INFO-VAX Thu, 10 Jan 2008 Volume 2008 : Issue 20 Contents: Re: "file locked by another user" mystery Re: "file locked by another user" mystery Re: "file locked by another user" mystery Re: "file locked by another user" mystery Re: "file locked by another user" mystery Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Re: Building libxml2 on OpenVMS/VAX Re: Carl J. Lydick Re: Carl J. Lydick Re: Carl J. Lydick Re: Carl J. Lydick Re: dial up modem Flame Form (was: f ile locked by another user) Re: Flame Form (was: f ile locked by another user) Re: Island Computers is moving Re: Island Computers is moving Re: Island Computers is moving Re: Island Computers is moving Re: Island Computers is moving MAC and Current address Re: MAC and Current address Re: Mystery of X-windows colours/resources Re: New Member to newsgroup: Hi and All about VMS on MV 3300 Re: OT: Data security now an issue for aircraft Re: OT: Data security now an issue for aircraft Re: OT: Data security now an issue for aircraft Re: Perl issues? (was Re: looking for blue |d|i|g|i|t|a|l| logo) Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Sophos Anti-Virus for OpenVMS Re: Sophos Anti-Virus for OpenVMS Re: SOT: (somewhat off topic) driver for LK250 keyboard Re: USB-stick Re: USB-stick ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 10:01:17 +0100 From: "P. Sture" Subject: Re: "file locked by another user" mystery Message-ID: In article <6V9hj.2$kF2.0@newsfe09.lga>, VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG wrote: > From: http://www.jaedworks.com/shoebox/flame.html Absolutely brilliant thanks. -- Paul Sture Sue's OpenVMS bookmarks: http://eisner.encompasserve.org/~sture/ovms-bookmarks.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 11:41:36 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: "file locked by another user" mystery Message-ID: In article , moroney@world.std.spaamtrap.com (Michael Moroney) writes: > > >tadamsmar writes: > >>I sometimes get this message when I don't think there is another user. > >>When I try to unlock the file with "UNLOCK" is says its not locked. > >>I end up rebooting. > >>What this all about? Is there a way to avoid rebooting? > >Others have already told you about $ SHOW DEV/FILE. >If you're in a cluster, you may have to do that on every node in the >cluster until you find the culprit. I assumed he was not clustered when he said a reboot cleared up his locked file issue. However, to extend my original command to the cluster: $ MCR SYSMAN SYSMAN> SET ENVIRONMENT/CLUSTER SYSMAN> DO PIPE SHOW DEVICE/FILE {ddcu:} | SEARCH SYS$PIPE {filename} Example using a file sure to be open if the volume is mounted clusterwide: $ MCR SYSMAN SYSMAN> SET ENVIRONMENT/CLUSTER %SYSMAN-I-ENV, current command environment: Clusterwide on local cluster Username SYSTEM will be used on nonlocal nodes SYSMAN> DO PIPE SHOW DEVICE/FILE DSA0: | SEARCH SYS$PIPE INDEXF.SYS %SYSMAN-I-OUTPUT, command execution on node XXXXXX 00000000 [000000]INDEXF.SYS;1 %SYSMAN-I-OUTPUT, command execution on node YYYYYY 00000000 [000000]INDEXF.SYS;1 %SYSMAN-I-OUTPUT, command execution on node ZZZZZZ 00000000 [000000]INDEXF.SYS;1 I could also have him look at file locks with SDA but I'm loathe to travel there until he tries these cursory checks first. -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" http://tmesis.com/drat.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 05:05:11 -0800 (PST) From: tadamsmar Subject: Re: "file locked by another user" mystery Message-ID: <39e11783-b012-411f-9591-83d770bff378@t1g2000pra.googlegroups.com> On Jan 9, 1:37=A0pm, "Richard B. Gilbert" wrote: > tadamsmarwrote: > > On Jan 9, 10:39 am, VAXman- =A0@SendSpamHere.ORG wrote: > > >>In article <8edb351d-9031-443e-b6b6-8be91c419...@j20g2000hsi.googlegroup= s.com>,tadamsmar writes: > > >>>I sometimes get this message when I don't think there is another user. > > >>>When I try to unlock the file with "UNLOCK" =A0is says its not locked. > > >>>I end up rebooting. > > >>>What this all about? Is there a way to avoid rebooting? > > >>What file? =A0Perhaps it is opened by the system? > > >>$ PIPE SHOW DEVICE/FILES {ddcu:} | SEARCH SYS$PIPE {filename} > > >>There {ddcu} is the device/volume on which the file resides and {filenam= e} > >>is the file name of the file you are accessing to get the error. > > >>-- > >>VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker =A0 VAXman(at)TMESIS(do= t)COM > > >> =A0"Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" > > >>http://tmesis.com/drat.html > > > Not system files. =A0The one's today were application files. > > You seem to be supplying an absolute minimum of useful information! Sorry, I have seen this problem multiple times over the years, and I sort of assumed everyone had seen it, so I did not go into details. I figured it was a common problem, but I guess not. In this case, a process tried to copy a file and got: %RMS-W-FLK, file currently locked by another user But all the other processes designed to access the file have already exited. ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 08:37:06 -0600 From: briggs@encompasserve.org Subject: Re: "file locked by another user" mystery Message-ID: In article <26e60ac2-0753-40f8-8bfc-9581649f1af0@c4g2000hsg.googlegroups.com>, "winston19842005@yahoo.com" writes: > As my memory fails, I seem to remember going into a utility and > executing a command, something about show channels, after a set > command to setup the file or disk (can't remember) you were interested > in... > > Can anybody "reboot" my memory here? I remember it gave me more > details than a show dev/files... $ ANALYZE /SYSTEM SDA> SET PROCESS /INDEX=xx SDA> SHOW PROCESS /CHANNELS Could that have been it? ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 12:21:44 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: "file locked by another user" mystery Message-ID: <40+DuMNDA9C6@eisner.encompasserve.org> In article <8edb351d-9031-443e-b6b6-8be91c419758@j20g2000hsi.googlegroups.com>, tadamsmar writes: > I sometimes get this message when I don't think there is another user. > > When I try to unlock the file with "UNLOCK" is says its not locked. That command does something which has much more to do with the wayback machine than anything usefull now. But "show device/files" will show you what process has the file open. A single user does not mean a single process. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 07:06:51 -0800 (PST) From: yyyc186 Subject: Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Message-ID: <77dfbc9d-a433-474b-9d86-4f14a81d976f@c4g2000hsg.googlegroups.com> On Jan 8, 11:11 am, billg...@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) wrote: > In article <841c744b-5f3a-48b6-9c08-9dfc58994...@e10g2000prf.googlegroups.com>, > yyyc186 writes: > > > You have a very strange understanding of the law. Need I point to the > Unix court case. Neither AT&T nor the CSRG did Unix for the Intel > architecture. But they still owned Unix and they won the case against > BSDI. And that only involved a dozen or so lines of code that could > be traced back to AT&T. People here are talking about using the original > engineers who can't become un-poluted. > Unix was a completely different situation. It didn't (and pretty much doesn't today) have any significant national security relevance. > > You forget that OpenVMS is used heavily by military and > > military contractors. > > You guys need to give this one a rest. It isn't true and there is > much more evidence to supoport the lack of VMS in DOD then there is > to try and support its presence. > When the people who post this are WEEKLY turning down project phone calls from pimps for black/brown/and grey ops projects, they have all the evidence they need with regard to how heavy it is in use. Just a few months ago 35 fellow OpenVMS developers were shuffled off to Missouri to work on an un-named un-mentionable project for a massively large company which has PUBLICLY stated it had gotten rid of OpenVMS. > > In the past it was under a Strategic Supplier > > contract, breach of which is an act of treason and all acts of treason > > are eligible for the death penalty. We've just tended to hand life in > > prison out lately. > > Boy, you do live in a strange reality. Reality is far far far stranger than fiction once you cross the clearance line. > > > > > Porting OpenVMS to a non-Intel non-HP platform would give the DOD a > > second source and a real hardware vendor. > > They aren't interested. If they were, HP would be doing to get all > that money. Or, a major contractor, like LMCO, would be doing it with > HP's blessing. You guys really need to wake up and smell the coffee. > The VMS constant is probably rapidly approaching 50,000 and shrinking > fast. (Unless they're counting hobbyist machines which may already > outnumber production machines. I know they do around here. :-) There is a significant difference between what the military is "interested" in and what it can get funding for through congress. In case you haven't watched any election campaign ads or debates, there is a trillion dollar war going on where thin-skinned Humvees get blown up like skeet. Politics and public opinion is currently redirecting every nickel it can to the purchase of body better armor and MRAP. