was simply asking if that was case with you - no insinuating any nefarious motives. > > > One of my customers called up HP and they were eager as puppies to > put him in > > touch with a partner to sell him OpenVMS. > > Please attempt to recreate this most exceptional experience so we can > tell > others how to do it and make the exception become the rule rather than > the other > way around. > Lead a horse to water... *I* did not put him up to it. It's real. It happens. > > Yes, they also mentioned they have > > Windows and Linux and HP-UX on the Itanium box, but who wouldn't? He > called me > > to say he liked the idea of being a little special - as in VMS. And > he had a > > great comfort in it being HP. > > The reason why would be fodder for a multi-prong success story. Please > correspond with Sue Skonetski. > I don't know her. I have very few contacts into the HP world, and none of those are at the technical level. Well, except for the kind people here that is. :) > > That's your average joe out there who runs a shoe factory of all > things. > > Hhmmm... An "average joe" running a shoe factory. The word "paradox" > comes to > mind. > ??? He *is* a average Joe -he isn't rich, or a politician; nor does he come from a moneyed background. He is smart, and savvy, and a very interesting person to be around. But then, so are an awful lot, even most of the people I know. Come to Austin, I'll buy you a beer and introduce you to some of 'em. :) [snipped most of the discussion about large/medium/small datacenters. Kerry and David are automatically right in this area, because they know a hell of a lot more about it than I do. I would love to talk to someone at a VMS data center of that size though - would easily be work a steak dinner or so! ] > > >> Know anyone who does not know who HP is? > > > > > >Knowing who HP is is not the issue, knowing what they sell is the > issue. > > > > Oh! But it IS. Knowing what they sell is OUR job, not the CUSTOMERS. > > Our job is to explain to the customers what they've seen in HP ads that > never > air/appear. No, that makes it easier perhaps. We disagree here, and will just have to agree to disagree. From my point of view, you seem to be blaming HP for things beyond their control. You also disagree with or discount the points I brought up about HP being rather fundamentally different that say, IBM or Sun. I certainly look at the company prospectus, annual report, press releases, technical information / web sites / etc. and draw that conclusion. Your milage may vary! [snip] > > complex. For example, talk to a laserjet out a parallel port, > > Not really part of VMS's primary focus, but a good point, none the > less. > > > and compress the > > print so as to print 132 column listings in the right size. > > I find setting the orientation to landscape, selecting fixed-pitch font > such as > Courier and pitch to circa 12cpi to be rather effective. Actually, I want line printer font at 16.66cpi, 8 lines per inch, and 84 lines on a portrait page. I know the PCL to set that up, and indeed, I know how to do it PostScript. What I don't know how to do is to tell VMS that is what I want. It ain't BSD style LPR/LPD, CUSP, InfoPrint, RSA, BARR, or any other system I am aware of. And I tend to start simple. One little printer, one little port... :) > > > Or better yet, HOW > > do you tell initialize to make four or five identical drives into a > RAID-0 > > array and write 64mb stripes on each drive? > > Better to be done on the array than via the host, really. > > INITIALIZE will set up RAID-1 (shadow-)sets for you so they don't do a > full-copy > when first MOUNTed, but does not provide for striping (RAID-0) "out of > the box". > VMS does not do this? Is there some underlying technical reason? Raid-0 striping provides significant advantages in terms of IO balancing and speed. I do NOT like Shadowing - waste of expensive DASD. I tend to configure disks into arrays of 8, 5+2 plus one spare. I get the speed I want, especially in read intensive online and batch applications, and I get data protection. I have had DASD units die off, and not notice it until the CE came in to replace the thing. I'm very sure HP units have the same capabilities. > > This is idiotically simple in say, Linux or Windows. And painfully > difficult > > to dig out of the manuals. Mostly because the manauals seem to assume > that > > *everyone* knows how to