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 07:09:15 -0800 (PST) From: yyyc186 Subject: Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Message-ID: On Jan 8, 11:32 am, John wrote: > > > Porting OpenVMS to a non-Intel non-HP platform would give the DOD a > > second source and a real hardware vendor. > > So the Department of Defense is going to buy a Chinese-written > operating system? Correct me if I'm wrong but that seems unlikely to > me. Not Chinese written. Chinese vulture capital funded. Only restriction is on public ownership, not funding source. Just take a look at what percentage of HP itself is held by foreign investors. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 07:32:00 -0800 (PST) From: yyyc186 Subject: Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Message-ID: <3bb7329d-7469-428a-ba55-3d5a5d82f581@j20g2000hsi.googlegroups.com> > > Even before Robert Palmer, the world was not beating a path to DEC's > door to buy VMS. The world was buying Unix! It crashed a lot but it > booted real fast. . . . And Unix ran on relatively cheap hardware. > > The seeds of disaster were sown in the early 1980s! DEC could not or > would not compete with the vendors of cheap Unix workstations. . . . > They wanted to compete with IBM for the big data center business and > they didn't have what it took to compete in that market either. In my original response which was some how truncated through the magic of google I stated that Ubuntu is quickly becoming the distro of choice in the Linux world. I also stated that clustering exists pretty much only by name in the world of Unix. The implementation of clustering so so poor they now call it grid to stop the comparisons. Red Hat recently hired the guy who couldn't get clustering to work perfectly in True64 to develop clustering which doesn't work perfectly for them. The only way to make a venture like this successful would be to start with the AMD64-bit kernel from Ubuntu. Add some code to it so it could and would only run on AMD64-bit and 128-bit hardware. Then hack the kernel to add logicals and ACL's to it (something you just can't make clustering work correctly without). Once that is done, add clustering to it and lexical functions via a DCL shell. At that point you have most of what made VMS great. Since the trademark VMS has lapsed, you can even buy/register the VMS trademark and actually call your distro VMS. Much of the existing code for Linux distro's will simply compile for this platform. There are both desktop and server editions and Dell already preloads it on some of their machines. ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 15:53:12 GMT From: billg999@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) Subject: Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Message-ID: <5umtb7F1iu6jqU1@mid.individual.net> In article <77dfbc9d-a433-474b-9d86-4f14a81d976f@c4g2000hsg.googlegroups.com>, yyyc186 writes: > On Jan 8, 11:11 am, billg...@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) wrote: >> In article <841c744b-5f3a-48b6-9c08-9dfc58994...@e10g2000prf.googlegroups.com>, >> yyyc186 writes: >> >> >> You have a very strange understanding of the law. Need I point to the >> Unix court case. Neither AT&T nor the CSRG did Unix for the Intel >> architecture. But they still owned Unix and they won the case against >> BSDI. And that only involved a dozen or so lines of code that could >> be traced back to AT&T. People here are talking about using the original >> engineers who can't become un-poluted. >> > > Unix was a completely different situation. It didn't (and pretty much > doesn't today) have any significant national security relevance. Say what?? I used Unix in DOD long before I saw my first DOD VMS machine. > >> > You forget that OpenVMS is used heavily by military and >> > military contractors. >> >> You guys need to give this one a rest. It isn't true and there is >> much more evidence to supoport the lack of VMS in DOD then there is >> to try and support its presence. >> > > When the people who post this are WEEKLY turning down project phone > calls from pimps for black/brown/and grey ops projects, they have all > the evidence they need with regard to how heavy it is in use. Just a > few months ago 35 fellow OpenVMS developers were shuffled off to > Missouri to work on an un-named un-mentionable project for a massively > large company which has PUBLICLY stated it had gotten rid of OpenVMS. So what does a "massively large company" getting "rid of OpenVMS" have to do with wether or not DOD is still a bigt user? Do you know who DISA is? Do you know what the date of the last published SRR for OpenVMS is? As compared to something equally obscure, like OS390. The only one older is TANDEM. > >> > In the past it was under a Strategic Supplier >> > contract, breach of which is an act of treason and all acts of treason >> > are eligible for the death penalty. We've just tended to hand life in >> > prison out lately. >> >> Boy, you do live in a strange reality. > > Reality is far far far stranger than fiction once you cross the > clearance line. Believe it or not, while my VMS experience is somewhat limited I probably know more about the above than you do. I worked my first DOD AIS in 1971. > >> >> >> >> > Porting OpenVMS to a non-Intel non-HP platform would give the DOD a >> > second source and a real hardware vendor. >> >> They aren't interested. If they were, HP would be doing to get all >> that money. Or, a major contractor, like LMCO, would be doing it with >> HP's blessing. You guys really need to wake up and smell the coffee. >> The VMS constant is probably rapidly approaching 50,000 and shrinking >> fast. (Unless they're counting hobbyist machines which may already >> outnumber production machines. I know they do around here. :-) > > There is a significant difference between what the military is > "interested" in and what it can get funding for through congress. In > case you haven't watched any election campaign ads or debates, there > is a trillion dollar war going on where thin-skinned Humvees get blown > up like skeet. Politics and public opinion is currently redirecting > every nickel it can to the purchase of body better armor and MRAP. Which has exactly what do with wether DOD buys VMS or Linux? bill -- Bill Gunshannon | de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n. Three wolves bill@cs.scranton.edu | and a sheep voting on what's for dinner. University of Scranton | Scranton, Pennsylvania | #include ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 11:29:56 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Message-ID: <$CJbmYHBv42m@eisner.encompasserve.org> In article , yyyc186 writes: > On Jan 6, 12:19 pm, gaoshan.w...@gmail.com wrote: > > I am in china right now, and have been talking with venture capitals > recently, probably can get 100m us$ to start up provided we have the > ability. There is a big OS market developing in china right now, Why is this starting to sonud like a 419? ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 11:31:50 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Message-ID: In article <5uhp5nF1i07l1U1@mid.individual.net>, billg999@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) writes: > > You guys need to give this one a rest. It isn't true and there is > much more evidence to supoport the lack of VMS in DOD then there is > to try and support its presence. VMS is alive and well in DoD. Just like everywhere else, its presence is much smaller than it was in the 80's, but it's still there. ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 11:33:14 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Message-ID: In article <4783B4F2.3070807@comcast.net>, "Richard B. Gilbert" writes: > > It's been done already. It was called PCVMS. It gave you a DCL shell > and, IIRC, some VMS-like APIs. A toy, really. This was twelve or > fifteen years ago. . . . PCVMS is not an OS. It's a DCL shell and some toys that run on Windows. FreeVMS is an OS that runs on x86. And it's nowhere near done. ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 18:44:45 GMT From: billg999@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) Subject: Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Message-ID: <5un7ctF1ib37qU1@mid.individual.net> In article , koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) writes: > In article <4783B4F2.3070807@comcast.net>, "Richard B. Gilbert" writes: >> >> It's been done already. It was called PCVMS. It gave you a DCL shell >> and, IIRC, some VMS-like APIs. A toy, really. This was twelve or >> fifteen years ago. . . . > > PCVMS is not an OS. It's a DCL shell and some toys that run on > Windows. > > FreeVMS is an OS that runs on x86. And it's nowhere near done. Actually, FreeVMS is a DCL shell and some toys that run on a patched Linux kernel. The OS is still Linux. Considering what people here seem to think of Linux I can't believe that anybody here would take this seriously. bill -- Bill Gunshannon | de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n. Three wolves bill@cs.scranton.edu | and a sheep voting on what's for dinner. University of Scranton | Scranton, Pennsylvania | #include ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 18:50:58 GMT From: billg999@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) Subject: Re: Anyone interested in building a vms-like OS? Message-ID: <5un7oiF1ib37qU2@mid.individual.net> In article , koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) writes: > In article <5uhp5nF1i07l1U1@mid.individual.net>, billg999@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) writes: >> >> You guys need to give this one a rest. It isn't true and there is >> much more evidence to supoport the lack of VMS in DOD then there is >> to try and support its presence. > > VMS is alive and well in DoD. Just like everywhere else, its > presence is much smaller than it was in the 80's, but it's > still there. Yeah, it's so prevalent that the approving authority for AIS in DOD hasn't seen fit to upgrade their Security Readiness Review Evaluation Scripts since 2005. And they don't even have a Security Technical Implementation Guide for it. There are, however STIGs for OS390, TANDEM and even Unisys. But none for OpenVMS. And I guess we don't really need to go into the fact that the abbreviation "VMS" actually stands for Vulnerabuility Management System within DOD. bill -- Bill Gunshannon | de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n. Three wolves bill@cs.scranton.edu | and a sheep voting on what's for dinner. University of Scranton | Scranton, Pennsylvania | #include ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 05:36:55 -0800 (PST) From: "Andreas W. Wylach" Subject: Re: Building libxml2 on OpenVMS/VAX Message-ID: <780926e9-d3a8-4c2d-8d79-a44bdfb62e57@f10g2000hsf.googlegroups.com> On 10 Jan., 02:21, Arne Vajh=F8j wrote: > yyyc186 wrote: > > Moving forward from the current Ubuntu base, you add on Logicals, > > ACL's, and clustering. This will require some kernel gutting and a > > break from the shared kernel of other distros. You will still be able > > to use the Debian distribution packaging, but the installer will need > > to be modified. > > It is by definition impossible to create VMS based on Ubuntu. The > best you can hope for is a VMS look-a-like. And I doubt that is > interesting for many. > > BTW, Ubuntu would be a very bad choice for starting distro - it > is created for maximum functionality to compete with Windows. > > > Once a stable kernel with Logicals, ACL's, and clustering is in place, > > you then set about developing a DCL shell with Lexical functions. > > Peoples definition of kernel varies, but I find it hard to > come up with one that includes ACL's. > > Arne Well, the Ubuntu distro is not the badest tho. Some monthes ago I tried to install Ubuntu on a USB stick, but didn't succeed, cause there was problems with swapping and some other stuff that didn't work out. So I ended up installing the regular debian on the 4GB stick, since I had not really the need with x-windows. It's still rocking and I have it with me all the time with some of my software. The main thing I like about ubuntu is the fact that it is based on debian. And when it comes to linux, debian is my Nr. 1 choice. 3 of my development servers and one internet server in my company is debian. Never had any major problems! Andreas W. Wylach ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 11:51:35 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Carl J. Lydick Message-ID: In article <4a71ab9d-d89d-4a80-94c6-d1e3bf92633d@e23g2000prf.googlegroups.com>, yyyc186 writes: > Hello, > > Does anyone here have a method of getting in touch with Carl J. > Lydick? Quite some time ago he posted GENTMPFILENAME.COM, and I would > like to talk with him about it. The email address associated with the > post is no longer valid. You'ld have to go to hell. Unless he got really lucky. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 13:39:46 -0500 From: "Richard B. Gilbert" Subject: Re: Carl J. Lydick Message-ID: <47866672.3090805@comcast.net> Bob Koehler wrote: > In article <4a71ab9d-d89d-4a80-94c6-d1e3bf92633d@e23g2000prf.googlegroups.com>, yyyc186 writes: > >>Hello, >> >>Does anyone here have a method of getting in touch with Carl J. >>Lydick? Quite some time ago he posted GENTMPFILENAME.COM, and I would >>like to talk with him about it. The email address associated with the >>post is no longer valid. > > > You'ld have to go to hell. Unless he got really lucky. > Now, now. . . . Having no patience with idiots is not that great a sin. "Mit der dumheit kämpfen die götter selbst vergeben!" ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 10:50:12 -0800 (PST) From: "Andreas W. Wylach" Subject: Re: Carl J. Lydick Message-ID: On 10 Jan., 19:39, "Richard B. Gilbert" wrote: > Bob Koehler wrote: > > In article <4a71ab9d-d89d-4a80-94c6-d1e3bf926...@e23g2000prf.googlegroup= s.com>, yyyc186 writes: > > >>Hello, > > >>Does anyone here have a method of getting in touch with Carl J. > >>Lydick? Quite some time ago he posted GENTMPFILENAME.COM, and I would > >>like to talk with him about it. The email address associated with the > >>post is no longer valid. > > > You'ld have to go to hell. Unless he got really lucky. > > Now, now. . . . > > Having no patience with idiots is not that great a sin. > > "Mit der dumheit k=E4mpfen die g=F6tter selbst vergeben!" Das ist doch eine Google Uebersetzung, oder? ..?? i would say "Es ist keine grosse Suende Geduld mit Idioten gehabt zu gaben" :-)) Andreas W. Wylach ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 10:52:38 -0800 (PST) From: "Andreas W. Wylach" Subject: Re: Carl J. Lydick Message-ID: <20a218c2-2cb3-4d7d-9789-138ee687a5be@i3g2000hsf.googlegroups.com> On 10 Jan., 19:50, "Andreas W. Wylach" wrote: > On 10 Jan., 19:39, "Richard B. Gilbert" > wrote: > > > > > Bob Koehler wrote: > > > In article <4a71ab9d-d89d-4a80-94c6-d1e3bf926...@e23g2000prf.googlegro= ups.com>, yyyc186 writes: > > > >>Hello, > > > >>Does anyone here have a method of getting in touch with Carl J. > > >>Lydick? Quite some time ago he posted GENTMPFILENAME.COM, and I would= > > >>like to talk with him about it. The email address associated with the= > > >>post is no longer valid. > > > > You'ld have to go to hell. Unless he got really lucky. > > > Now, now. . . . > > > Having no patience with idiots is not that great a sin. > > > "Mit der dumheit k=E4mpfen die g=F6tter selbst vergeben!" > > Das ist doch eine Google Uebersetzung, oder? ..?? > > i would say > > "Es ist keine grosse Suende Geduld mit Idioten gehabt zu gaben" > > :-)) > > Andreas W. Wylach gaben =3D haben .. sorry for the mistake! Andreas W. Wylach ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 12:03:27 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: dial up modem Message-ID: In article <4ef6029b-f799-4a05-a7ac-f5cc88098557@t1g2000pra.googlegroups.com>, "winston19842005@yahoo.com" writes: > On Jan 8, 4:02 am, "P. Sture" wrote: >> In article <4780C0D5.4609.E452...@infovax.stanq.com>, >> "Stanley F. Quayle" wrote: >> >> > Hyperterminal. It's a really lousy implementation, though. >> >> Last time I looked, Hilgraeve do a Personal Edition which is far >> superior to the version which comes with Windows. >> > > And wasn't that free at one time? I remember upgrading the one that > came with Windows. It was free for personal use. Lots of folks thought that included thier job. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 12:46:05 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Flame Form (was: f ile locked by another user) Message-ID: In article , "P. Sture" writes: > > >In article <6V9hj.2$kF2.0@newsfe09.lga>, VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG >wrote: > >> From: http://www.jaedworks.com/shoebox/flame.html > >Absolutely brilliant thanks. Could do with a bit of updating and a couple of additons, but all in all it was quite humorous. [ ] your lines are 80 columns wide or wider. [ ] and your editor: [ ] wrapped them, making them difficult to read. [ ] truncated them, making them impossible to read. [ ] used quoted-printable making it impossible to read. <<< Your attention is drawn to the fact that (check all that apply): : : [ ] your post referred to the newsgroup as a Board, BBoard, BBS, Domain, or Notesfile. [ ] your post referred to the newsgroup as an on-line chat room. <<< -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" http://tmesis.com/drat.