do that anyway... > > Well, again, it can be possible, but recommendable is another issue. I just want the speed right now, not the data protection. What I need to protect data wise goes onto multiple redundant backups, processed every night of course. And I make archive copies at strategic points as well. > > I just have my experience to draw upon, but I never saw Alpha > machines > > proposed against PowerPC or Mainframes, or even AS/400 machines. > Heck, I never > > saw em proposed against *windows* machines. And this is in over 300 > proposals > > dealth with in the past 28 years. > > How many of those applications were actually AVAILABLE on OpenVMS? > ...on Tru64? Well now, isn't that precisely the point I was asking? Why are developers not writing new applications for VMS? It is certainly not cost, HP will loan you all the development licenses and sell you a nice hunk of hardware for a reasonable cost, support you in marketing and with technical support. > > selling more machines with OpenVMS on 'em. > > ...and fully configured as turn-key replacements for the > virus/trojan/worm-riddled platforms they'd need to replace. And on that note, we absolutely agree! :) -Paul ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 07 Jul 2007 00:30:41 -0400 From: Bill Todd Subject: Re: July the 4th Message-ID: Bill Gunshannon wrote: > In article <468dca0b$0$25492$ba620dc5@text.nova.planet.nl>, > Wilm Boerhout writes: >> on 5-7-2007 20:19 Bill Gunshannon wrote... >> >>> Personally, I have changed my opinion. I, too, think we should bring >>> all our troops home. Not just from Iraq and Afghanistan but from Korea, >>> Germany, England and everywhere else outside the US. And we should place >>> them along the north and south borders and keep all foreigners out of >>> the country. Including all those snowbirds with the Quebec license plates >>> who live down here 6 months of the year without paying a penny in taxes >>> and drive on our highways totally ignoring laws like speed limits!! >> Welcome to the land of the free and the home of the brave. So free and >> so brave that you, Bill, like to build fence all around it. > > Gee, I thought the rest of the world wanted us to stay out of their > affairs. And here I am suggesting just that. And keeping them out > of ours. There's a significant difference between being a good, non-interfering neighbor and being a reclusive xenophobe, Bill. It's one thing to "keep out of each other's affairs", and quite another to fence everyone else out, period. > >> Well, if it >> keeps you in... Why bother in the first place? You are already owned by >> China anyway. > > Dream on. China needs our money a lot more than we need their products. > We can make shirts here, can China make American dollars? The disturbing part is that China already *has* so much of our money (both physically, and in IOUs - and one major U.S. default on international debt is all it would take to plunge the dollar into the toilet for real). And that financial flow (and the reverse flow of inexpensive products) is all that keeps a large portion of our population from a significantly lower standard of living. China can find (and already is finding) perfectly good markets in the rest of the world (and in its own rapidly-expanding economy) for its products. > >> Ever heard of earning money before spending it? > > What's that got to do with anything? Guess you won't be looking for a job in finance any time soon. ... We are either > imperialists or provincials. No: we're both. - bill ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 07 Jul 2007 00:36:50 -0400 From: Bill Todd Subject: Re: July the 4th Message-ID: David J Dachtera wrote: > Didier_Toulouse wrote: >> HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY to my US Friends ! > > UFB... Even here we can see how hated the US has become since WWII. Actually, most of the hate developed only after our post-9/11 insanity emerged (despite the fact that some of our actions in Kosovo were considered excessive as well). Amazing how over a half-century of good will and (for the most part) respect can be squandered so quickly, if a nation puts its mind to it. - bill ------------------------------ Date: 6 Jul 2007 13:20:59 -0500 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Memory problem Message-ID: <5CUVFON25mBk@eisner.encompasserve.org> In article <1183729954.188124.148560@i13g2000prf.googlegroups.com>, robfindlay@optusnet.com.au writes: > > Forgive my limited experience on the VMS platform, but was it totally > unrealistic to expect 27MB to be able to allocated in one hit at such > a stage in the program (after previously allocating/freeing a lot of > dynamic memory earlier in the program) using calloc or LIB$GET_VM? This is cimpletely upto howthe system manager configures your system and your account. I'm sure many systems have limits above 27MB and many others below. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 07 Jul 2007 00:15:24 -0400 From: Bill Todd Subject: Re: OpenVMS - When downtime is not an option Message-ID: david20@alpha2.mdx.ac.uk wrote: ... > You claimed that the last four words "with full user rights" applied to all > the preceding list items rather than just the last item which is grammatically > incorrect. I made no assertion about its grammatical correctness: my assertion concerned its *meaning*. When I learned grammar a long time ago, the use of semi-colons rather than commas to separate its phrases would have been considered dubious. And had it used commas, my interpretation of how the final words distributed over the rest of the sentence would have been even more tenable. > > I admit I hadn't noticed that MS07-035 also used the phrase > > "An attacker could then install programs; view, change, or delete data; or > create new accounts with full user rights". > > Hence my use of the word "Instead" was misplaced. However it makes no > difference to the argument. Of course it makes a difference: it proves that Microsoft used exactly the same phrasing elsewhere to mean exactly what I suggested it meant in the case in question. Whether that usage conforms with your understanding of grammar is what makes no difference to the argument. - bill ------------------------------ Date: 6 Jul 2007 13:33:32 -0500 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Message-ID: <8ayZtpUUc9Ys@eisner.encompasserve.org> In article , VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG writes: > I've installed V8.3 on a system and configured TCPIP. However, when I > go to use ssh, I get a stack dump. > > %SYSTEM-F-ACCVIO, access violation, reason mask=00, virtual > address=000000000000 > 0000, PC=00000000000EA240, PS=0000001B > Last time I saw one of these after an install I had gotten a process with an out of date DCLTABLES.EXE mapped. Logging off that process cured it, of course. I was surprised to get an accvio instead of a parse error, so it threw me for a minute. I'm assuming you're still using HP's stack? ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:23:01 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Message-ID: In article <8ayZtpUUc9Ys@eisner.encompasserve.org>, koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) writes: > > >In article , VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG writes: >> I've installed V8.3 on a system and configured TCPIP. However, when I >> go to use ssh, I get a stack dump. >> >> %SYSTEM-F-ACCVIO, access violation, reason mask=00, virtual >> address=000000000000 >> 0000, PC=00000000000EA240, PS=0000001B >> > > Last time I saw one of these after an install I had gotten a process > with an out of date DCLTABLES.EXE mapped. Logging off that process > cured it, of course. I was surprised to get an accvio instead of > a parse error, so it threw me for a minute. Except that ssh is not a DCLTABLES command. It is defined as a foreign command: SSH*2 == "$SYS$SYSTEM:TCPIP$SSH_SSH2.EXE" $ mcr TCPIP$SSH_SSH2.EXE -h %SYSTEM-F-ACCVIO, access violation, reason mask=00, virtual address=0000000000000000, PC=00000000000EA240, PS=0000001B Improperly handled condition, image exit forced. Signal arguments: Number = 0000000000000005 Name = 000000000000000C 0000000000000000 0000000000000000 00000000000EA240 000000000000001B Register dump: R0 = 0000000000000000 R1 = 0000000000000014 R2 = 0000000000015E80 R3 = 0000000000000000 R4 = 0000000000010440 R5 = 000000000005AA40 R6 = 0000000000000001 R7 = 000000000005AA40 R8 = 0000000000000001 R9 = 0000000000000000 R10 = 0000000000000001 R11 = 0000000000000000 R12 = 0000000000000001 R13 = 00000000004E8708 R14 = 0000000000519958 R15 = 0000000000519B00 R16 = 0000000000000000 R17 = 00000000000615E0 R18 = 0000000000060C70 R19 = 0000000000000CF4 R20 = 0000000000015C78 R21 = 0000000000000000 R22 = 0000000000519C42 R23 = 0000000000000019 R24 = 0000000000021999 R25 = 0000000000000001 R26 = 00000000000FD918 R27 = 0000000000013EA0 R28 = 0000000000000000 R29 = 000000007AE26D50 SP = 000000007AE26D40 PC = 00000000000EA240 PS = 000000000000001B dumps just the same... > I'm assuming you're still using HP's stack? Yes. This is on a client's machine and I need to get this running before the day is out! -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" ------------------------------ Date: 6 Jul 2007 15:28:34 -0500 From: brooks@cuebid.zko.hp.nospam (Rob Brooks) Subject: Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Message-ID: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG writes: > koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) writes: >>VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG writes: >>> I've installed V8.3 on a system and configured TCPIP. However, when I >>> go to use ssh, I get a stack dump. >>> >>> %SYSTEM-F-ACCVIO, access violation, reason mask=00, virtual >>> address=000000000000 >>> 0000, PC=00000000000EA240, PS=0000001B >> Last time I saw one of these after an install I had gotten a process >> with an out of date DCLTABLES.EXE mapped. Logging off that process >> cured it, of course. I was surprised to get an accvio instead of >> a parse error, so it threw me for a minute. > > Except that ssh is not a DCLTABLES command. It is defined as a foreign > command: > > SSH*2 == "$SYS$SYSTEM:TCPIP$SSH_SSH2.EXE" > > $ mcr TCPIP$SSH_SSH2.EXE -h > %SYSTEM-F-ACCVIO, access violation, reason mask=00, virtual address=0000000000000000, PC=00000000000EA240, PS=0000001B > > Yes. This is on a client's machine and I need to get this running before > the day is out! Something is misconfigured; SSH should be a DCL verb; it is on my stock V8.3 installation with TCP/IP V5.6 with no patches. -- Rob Brooks MSL -- Nashua brooks!cuebid.zko.hp.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:44:02 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Message-ID: <6Ywji.20$uy7.4@newsfe12.lga> In article , brooks@cuebid.zko.hp.nospam (Rob Brooks) writes: > > >VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG writes: >> koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) writes: > >>>VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG writes: >>>> I've installed V8.3 on a system and configured TCPIP. However, when I >>>> go to use ssh, I get a stack dump. >>>> >>>> %SYSTEM-F-ACCVIO, access violation, reason mask=00, virtual >>>> address=000000000000 >>>> 0000, PC=00000000000EA240, PS=0000001B > >>> Last time I saw one of these after an install I had gotten a process >>> with an out of date DCLTABLES.EXE mapped. Logging off that process >>> cured it, of course. I was surprised to get an accvio instead of >>> a parse error, so it threw me for a minute. >> >> Except that ssh is not a DCLTABLES command. It is defined as a foreign >> command: >> >> SSH*2 == "$SYS$SYSTEM:TCPIP$SSH_SSH2.EXE" >> >> $ mcr TCPIP$SSH_SSH2.EXE -h >> %SYSTEM-F-ACCVIO, access violation, reason mask=00, virtual address=0000000000000000, PC=00000000000EA240, PS=0000001B >> >> Yes. This is on a client's machine and I need to get this running before >> the day is out! > >Something is misconfigured; SSH should be a DCL verb; it is on my >stock V8.3 installation with TCP/IP V5.6 with no patches. From TCPIP$DEFINE_COMMANDS.COM on my V8.3 system (which has a working ssh): : : $ ! $ ! ssh2 utilities $ ! $ scp*2 :== $'f$edit("sys$system:tcpip$ssh_scp2.exe","upcase")' $ sftp*2 :== $'f$edit("sys$system:tcpip$ssh_sftp2.exe","upcase")' $ ssh*2 :== $'f$edit("sys$system:tcpip$ssh_ssh2.exe","upcase")' $ ssh_add*2 :== $'f$edit("sys$system:tcpip$ssh_ssh-add2.exe","upcase")' $ ssh_agent*2 :== spawn /nowait run 'f$edit("sys$system:tcpip$ssh_ssh-agent2.exe","upcase")' $ ssh_keygen*2 :== $'f$edit("sys$system:tcpip$ssh_ssh-keygen2.exe","upcase")' $ ! : : ... and yes, without execution of that file, ssh is defined as a command. DCL does little more than cause sys$system:tcpip$ssh_ssh2.exe to execute and then tcpip$ssh_ssh2.exe reads 'switches' using the C rtl mechanism. -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" ------------------------------ Date: 6 Jul 2007 15:51:41 -0500 From: brooks@cuebid.zko.hp.nospam (Rob Brooks) Subject: Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Message-ID: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG writes: > ... and yes, without execution of that file, ssh is defined as a command. > DCL does little more than cause sys$system:tcpip$ssh_ssh2.exe to execute > and then tcpip$ssh_ssh2.exe reads 'switches' using the C rtl mechanism. What's the link date/time of sys$system:tcpip$ssh_ssh2.exe? On my unpatched V5.6 system, it's link date/time: 22-JUN-2006 20:22:59.06 -- Rob Brooks MSL -- Nashua brooks!cuebid.zko.hp.