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 17:57:42 +0100 From: "P. Sture" Subject: Re: Flame Form (was: f ile locked by another user) Message-ID: In article , VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG wrote: > Could do with a bit of updating and a couple of additons, but all in all > it was quite humorous. > > [ ] your lines are 80 columns wide or wider. > [ ] and your editor: > [ ] wrapped them, making them difficult to read. > [ ] truncated them, making them impossible to read. > [ ] used quoted-printable making it impossible to read. <<< > > > Your attention is drawn to the fact that (check all that apply): > : > : > [ ] your post referred to the newsgroup as a Board, BBoard, BBS, > Domain, or Notesfile. > [ ] your post referred to the newsgroup as an on-line chat room. <<< Another couple of additions: Your attention is drawn to the fact that (check all that apply): : : [ ] your post referred to the newsgroup as a Board, BBoard, BBS, Domain, or Notesfile. [ ] your post referred to the newsgroup as an on-line chat room. [ ] your post referred to the newsgroup as a Google Group. <<< [ ] your post referred to the newsgroup as an internet forum. <<< -- Paul Sture Sue's OpenVMS bookmarks: http://eisner.encompasserve.org/~sture/ovms-bookmarks.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 09:58:20 +0100 From: Michael Kraemer Subject: Re: Island Computers is moving Message-ID: Bill Gunshannon schrieb: > Somehow, I doubt they > have money to just throw away. I was talking about the psychological effect, not business math. With your line of reasoning an advertising campaign would be wasted money as well. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 10:11:08 +0100 From: Michael Kraemer Subject: Re: Island Computers is moving Message-ID: JF Mezei schrieb: > Re: Island running on Windows. > > Instead of blasting Island for not running VMS, you should be blasting > the owners of VMS on why they are not pushing VMS as a simple turn-key > solution for SMBs like Island. sorry, I'm not really blasting Island, I'm just wondering why a relatively small company whose business depends to 50% (wild guess, OK) on VMS gear does not take every opportunity to put one of their main sales items into a more positive light. Should be in their very own interest. Demonstrating 100% uptime even during a move. (I've been told here all day long that remote clustering is one of VMS's strengths) HP on the other hand doesn't depend on VMS. Their BCS is just 4% of the company's revenue and profit. Being very optimistic VMS may represent 1/4 of that, i.e. 1% of HPs bottom line. ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 14:03:23 GMT From: billg999@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) Subject: Re: Island Computers is moving Message-ID: <5ummtbF1i82frU2@mid.individual.net> In article , Tad Winters writes: > billg999@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) wrote in > news:5ul3h6F1it6j4U2@mid.individual.net: > >> In article , >> Michael Kraemer writes: >>> I don't quite understand this cost issue. >>> I would not compare it to the cost of a PC solution >> >> Why not? If a PC (hardware) can replace the much more expensive >> Alpha. >> >>> but to the overall cost (they move to a more expensive area !) >>> or to the cost of an ad campaign. >> >> The question was why were they not using VMS and WASD for their >> webservers. That has nothing to do with moving to a more expensive >> area or an ad campaign. >> >>> Using a couple of surplus alphas can't be *that* expensive. >>> They seem to have enough of them to give them away on a >>> quarterly basis, it seems. >> >> What does a commercial VMS license cost? What does a Linux License >> cost? What does a BSD License cost? get the picture now? > > Yet 4 years ago, www.islandco.com was running Tru64. There was certainly > some investment in that. And now they don't. Makes perfect sense to me. Of course, dropping Tru64 could also have had something to do with the fact that it is a dead product making it even less desirable. I don't think you can even buy licenses for it anymore making it totally unusable anyway. bill -- Bill Gunshannon | de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n. Three wolves bill@cs.scranton.edu | and a sheep voting on what's for dinner. University of Scranton | Scranton, Pennsylvania | #include ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 14:08:47 GMT From: billg999@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) Subject: Re: Island Computers is moving Message-ID: <5umn7fF1i82frU3@mid.individual.net> In article , Michael Kraemer writes: > Bill Gunshannon schrieb: > >> Somehow, I doubt they >> have money to just throw away. > > I was talking about the psychological effect, > not business math. With your line of reasoning > an advertising campaign would be wasted money as well. How would there be any advertising value? I visit hundreds of web sites in my day-to-day activities. I have no idea what any of them run. And you know what, I really don't care. Do you think the average websurfer is any different? Considering that web serving is an I/O bound task and considering the admited additional overhead in all VMS I/O because of the RMS layer VMS is probably not the right tool for the job. Using the wrong tool is hardly good advertising. For those who might actually understand it demonstrates that the organization does not make good performance decisions in which case, why should I risk my business on their decision about what I should be running? And for those who don't understand any of this anyway, it is moot. bill -- Bill Gunshannon | de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n. Three wolves bill@cs.scranton.edu | and a sheep voting on what's for dinner. University of Scranton | Scranton, Pennsylvania | #include ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 14:12:52 GMT From: billg999@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) Subject: Re: Island Computers is moving Message-ID: <5umnf3F1i82frU4@mid.individual.net> In article , Michael Kraemer writes: > JF Mezei schrieb: >> Re: Island running on Windows. >> >> Instead of blasting Island for not running VMS, you should be blasting >> the owners of VMS on why they are not pushing VMS as a simple turn-key >> solution for SMBs like Island. > > sorry, > I'm not really blasting Island, > I'm just wondering why a relatively small company > whose business depends to 50% (wild guess, OK) on VMS gear > does not take every opportunity to put one of their > main sales items into a more positive light. Because the expense greatly outweighs any possible positive light. > Should be in their very own interest. > Demonstrating 100% uptime even during a move. > (I've been told here all day long that remote clustering > is one of VMS's strengths) Companies of this size seldom have the option of running two sites during a move. You shut down one and load it in the van and move it to the other. Even if the option of having networking that supported this at both ends (no guarantee they even have the same network provider) existed the cost would likely be prohibitive. I didn't look, but I would guess their IP addresses all changed with this move. bill -- Bill Gunshannon | de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n. Three wolves bill@cs.scranton.edu | and a sheep voting on what's for dinner. University of Scranton | Scranton, Pennsylvania | #include ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 09:19:11 -0800 From: "Tom Linden" Subject: MAC and Current address Message-ID: I note that since 7.3-2 that mc lancp show config prints both MAC and Current address and that for DE500 they are the same but for DE600 they are different. What is the difference and how are these addresses used? -- PL/I for OpenVMS www.kednos.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 09:28:05 -0800 (PST) From: sean@obanion.us Subject: Re: MAC and Current address Message-ID: <1ada706b-bec1-4834-81b3-1a851469144c@l6g2000prm.googlegroups.com> Tom, Is DECnet running on the DE600 and not on the DE500? If you are running DECnet then the two addresses are (almost certainly) supposed to be different. Sean On Jan 10, 9:19=A0am, "Tom Linden" wrote: > I note that since 7.3-2 that > mc lancp show config > prints both MAC and Current address and that for DE500 > they are the same but for DE600 they are different. > > What is the difference and how are these addresses used? > > -- > PL/I for OpenVMSwww.kednos.com ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 12:02:24 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Mystery of X-windows colours/resources Message-ID: In article <478300a1$0$15738$c3e8da3@news.astraweb.com>, JF Mezei writes: > > When a VMS application starts and has its output targetted at a remote X > terminal, does the X protocol end up having that VMS application > accessing resource files that are on the remote X terminal (other than > window manager stuff) ? The X provides the fonts, although often via a fontserver. It also maps color numbers to actual video driver commands. So if you run from the same X client and poll for the font list on different X servers you can get a different list. If you poll for color names you'll get the same list (those mappings are defined on the client), but they may not look the same. The latter is quite obvious if your client is running an early version of X11 or an early Sun implementation of CDE, where "wheat" and/or "khaki" was mapped to color values that show up green. I haven't tried a recent Sun, but long since X11 maps khaki to the color the army wears when it isn't wearing green. But I can reproduce some of what you see by running two sessions on the same VXT from the same Alpha. X11 is not 100% deterministic. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 09:06:30 +0200 From: =?UTF-8?B?VXVzaW3DpGtp?= Subject: Re: New Member to newsgroup: Hi and All about VMS on MV 3300 Message-ID: <4785c31a$0$14999$9b536df3@news.fv.fi> Alistair J. Ross wrote: > Hi All, > > This is my first post to this newsgroup so please don't flame me (too > much) if I've got the wrong group. > > I'm really excited this week because I'm a big collector of all old kit > and I have, until now, never owned *any* Digital Equipment other than a > crazy old line printer which went bust many years ago. > > I now am the proud owner of a MicroVAX 3300, and also a VAXStation 3100. > Unfortunately the 3100 has no hard drive so I'll need to work out > something later with that. I have therefore concentrated my efforts to > the MV and noticed that the boot indicator went to 3, not 0, meaning it > wasn't booting fully. I didn't have a compatible console cable, so it sat > there for 4 lonely weeks unused until I could get my hands on an MMJ to > RJ11 cable (which I then plugged into an RJ11 -> RS232 converter). I > opened up minicom on my Linux boxen, figured out how to boot the thing at > the '>>>' prompt (>>>boot dia0) and here I am - a fresh user into the > world of VMS. It works! I'm amazed the hard drives still spin fresh after > all these years. I've seen many MFM/RLL & SCSI drives of similar vintage > die horrible deaths at less years than this. > > Next problem: I've been googling for a while today trying to find out if > VMS has such a thing as a single user mode (like in Unix so I can > circumvent the login prompt), or even a default system password. At the > moment, all that greets me is the following: > +�������������������������������+ > | | > | VAX 3300 | > | | > | Welcome To GSi Exel II | > | | > | Ashdown Garage | > | | > +�������������������������������+ > > > Username: GUEST > Password: > User authorization failure > > > I have no idea what GSi Exel II and Ashdown Garage are, but I'm guessing > this is some sort of motd file and not some specialist shell. > > Can anyone point me in the right direction of a FAQ or provide suitable > instructions as to a) how I might log/break in to this system and b) > where I can find a VMS manual for 'Completely Hapless User'/Unix User > that has no clue about VMS? > > I am so interested in the world of VMS & Digital, and now, finally I have > my first bit of kit - I've always wanted to find out why all the VMS > Admins I've spoken to in years gone by laughed at my love for UNIX! > > Thanks in advance for any help. > > Regards, > > Ali Ross Hi Ali, Welcome to the fascinating world of VMS! My suggestion to getting a CD-ROM drive plugged to your VAXen is that you try to find on Ebay a DEC StorageWorks BA353 box (looks like a pizzabox) with two slots for SBB's (StorageWorks Building Blocks) and the third for a CD-ROM (or a Tape Drive). It can be connected to your VAXstation with a regular SCSI cable (Narrow 50-pin to Centronix). It can also be connected to the MicroVAX 3300 by using the DSSI bus. For that you need to find a DSSI-to-SCSI controller called HSD05 (or HSD10), which is conveniently also in a SBB, and a DSSI cable BC29R-xx (xx=length in feet). You then put the HSD05 in the left slot of the BA353 and then connect the DSSI cable to the HSD05 and the other end to the MV 3300. Now the MV 3300 console will show the CD-ROM (and if you have a SBB disk in the BA353 box, that too) when you issue >>> show device One caution here: You cannot have the BA353 box connected to both VAXen at the same time! With this arrangement you can boot your VAXen from the CD-ROM (for installing VMS) or install software. Very convenient. This is of course an example. You can use other StorageWorks boxes (BA350, BA356, etc) also and you can even chain them together to be able to connect more storage to your VAXen. I don't want to bore the newsgroup readers by explaining all the possible combinations how to connect SCSI equipment to MV 3300 or VS 3100, but if you are interested, you can always mail me. (Remove the extra prefix from the domain address) I'll be happy to help you out. Kari ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 12:27:32 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: OT: Data security now an issue for aircraft Message-ID: In article <47859511$0$6237$c3e8da3@news.astraweb.com>, JF Mezei writes: >{...snip...} >And yeah, there are now widnows systems in cockpits to provide PDF >manuals to the crews. (called "electronic flight book"). Pilot on radio: -------------- "May Day! May Day! This is international flight 123 requesting emergency landing assistance and priority. Only one set of langing gear has deploy- ed and the engines have just cut out on our approach." Pilot to co-pilot: ----------------- "Quick, consult the electronic flight book for emergency landing procedures for landing gear and engine malfunction!" Co-pilot: -------- {M$ Exploiter} Search for: [landing gear and engine malfunction] Trying... Trying... Trying... +--------------------------------------+ | Weendoze has detected a fatal error! | | | | +-------+ +-------+ +------+ | | | Abort | | Retry | | Fail | | | +-------+ +-------+ +------+ | +--------------------------------------+ .... later that evening... "Welcome to the 6 0'clock news. Our top story tonight... another airline tragedy. We now switch you live to our field correspondent at the sight of the crash..." "Good Evening! This is Hugh Oughtnotusems reporting live from the scene of a terrible airline crash... Was it pilot error or system failure?" ... -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" http://tmesis.com/drat.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 09:06:17 -0800 (PST) From: IanMiller Subject: Re: OT: Data security now an issue for aircraft Message-ID: <4bf71cba-8f70-4926-9391-326f7dc384e6@d21g2000prf.googlegroups.com> See Bruce Schnier's blog for some sensible comment on this http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2008/01/hacking_the_boe.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 18:46:58 +0100 From: "P. Sture" Subject: Re: OT: Data security now an issue for aircraft Message-ID: In article <4bf71cba-8f70-4926-9391-326f7dc384e6@d21g2000prf.googlegroups.com>, IanMiller wrote: > See Bruce Schnier's blog for some sensible comment on this > http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2008/01/hacking_the_boe.html Gotta love this reader's comment: 5 years ago (issue 2003/1), this was a cartoon in the german it-paper c't: http://www.heise.de/ct/schlagseite/03/01/gross.jpg Translation: New device found Device: Airbus A310 Start auto configuration? [OK] [cancel] -- Paul Sture Sue's OpenVMS bookmarks: http://eisner.encompasserve.org/~sture/ovms-bookmarks.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 01:40:46 -0800 (PST) From: etmsreec@yahoo.co.uk Subject: Re: Perl issues? (was Re: looking for blue |d|i|g|i|t|a|l| logo) Message-ID: <7585297d-e651-449d-a414-74e43f9a8830@k2g2000hse.googlegroups.com> On 8 Jan, 04:47, "Craig A. Berry" wrote: > In article > , > > =A0etmsr...