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:04:31 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Message-ID: OK. SSH_KEYGEN2 never creates TCPIP$SSH_DEVICE:[TCPIP$SSH.SSH2]HOSTKEY or TCPIP$SSH_DEVICE:[TCPIP$SSH.SSH2]HOSTKEY.PUB. If I run it with -? I get a list of possible switches. If I run it interactively, it to stack dumps: $ SSH_KEYGEN "-P" TCPIP$SSH_DEVICE:[TCPIP$SSH.SSH2]HOSTKEY %SYSTEM-F-ACCVIO, access violation, reason mask=00, virtual address=000000000000 0000, PC=00000000000D2BC0, PS=0000001B Improperly handled condition, image exit forced. Signal arguments: Number = 0000000000000005 Name = 000000000000000C 0000000000000000 0000000000000000 00000000000D2BC0 000000000000001B Register dump: R0 = 00000000002F3648 R1 = 00000000002F3648 R2 = 00000000000405C0 R3 = 0000000000000000 R4 = 0000000000000000 R5 = 0000000000000000 R6 = 00000000004BA2DD R7 = 00000000004BAC18 R8 = 0000000000000000 R9 = 00000000004BFBD8 R10 = 00000000000AD790 R11 = 0000000000000000 R12 = 000000007FFCDA98 R13 = 000000007AF05050 R14 = 0000000000000000 R15 = 000000007AF04660 R16 = 0000000000000000 R17 = 00000000004BFBD8 R18 = 0000000000010D7F R19 = 00000000002F366E R20 = 0000000000000002 R21 = 000000000072676D R22 = 00000001004BD7D0 R23 = 00000000004BD838 R24 = 000000000000002F R25 = 0000000000000001 R26 = 000000000023A194 R27 = 0000000000012CC0 R28 = 0000000000000000 R29 = 000000007AE27740 SP = 000000007AE27740 PC = 00000000000D2BC0 PS = 000000000000001B -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:07:03 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: ssh stack dumps on new V8.3 install Message-ID: In article , brooks@cuebid.zko.hp.nospam (Rob Brooks) writes: > > >VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG writes: > >> ... and yes, without execution of that file, ssh is defined as a command. >> DCL does little more than cause sys$system:tcpip$ssh_ssh2.exe to execute >> and then tcpip$ssh_ssh2.exe reads 'switches' using the C rtl mechanism. > >What's the link date/time of sys$system:tcpip$ssh_ssh2.exe? > >On my unpatched V5.6 system, it's > >link date/time: 22-JUN-2006 20:22:59.06 I've check all the images against a V8.3 system where ssh is functional. See my follow-up. It appears that SSH_KEYGEN is the problem. I cannot get it to generate the HOSTKEY/HOSTKEY.PUB files. -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" ------------------------------ Date: 6 Jul 2007 13:25:09 -0500 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: WARNING: BSOD (wasSCUP: Another opportunity Message-ID: In article , "John Vottero" writes: > > That's strange. PowerShell doesn't run during boot or login so I can't > imagine what was going wrong. Are you sure that Windows Update didn't slip > in some other "critical update"? > I didn't use Windows Update for this. I went to the web site and downloaded the appropriate version. I've never seen this software offered via Windows Update. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:22:24 GMT From: "John Vottero" Subject: Re: WARNING: BSOD (wasSCUP: Another opportunity Message-ID: "Bob Koehler" wrote in message news:bOMBgE7pG+c5@eisner.encompasserve.org... > In article , "John Vottero" > writes: >> >> That's strange. PowerShell doesn't run during boot or login so I can't >> imagine what was going wrong. Are you sure that Windows Update didn't >> slip >> in some other "critical update"? >> > > I didn't use Windows Update for this. I went to the web site and > downloaded the appropriate version. I've never seen this software > offered via Windows Update. > Right, I was just guessing that maybe you have Windows Update set to auto download or auto update etc. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 13:57:52 -0400 From: JF Mezei Subject: Re: XMODEM for VMS Message-ID: Stephen Hoffman wrote: > There was some seriously weird stuff done twenty or thirty years ago, This switch is relatively recent (end of sales in 2003). > (Here, having > a NIC, it's certainly rather weird that it would not have and use a > network connection, and use something like tftp to re-load itself.) Perhaps the architecture of the switch makes it complex to access one NIC. I guess it would be possible for the ROM to gain access to one port and then run a minimal IP stack with a fixed IP address and as the real software loads during boot, the ROM would relinquish all access to that port and give it to the OS. Note that one you have it running, a software upgrade is basically: switch> TAR tftp://10.0.0.11/switch1/long_file_name.TAR flash: This fetches the TAR ball on the remote system, and unpacks it into the flash drive. Then, you delete the old version of the OS and voila. In the end, this upgrade went sour requiring me to go all the way down to the bare bones XMODEM technique because one file I had copied from the other switch was bad. (have not yet infestigated if it gt bad due to TFTP to and from VMS or whether that file simply can't be moved from switch to switch (VLAN.DAT). Murphy is my brother in law :-) ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 14:40:00 -0400 From: "Richard B. Gilbert" Subject: Re: XMODEM for VMS Message-ID: <468E8C80.4010702@comcast.net> David J Dachtera wrote: > Rob Brown wrote: > >>On Thu, 5 Jul 2007, JF Mezei wrote: >> >> >>>Am stuck with an unbootable switch. Only option is to use its serial >>>console and XMODEM to transfer an older software version to it. >> >>I know this is off-topic, but I am somewhat amazed that this thing has >>XMODEM built into its ROM. > > > Based on JF's posts, I believe he is running some gear that pre-dates TFTP and > kin. > Or maybe it's equipment from another universe? I has been at least fifteen years since I used XMODEM for anything and I don't think that VMS was the O/S I used it under. ------------------------------ Date: 6 Jul 2007 13:47:49 -0500 From: briggs@encompasserve.org Subject: Re: XMODEM for VMS Message-ID: In article , Stephen Hoffman writes: > JF Mezei wrote: >> Am stuck with an unbootable switch. Only option is to use its serial >> console and XMODEM to transfer an older software version to it. > > What sort of switch is this, and what does the switch vendor say to > do when an emergency reload is required, and is it feasible to replace > this existing switch with a commodity switch? JF's already solved his problem. It's a Cisco 2924XL iirc. According to the thread at comp.dcom.sys.cisco it was an 8 meg model and should have been able to handle the image. The problem turned out to revolve around the VLAN configuration in vlan.dat which pushed the switch over some sort of memory limit and rendered it unbootable. Or crashed it shortly after boot. Which works out to have pretty much the same effect. TFTP is the standard way to load software on a Cisco switch that's still bootable. I don't remember chapter and verse for the 2924, but it would be fairly typical to format the flash, TFTP the new version into place and do a reload. I don't think the 2924 flash is big enough to fit a new image in alongside the old. Models more recent than the 2924 support file transfer protocols other than TFTP. In the event of a failed boot, the console returns to a rommon> prompt which is roughly analogous to the VAX ">>>" console prompt. If the console does not return to rommon> on its own, pressing BREAK (or using a suitable keypress at an unusually low baud rate) shortly after cycling power will get you there. [http://www.cisco.com and search for "password recovery procedure" will get you details about obtaining rommon> access on a variety of devices using a variety of terminal emulators] rommon supports xmodem and enough commands to get a download onto the boot file system using it. This is the standard way to put a usable IOS or CatOS image onto a Cisco switch or router that has become unbootable due to a corrupt image, a bogus image or a corrupt boot file system. >> At this time of the night, I cannot find an alpha executable for XMODEM >> on the net. This should really be in the freeware. In fact, it should >> come with VMS as a basic application. > > You're certainly welcome to participate in the open-source community, > and to port over and update the xmodem code for use on OpenVMS. > >> I realise that those IA64 things probably don't have serial ports. > > One and sometimes two serial connections, and -- like your "MAC" -- > USB-based serial devices are also an available for OpenVMS I64 on > Integrity