@yahoo.co.uk wrote: > > Perl: > > I was attempting to upgrade from VMS v7.3 on Alpha to VMS v8.3. > > Using the Perl v5.8.6 build on the HP website, the VMS::Mail module > > (from David North IIRC) wouldn't build. =A0There were errors at compile > > time relating to the version of Perl it would run under (it was > > hardcoded to 5.6 and needed the source editing to put 5.8 in there > > instead). > > Details! > > > It'd be easier for me if the Mail module was included in the Perl > > build! :o( > > Any problems you have building the extension against an installed Perl > would almost certainly also occur when simply inserting the extension > into the main Perl build process. =A0I haven't built VMS::Mail myself in > quite awhile, but I believe it's included in the Perl 5.8.4 kit here: > > http://h71000.www7.hp.com/freeware/freeware70/perl/ > > I should know, since I built it, but there's been a lot of water under > the bridge since then and I'm overdue to put together a new kit. > > > Bernd Ulmann did suggest doing my own Perl build, but I'm a little > > nervous about doing that. > > It's not that tough and there is help available. =A0It's currently the > only way to get Perl 5.10.0, with its large file, hard link, symlink, > and other recent goodness. =A0But there's also no urgent reason to go > that route if you have a lot based on the HP 5.8.6 kit. > > While technical content on c.o.v is welcome, albeit a bit shocking at > this point, you may also want to consider the low-volume and more > targeted mailing list specifically for Perl on VMS issues. =A0Just send > any old message to vmsperl-subscribe AT perl DOT org. > > -- > Posted via a free Usenet account fromhttp://www.teranews.com Hi Craig, Having got the Perl 5.8.4 kit from the HP Freeware, is it just a case of unzipping the file? There don't appear to be any makefiles etc. thanks in advance Steve ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 12:08:00 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article , moroney@world.std.spaamtrap.com (Michael Moroney) writes: > > >=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jan-Erik_S=F6derholm?= writes: > >>> Jan-Erik Söderholm wrote: >>>> In many places in the VMS docs one is recomended >>>> to use the /GENERATE option of SET PASS (or the >>>> correspending flag in SYSUAF). What is the current >>>> view of these generated passwords ? How safe are they >>>> against hacking/probing/directory-attacs ? >>>> >>I know everything about all that. I was *specificaly* asking >>about the builtin security of the *generated* passwords. >>Nothing else... :-) > >OK. > >Without seeing the source, I'm going to _guess_ that the generated >passwords use an "alphabet" of syllables, each about 3 characters long. >I have no idea how many "letters" are in this alphabet, but I suspect it >is well over 26. However, since there are 3 or so real letters in each >syllable, a 12 character generated password may be the equivalent of only >about 4 "letters" long! But there should be plenty of "letters" in the >"alphabet" so the generated password really isn't as weak as a 4 letter >password. But consider: Have a look at SYS$LOADABLE_IMAGES:VMS$FORGE_WORD.DATA -- The forged word database. It's used by the $FORGE_WORD system servcie when creating its nonsense words. If you dump it out, you will see this file also contains a list of words that should NOT be forged by the password generator: .English..asshole.belgium.bitch.cock.c@@n.cunt.fuck.fuk.fuq.n!%%&r.piss. shit.tits. I've elided some characters from some words to keep Google's search engine from indexing on it. I didn't know belgium was a dirty word! I will discuss that with George Carlin next time I see him. ;) The source code for the $FORGE_WORD service has other details but I am not at liberty to post that. -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" http://tmesis.com/drat.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 23:05:29 +1030 From: Mark Daniel Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: <13oc4aj7ebkgpb2@corp.supernews.com> VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG wrote: > In article , moroney@world.std.spaamtrap.com (Michael Moroney) writes: > >> >>=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jan-Erik_S=F6derholm?= writes: >> >> >>>>Jan-Erik Söderholm wrote: >>>> >>>>>In many places in the VMS docs one is recomended >>>>>to use the /GENERATE option of SET PASS (or the >>>>>correspending flag in SYSUAF). What is the current >>>>>view of these generated passwords ? How safe are they >>>>>against hacking/probing/directory-attacs ? >>>>> >>> >>>I know everything about all that. I was *specificaly* asking >>>about the builtin security of the *generated* passwords. >>>Nothing else... :-) >> >>OK. >> >>Without seeing the source, I'm going to _guess_ that the generated >>passwords use an "alphabet" of syllables, each about 3 characters long. >>I have no idea how many "letters" are in this alphabet, but I suspect it >>is well over 26. However, since there are 3 or so real letters in each >>syllable, a 12 character generated password may be the equivalent of only >>about 4 "letters" long! But there should be plenty of "letters" in the >>"alphabet" so the generated password really isn't as weak as a 4 letter >>password. But consider: > > > Have a look at SYS$LOADABLE_IMAGES:VMS$FORGE_WORD.DATA -- The forged word > database. It's used by the $FORGE_WORD system servcie when creating its > nonsense words. > > If you dump it out, you will see this file also contains a list of words > that should NOT be forged by the password generator: > > .English..asshole.belgium.bitch.cock.c@@n.cunt.fuck.fuk.fuq.n!%%&r.piss. > shit.tits. Interesting that n!%%&r is no longer acceptable but c~^t is. At least we're finally getting our priorities sorted. :-) > I've elided some characters from some words to keep Google's search engine > from indexing on it. > > I didn't know belgium was a dirty word! I will discuss that with George > Carlin next time I see him. ;) > > The source code for the $FORGE_WORD service has other details but I am not > at liberty to post that. -- Every one of us is precious in the cosmic perspective. If a human disagrees with you, let him live. In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another [like him]. [Carl Sagan; Cosmos] ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 12:59:36 +0000 (UTC) From: david20@alpha2.mdx.ac.uk Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article , VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG writes: >In article , moroney@world.std.spaamtrap.com (Michael Moroney) writes: >> >> >>=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jan-Erik_S=F6derholm?= writes: >> >>>> Jan-Erik Söderholm wrote: >>>>> In many places in the VMS docs one is recomended >>>>> to use the /GENERATE option of SET PASS (or the >>>>> correspending flag in SYSUAF). What is the current >>>>> view of these generated passwords ? How safe are they >>>>> against hacking/probing/directory-attacs ? >>>>> >>>I know everything about all that. I was *specificaly* asking >>>about the builtin security of the *generated* passwords. >>>Nothing else... :-) >> >>OK. >> >>Without seeing the source, I'm going to _guess_ that the generated >>passwords use an "alphabet" of syllables, each about 3 characters long. >>I have no idea how many "letters" are in this alphabet, but I suspect it >>is well over 26. However, since there are 3 or so real letters in each >>syllable, a 12 character generated password may be the equivalent of only >>about 4 "letters" long! But there should be plenty of "letters" in the >>"alphabet" so the generated password really isn't as weak as a 4 letter >>password. But consider: > >Have a look at SYS$LOADABLE_IMAGES:VMS$FORGE_WORD.DATA -- The forged word >database. It's used by the $FORGE_WORD system servcie when creating its >nonsense words. > >If you dump it out, you will see this file also contains a list of words >that should NOT be forged by the password generator: > >..English..asshole.belgium.bitch.cock.c@@n.cunt.fuck.fuk.fuq.n!%%&r.piss. >shit.tits. > >I've elided some characters from some words to keep Google's search engine >from indexing on it. > >I didn't know belgium was a dirty word! It is the most unspeakably rude word there is and the reason why Earth has beened shunned by the rest of the Galaxy according to the Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/hitchhikers/guide/belgium.shtml David Webb Security team leader CCSS Middlesex University >I will discuss that with George >Carlin next time I see him. ;) > >The source code for the $FORGE_WORD service has other details but I am not >at liberty to post that. > >-- >VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM > > "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" > >http://tmesis.com/drat.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 13:02:43 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article <13oc4aj7ebkgpb2@corp.supernews.com>, Mark Daniel writes: >{...snip...} >> .English..asshole.belgium.bitch.cock.c@@n.cunt.fuck.fuk.fuq.n!%%&r.piss. >> shit.tits. > >Interesting that n!%%&r is no longer acceptable but c~^t is. At least >we're finally getting our priorities sorted. :-) It's not about priorities. I'd prefer not to lure the racial bigots and other extremists to c.o.v. http://www.erenkrantz.com/Humor/SevenDirtyWords.shtml -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" http://tmesis.com/drat.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 14:07:51 +0100 From: "P. Sture" Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article , VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG wrote: > I didn't know belgium was a dirty word! http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=497833 Re: The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy - "It seems worth noting that 'belgium' was a curse word in only the U.S. editions." I 'm pretty sure it was there in the radio shows, as the F-word would not have been countenanced on the BBC in those days. -- Paul Sture Sue's OpenVMS bookmarks: http://eisner.encompasserve.org/~sture/ovms-bookmarks.html ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 13:59:05 GMT From: billg999@cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: <5umml9F1i82frU1@mid.individual.net> In article , Tad Winters writes: > AEF wrote in > news:b6ed5b92-c187-427f-b464-b91417742108@q39g2000hsf.googlegroups.com: > >>> >http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/07/21/30OPsecadvise_1.html >>> >>> "At 31 characters long, my password is all but unhackable." One of my >>> first Linux installations silently dropped characters at the end of >>> passwords and only used the first 6 characters. See comment below. > OK that was back in >>> 2000, but think about it... >> >> And VMS could even do 32-char passwords even years ago. At least back >> to the 1990's. Only 6 for Linux? Inexcusable! On a somewhat related >> note: At a previous job in the late 1990's, a secretary user of mine >> would type in what seemed to be a novella for a password. I never told >> her that only the first 32 chars get looked at! (I'm pretty sure she >> typed in more than 32 chars.) > > Reminds me of an account I had in college on a BSD system. I changed the > password to something with, maybe, 15 characters, about 9 months after > graduating. About a month later, my account was disabled because "the > password was too easy to guess." It turns out the first 6 or 7 characters > were probably in some dictionary, and the rest was not being recognized, > though gladly accepted, when I made the change. Actually, the magic number was 8. And that was always well documented. This has changed and the limit for most modern Unix variants is currently 128. And you can set a minimum (currently usually 6). > Also, consider that VMS has supported a primary and optionally, a secondary > password since at least as far back as 1988. As a result, you have 64 > characters of password space. Looks like it is still only half of Unix's. :-) bill -- Bill Gunshannon | de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n. Three wolves bill@cs.scranton.edu | and a sheep voting on what's for dinner. University of Scranton | Scranton, Pennsylvania | #include ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 14:11:05 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article , david20@alpha2.mdx.ac.uk writes: > > >In article , VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG writes: >>In article , moroney@world.std.spaamtrap.com (Michael Moroney) writes: >>> >>> >>>=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jan-Erik_S=F6derholm?= writes: >>> >>>>> Jan-Erik Söderholm wrote: >>>>>> In many places in the VMS docs one is recomended >>>>>> to use the /GENERATE option of SET PASS (or the >>>>>> correspending flag in SYSUAF). What is the current >>>>>> view of these generated passwords ? How safe are they >>>>>> against hacking/probing/directory-attacs ? >>>>>> >>>>I know everything about all that. I was *specificaly* asking >>>>about the builtin security of the *generated* passwords. >>>>Nothing else... :-) >>> >>>OK. >>> >>>Without seeing the source, I'm going to _guess_ that the generated >>>passwords use an "alphabet" of syllables, each about 3 characters long. >>>I have no idea how many "letters" are in this alphabet, but I suspect it >>>is well over 26. However, since there are 3 or so real letters in each >>>syllable, a 12 character generated password may be the equivalent of only >>>about 4 "letters" long! But there should be plenty of "letters" in the >>>"alphabet" so the generated password really isn't as weak as a 4 letter >>>password. But consider: >> >>Have a look at SYS$LOADABLE_IMAGES:VMS$FORGE_WORD.DATA -- The forged word >>database. It's used by the $FORGE_WORD system servcie when creating its >>nonsense words. >> >>If you dump it out, you will see this file also contains a list of words >>that should NOT be forged by the password generator: >> >>..English..asshole.belgium.bitch.cock.c@@n.cunt.fuck.fuk.fuq.n!%%&r.piss. >>shit.tits. >> > > >>I've elided some characters from some words to keep Google's search engine >>from indexing on it. >> >>I didn't know belgium was a dirty word! > >It is the most unspeakably rude word there is and the reason why Earth has >beened shunned by the rest of the Galaxy according to the >Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy. > >See http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/hitchhikers/guide/belgium.shtml Thanks David, The humor of the VMS team never ceases to amuse. -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" http://tmesis.com/drat.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 14:20:39 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article , "P. Sture" writes: > > >In article , VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG >wrote: > >> I didn't know belgium was a dirty word! > >http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=497833 > >Re: The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy - > >"It seems worth noting that 'belgium' was a curse word in only the U.S. >editions." > >I 'm pretty sure it was there in the radio shows, as the F-word would >not have been countenanced on the BBC in those days. Would that be the Belgium Broadcasting Corporation? :) -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?" http://tmesis.com/drat.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 17:53:04 +0100 From: "P. Sture" Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article , VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG wrote: > In article , "P. Sture" > writes: > > > > > >In article , VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG > >wrote: > > > >> I didn't know belgium was a dirty word! > > > >http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=497833 > > > >Re: The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy - > > > >"It seems worth noting that 'belgium' was a curse word in only the U.S. > >editions." > > > >I 'm pretty sure it was there in the radio shows, as the F-word would > >not have been countenanced on the BBC in those days. > > Would that be the Belgium Broadcasting Corporation? :) Quite apt for the state of play today. I feel the need to quote from the station summary for my cable TV: "BBC 1 intends to become the most highly-regarded television station in the UK, offering the widest range of quality programs." Lord Reeth must be spinning in his grave. :-( -- Paul Sture Sue's OpenVMS bookmarks: http://eisner.encompasserve.org/~sture/ovms-bookmarks.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 18:13:33 +0100 From: "P. Sture" Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article , VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG wrote: > In article , "P. Sture" > writes: > > > > > >In article , VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG > >wrote: > > > >> I didn't know belgium was a dirty word! > > > >http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=497833 > > > >Re: The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy - > > > >"It seems worth noting that 'belgium' was a curse word in only the U.S. > >editions." > > > >I 'm pretty sure it was there in the radio shows, as the F-word would > >not have been countenanced on the BBC in those days. > > Would that be the Belgium Broadcasting Corporation? :) Quite apt for the state of play today. I feel the need to quote from the station summary for my cable TV: "BBC 1 intends to become the most highly-regarded television station in the UK, offering the widest range of quality programs." Lord Reith must be spinning in his grave. :-( -- Paul Sture Sue's OpenVMS bookmarks: http://eisner.encompasserve.org/~sture/ovms-bookmarks.html ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 12:04:23 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article , =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jan-Erik_S=F6derholm?