servers. > >> But >> there are still a lot of devices out there that have a serial port for >> emergency core software procedures (just as loading raw software back >> onto a router/switch). > > Yep, though these are usually now reserved for manufacturing and > diagnostics. And most now use slip or ppp or a specific (re)loader > tool. Or the tools can be reflashed over a network or USB. > >> (I don't feel like installing fortran and then debugging the circa 1985 >> version of XMODEM that worked on VAX, so I will have to physically move >> the switch to the vax and use it there). > > Autoschadenfreude isn't a word I'd contemplated before now. > > I haven't used nor needed xmodem, ymodem, zmodem or other such since, > well, twenty years ago. The last I dealt with any semi-related tools > was when the CMU folks asked to have Kermit removed from the Freeware, > and that was back around V5.0 or so -- kermit was far better known and > far more widely used than it is now. http://www.columbia.edu/kermit/ I've used xmodem on a Cisco 3560 as recently as a year and a half ago. (TFTP server bug left an unbootable truncated image on the switch). Rather than use a VMS box, I used a copy of Reflection on Windows which had Xmodem support built in. A couple of hours later the new image was in place and the switch was back in working order. ------------------------------ Date: 6 Jul 2007 13:51:25 -0500 From: briggs@encompasserve.org Subject: Re: XMODEM for VMS Message-ID: In article <468E713D.BBE380C6@spam.comcast.net>, David J Dachtera writes: > Rob Brown wrote: >> >> On Thu, 5 Jul 2007, JF Mezei wrote: >> >> > Am stuck with an unbootable switch. Only option is to use its serial >> > console and XMODEM to transfer an older software version to it. >> >> I know this is off-topic, but I am somewhat amazed that this thing has >> XMODEM built into its ROM. > > Based on JF's posts, I believe he is running some gear that pre-dates TFTP and > kin. Naw. The 2924's support TFTP. And JF's actually running 2924XL's which are newer yet. The problem is that if you wipe out the working boot image and TFTP a new image on and that image is unbootable then you no longer have network access. In that case you fall back on boot console "rommon" code which isn't smart enough to do TFTP but is smart enough to do xmodem. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 13:07:43 -0600 From: Mark Berryman Subject: Re: XMODEM for VMS Message-ID: <468e3091$1@mvb.saic.com> JF Mezei wrote: > briggs@encompasserve.org wrote: >> Or, as in the case at hand, one should be able to import a file into >> VMS using binary FTP (from cisco.com) and export it using xmodem >> and not worry overmuch about which particular binary file format >> was used on disk on the VMS platform. > > That was exactly the problem. The XMODEM software did a simple "open" > statement which in VMS has RMS implications and processing and this > resulted ina very corrupted file on the switch. I had to add options to > that open statement to force it to not interpret lf/cr it finds in this > binary data. > > The point is that on VMS, one needs to ALWAYS worry about whether a > binary file will make it intact or not. > > Another example: (which I have to do more investigation) > > on the cisco switch: > > COPY flash:config.text tftp://10.0.0.11/switch1/config.text > followed by > COPY tftp://10.0.0.11/switch1/config.text flash:config.text > > results in a corrupted file. The VMS file is stored as a fixed512 file, > but when being sent back, the LFs in it get mangled (probably due to > logical records (aka: text lines) spanning end of blocks). > > Doing a SET FILE CONFIG.TEXT/ATTRIB=(RFM=STMLF,RAT=NONE) not only allows > me to edit the config.text on VMS but safely send it back to the switch ! There are many many reasons why I do not use the TCPIP services product for VMS. In your various postings, you have hit on some of them. Since you are running a hobbyist system, do yourself a favor and switch to Multinet. Literally none of the problems I have seen you post about exist in that stack (including this one). Mark Berryman ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 13:11:44 -0600 From: Mark Berryman Subject: Re: XMODEM for VMS Message-ID: <468e3182@mvb.saic.com> JF Mezei wrote: > David J Dachtera wrote: >> Based on JF's posts, I believe he is running some gear that pre-dates >> TFTP and >> kin. > > The switch's software