= writes: > In many places in the VMS docs one is recomended > to use the /GENERATE option of SET PASS (or the > correspending flag in SYSUAF). What is the current > view of these generated passwords ? How safe are they > against hacking/probing/directory-attacs ? Better than requiring all passwords to contain either $ or _. ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 12:08:03 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article <478384E6.90203@comcast.net>, "Richard B. Gilbert" writes: > > I'd advise a 90 day lifetime and eight character minimum. Train the > users! They should not use theirs pet's name, husband's name, name of > the street they live on, etc! Suggest that they invent a new word or > miss spell a word creatively. Strings like "knobnoxious" or "snickels" > are quite secure and quite memorable if the user invents his/her own. Common intentional misspellings, like Mi$$p311ing$, can used to meet all the "strong" password criteria, but are well known by the cracker programs. ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 12:09:57 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article <7e686001-d849-4c98-a94f-36bcaf04ccc0@41g2000hsy.googlegroups.com>, AEF writes: > > Exactly. This is yet another reason why increasing length is much > better than increasing "complexity". The only complexity checks should > be for stupid passwords like AAAAAAAAA or 12345678 and the like. > Things like using O's for zeros are not going to help much at all and > just make the system admin's job harder than it has to be. > You'ld be suprised how many systems would accept simple variations on QWERTY as "strong". ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 12:11:50 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article <4783f26b$0$15789$c3e8da3@news.astraweb.com>, JF Mezei writes: > > The syetem gererated passwords require the user write them down on a > post-it note that is permanently attached to their monitor. Not in our facilities. You WILL memorise that generated password. ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 12:14:47 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: In article , "P. Sture" writes: > > "At 31 characters long, my password is all but unhackable." One of my > first Linux installations silently dropped characters at the end of > passwords and only used the first 6 characters. OK that was back in > 2000, but think about it... > When I installed 0.99, passwd and login could handle long passwords, but the FTP server couldn't. So I downloaded the ftp server code and just tuncated the input at 8 characters. Yep, worked fine. I even tried some different 9th characters. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 10:18:29 -0800 (PST) From: AEF Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: On Jan 10, 2:09 pm, koeh...@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) wrote: > In article <7e686001-d849-4c98-a94f-36bcaf04c...@41g2000hsy.googlegroups.com>, AEF writes: > > > > > Exactly. This is yet another reason why increasing length is much > > better than increasing "complexity". The only complexity checks should > > be for stupid passwords like AAAAAAAAA or 12345678 and the like. > > Things like using O's for zeros are not going to help much at all and > > just make the system admin's job harder than it has to be. > > You'ld be suprised how many systems would accept simple variations on > QWERTY as "strong". Bummer. AEF ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 10:21:32 -0800 (PST) From: AEF Subject: Re: Security level of SET PASS /GENERATE ? Message-ID: <388cd57c-024e-4525-af23-c5e1439d3bcd@k2g2000hse.googlegroups.com> On Jan 10, 2:11 pm, koeh...@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) wrote: > In article <4783f26b$0$15789$c3e8...@news.astraweb.com>, JF Mezei writes: > > > > > The syetem gererated passwords require the user write them down on a > > post-it note that is permanently attached to their monitor. > > Not in our facilities. You WILL memorise that generated password. Hi Bob! And a belated welcome back. How about a 15-char or longer password? Wouldn't (or shouldn't!) that be okay? AEF ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 08:13:52 -0600 From: Kilgallen@SpamCop.net (Larry Kilgallen) Subject: Sophos Anti-Virus for OpenVMS Message-ID: I just took a look at the online documentation for the product Sophos Anti-Virus for OpenVMS. It looks at VMS files to see if any contain viruses that might affect a Windows machine. Is anyone in the newgroup aware of any other commercial product that does the same thing ? (No, LJK Software has not started using Windows, this for giving advice to customers :-) ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 10:00:05 -0800 (PST) From: Keith Cayemberg Subject: Re: Sophos Anti-Virus for OpenVMS Message-ID: <2964751f-36a3-4b63-aaf9-fea38713e2ca@d4g2000prg.googlegroups.com> On Jan 10, 3:13 pm, Kilgal...@SpamCop.net (Larry Kilgallen) wrote: > I just took a look at the online documentation for the product > Sophos Anti-Virus for OpenVMS. It looks at VMS files to see if > any contain viruses that might affect a Windows machine. > > Is anyone in the newgroup aware of any other commercial product > that does the same thing ? > > (No, LJK Software has not started using Windows, this for giving > advice to customers :-) Here are my links in connection with the subject AntiVirus Software for use with OpenVMS... ClamAV http://fafner.dyndns.org/~alexey/clamav/ http://www.openvms.org/stories.php?story=07/03/25/4611044 EuroKom - vFastScan http://www.eurokom.ie/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=36&Itemid=69 Sophos Anti-Virus for OpenVMS http://www.sophos.com/products/government/central/ http://www.sophos.com/sophos/docs/eng/factshts/vms_fen.pdf Sophos > SAVI (Sophos Anti-Virus Interface) SDK - Wayback Machine http://web.archive.org/web/20061025172250/http://www.cdg-group.com/go.exe?prodid=201 SOPHOS VSWEEP http://www.sophos.com/support/knowledgebase/article/10159.html http://www.axp.mdx.ac.uk/www/sophos/ WCF & Associates - SpamTagger with RAV Anti-Virus http://www.wcfa.com/SpamTagger.htm NOVIRUS, Validates images using CRC32 checksum http://h71000.www7.hp.com/freeware/freeware40/novirus/ FB's Checksummer http://www.anzwers.org/trade/franco/vmsutils/syssec.htm Cheers! Keith Cayemberg ------------------------------ Date: 10 Jan 2008 11:49:49 -0600 From: koehler@eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) Subject: Re: SOT: (somewhat off topic) driver for LK250 keyboard Message-ID: In article , moroney@world.std.spaamtrap.com (Michael Moroney) writes: > > Did you have to tweak anything? I haven't tweaked anything. I was, however, forward looking when I defined by TPU keypad. When I started with the first release of TPU, it didn't have a prwritten EDT keypad, and I'd seen early PC keyboards where NumLock was actually a throwable switch instead of a momentary contact switch interpreted by the driver. In those first releases TPU's Gold key was known as Shift, and I defined Shift to be KP4. This helps a lot. When I had defined enough keys I to use up two keypad layouts, I decided Shift-Shift would get me to a third keypad layout instead of doing a DEBUG-like Blue key. But usually when I'm running something that does use PF1 I can get a couple strokes on NumLock to mean the same thing. Now if I could only get that 000 key to do something. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 09:51:34 +0100 From: "P. Sture" Subject: Re: USB-stick Message-ID: In article , briggs@encompasserve.org wrote: > Try $ MCR PCDISK > > I don't know whether that came with MicroVaxen or with Pathworks or > both. But it knew about FAT file systems. And last I knew it could > deal with container file systems, so it wasn't just FAT on floppy > disk drives. > > No clue where to lay my hands on a copy, unfortunately. I do have a copy (for Alpha), but have no idea where it came from. -- Paul Sture Sue's OpenVMS bookmarks: http://eisner.encompasserve.org/~sture/ovms-bookmarks.html ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2008 10:37:47 +0000 (UTC) From: gartmann@nonsense.immunbio.mpg.de (Christoph Gartmann) Subject: Re: USB-stick Message-ID: In article , briggs@encompasserve.org writes: >Try $ MCR PCDISK > >I don't know whether that came with MicroVaxen or with Pathworks or >both. But it knew about FAT file systems. And last I knew it could >deal with container file systems, so it wasn't just FAT on floppy >disk drives. It is not present on my system. So I assume it came from Pathworks. Regards, Christoph Gartmann -- Max-Planck-Institut fuer Phone : +49-761-5108-464 Fax: -452 Immunbiologie Postfach 1169 Internet: gartmann@immunbio dot mpg dot de D-79011 Freiburg, Germany http://www.immunbio.mpg.de/home/menue.html ------------------------------ End of INFO-VAX 2008.020 ************************