supports TFTP once it is running. XMODEM is for > when the firmware won't load due to corruption. Think of it as XMODEM > being supported at the >>> mode on an alpha. > > When a swicth doesn't have its software, it doesn't know about IP, > ethernet etc. It only knows about its serial port. What model switch are you using? Perhaps it is just an old one but the Cisco switches we use support TFTP from ROM. Mark Berryman ------------------------------ Date: 6 Jul 2007 14:12:40 -0500 From: briggs@encompasserve.org Subject: Re: XMODEM for VMS Message-ID: In article <1d0a6$468e7fdb$cef8887a$20451@TEKSAVVY.COM>, JF Mezei writes: > briggs@encompasserve.org wrote: >> Or, as in the case at hand, one should be able to import a file into >> VMS using binary FTP (from cisco.com) and export it using xmodem >> and not worry overmuch about which particular binary file format >> was used on disk on the VMS platform. > > That was exactly the problem. The XMODEM software did a simple "open" > statement which in VMS has RMS implications and processing and this > resulted ina very corrupted file on the switch. I had to add options to > that open statement to force it to not interpret lf/cr it finds in this > binary data. > > The point is that on VMS, one needs to ALWAYS worry about whether a > binary file will make it intact or not. > > Another example: (which I have to do more investigation) > > on the cisco switch: > > COPY flash:config.text tftp://10.0.0.11/switch1/config.text > followed by > COPY tftp://10.0.0.11/switch1/config.text flash:config.text > > results in a corrupted file. The VMS file is stored as a fixed512 file, > but when being sent back, the LFs in it get mangled (probably due to > logical records (aka: text lines) spanning end of blocks). Plausible. If the Fixed512 file has CarriageControl CR then the bug is on the TFTP server when storing the file on VMS. It should have CarriageControl None. If the Fixed512 file has CarriageControl None then the bug is on the TFTP server when retrieving the file from VMS. It should not be inserting carriage control at record boundaries. Either way it's a problem with the VMS TFTP server. Having used the Multinet TFTP server to upload and download IOS images onto Cisco gear, I trust the Multinet TFTP server. I've never used the TFTP server provided as part of TCP services, so I don't trust it. One way to narrow down the diagnosis would be to check file size on the Cisco switch. Compare the file size delta to the number of blocks and to the number of lines in the file. > Doing a SET FILE CONFIG.TEXT/ATTRIB=(RFM=STMLF,RAT=NONE) not only allows > me to edit the config.text on VMS but safely send it back to the switch ! Yup. Cisco config files are uploaded to the server with LF delimited text lines. When downloaded to a Cisco device, either LF or CRLF delimiters will work. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 18:14:49 -0400 From: Glenn Everhart Subject: Re: XMODEM for VMS Message-ID: <468EBED9.5000902@gce.com> Richard B. Gilbert wrote: > David J Dachtera wrote: >> Rob Brown wrote: >> >>> On Thu, 5 Jul 2007, JF Mezei wrote: >>> >>> >>>> Am stuck with an unbootable switch. Only option is to use its serial >>>> console and XMODEM to transfer an older software version to it. >>> >>> I know this is off-topic, but I am somewhat amazed that this thing has >>> XMODEM built into its ROM. >> >> >> Based on JF's posts, I believe he is running some gear that pre-dates >> TFTP and >> kin. >> > > Or maybe it's equipment from another universe? > > I has been at least fifteen years since I used XMODEM for anything and I > don't think that VMS was the O/S I used it under. > > Xmodem sends 128 byte blocks (like cp/m used) and really has no notion of file size as I recall. It is moreover synchronous, so makes for rather slow transfers. The old vmodem program is an xmodem for VMS. Also Vaxnet supports xmodem (and the older versions of kermit protocol and its own), was on the "alpha startup cd" that DECUS had some time back. It has been ages since I tried to use these. There was always an issue with xon/xoff which I do not believe it handled. Y/Z modem (sy/ry and sz/rz) did longer blocks, could have several in flight, had some idea of file exact size, and of course the later kermit protocol mods added a lot of sophistication. Glenn Everhart ------------------------------ End of INFO-VAX 2007.367 ************************