HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: LANCE@CSSS-A.Prime.COM
Subject: re: Cartridge tape access on an EXL
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1992 12:05:59 GMT

Do a mt -t /dev/rmt/ctape4 fsf

this will forward space you one file.

Regards,
Lance Andersen
From: SA@MD-B.Prime.COM (Johnson Bushwax)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
Subject: Just a little humor
Date: 30 Jul 92 15:59:04 GMT
Article-I.D.: usenet.9207301603.AA14339
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM


                  In the beginning was the plan
                  And then came the assumptions
              And the assumptions were without form
          and the plan was completely without substance
         And darkness was upon the faces of the workers
             And they spoke among themselves saying:
             "It is a crock of %$#@, and it stinketh
     And the workers went unto their supervisors and sayeth:
     "It is a pile of %$%^& and none abide the odor thereof"
        And the supervisors went unto their managers and
                        Sayeth unto them:
        "It is a pile of excrement and it is very strong,
                  Such that none may abide it"
And the managers went unto their Directors and sayeth unto them:
"It is a vessel of fertilizer, and none may abide its strength!"
And the Directors spoke among themselves, saying one to another:
           "It contains that which aids plant growth,
                     And it is very strong!"
         And the Directors went unto the Vice Presidents
                      And sayeth unto them:
            "It promotes growth and is very powerful"
         and the Vice Presidents went unto the President
                      and sayeth unto him:
         "This new plan will actively promote the growth
 And efficiency of this company, and these areas in particular!"
And the President looked upon the plan and saw that it was good.
                   "THIS IS HOW $%^& HAPPENS".
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: Slutz@s35.Prime.COM (Donald Slutz, slutz@s35)
Subject: Re: rev23.3 logging
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1992 18:58:48 GMT

Incorrect ARID can be determined from the DSM logs.  The product
NPX should be logging all user rejected messages from ARIDs.
   -Don Slutz
From: HENDER%morekypr.bitnet@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
Subject: CSBU
Date: 24 Jul 92 14:18:52 GMT
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM

I, too, have been in contact with folks in Prime.  I've been told that there
will be an article in Wall Street Journal (possibly today's), indicating what
is going on with the CSBU.  Apparently, it will be absorbed by Computervision/
PrimeService.  There will be no new hardware development, what is in the
manufacturing process currently, is all there will be.  The current state of
Information and PI/Open is not known, but it may be mentioned in the article.

Drew
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: CHUCK@pel.ac.uk (Chuck Foster)
Subject: bibi world
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Fri, 31 Jul 1992 11:35:13 GMT

Hi!

I discovered this week that I will be losing my link to the outside world
after all :-(  Originally I thought that the link would remain until the
Prime went, but no, the pad link will be shoved into the Sun, and as we
aren't about to spend money on an expensive card for a machine that will
be redundant at Christmas if they get their way, it seems my worst fears
will become reality after all.

(deep sigh)

I'm uncertain as to what will happen to mail as the Sun will be handling
it; I hope to move into this highly interesting area anyway, so it'll be
fun learning (and now everyone will so "oh no it isn't!!!!). Losing the
X25 link means that mail will come via SMTP instead to the Prime, yeuch.
Still, Michel's MAILER isn't so bad :-)

All is not completely lost though, as we should be on the internet by the
end of September; the Sun ought to route the IP packets and then I could
still telnet to places (for as long as it lasts :-)).


Hopefully I can find a nice friendly site willing to let me continue playing
with my programs; it would be a shame to lose the environment that I "grew
up" in .....

Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: R.KITTREDGE@MD-B.Prime.COM (Roland Kittredge - Marketing 620-2800 x4666, 508)
Subject: re: Re- New variations on the l
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Fri, 31 Jul 1992 11:41:36 GMT

That's no lie, and I thought I was going to be the first to go but I do
believe Leutner and Kumbatovic have beat me to the punch.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: R.KITTREDGE@MD-B.Prime.COM (Roland Kittredge - Marketing 620-2800 x4666, 508)
Subject: Re: PRIME
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 11:34:04 GMT

Yo Andy,

Donmt forget to give me back your computer room acess card.

Roland
From: knight@hal.gnu.ai.mit.edu (Knight of the Living Dead)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
Subject: Okay, now what?
Summary: Basic Prime 50 death confusion
Keywords: prime
Date: 24 Jul 92 19:54:01 GMT
Organization: It doesn't look like much, but its a system.


     When I gave the info about Prime to the Computer Center yesterday,
they acted like thier best friend died.  Basically, the two Prime
computers here (4150 & 6150) do everything for this University.
Being told that after August 31 the techincal support will go to slim
to nil will likely cause some panic.

     A few questions about the gravity of this situation:  since
the students, staff, professors, library card catalogs, accounting
information, mathmaticians, and networking are done from these
computers (nothing is on unix yet) what support will we be able
to get after August 31st?

     Support needed:  Can OS bugs be fixed?  Can we continue to
purchase spare parts?  Are there enough spare parts being manufactured
currently to meet demand say, a year from now?  

     If anyone from Prime could comment... Would they suggest we
would be taking a large chance keeping with our Prime 50s after
August 31st?  

     I'm sure the regular Computer Center staff will ask these same
questions, but all the "Prime" experts are on vacation for awhile.
Meanwhile, I was asked to explain this problem to the U President
and I'm just a student hourly!  Oy.

     Thanks alot,

     Eric Knight
     s0nn6@starburst.uscolo.edu

These opinions are not USColo's, unless of course, they vote on it.
From: apirwani@bcm.tmc.edu (Ash Pirwani)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
Subject: MIGRATING PICK DATABASE SYSTEMS TO UNIX
Date: 22 Jul 92 13:53:12 GMT
Article-I.D.: q.QA6D7659
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM


This may not be directly related to the Info-Prime list but it is a Pick
related question and I'm hoping that some one in this group may be able
to point me in the right direction.

Are there any vendors out there who are migrating/converting applications
written in Pick/Basic (not Info/Basic) to Unix based platforms.  I've
already talked to Unidata and Universe, but I'd like to explore some more
options if there are any.

If this question should appear on another "Pick" list, then I would
appreciate the address of that list, and I apologize for wasting fellow
Prime-netters time.

Thank you in advance for your replies.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: franl@centerline.com (Fran Litterio)
Subject: Re: Source
Organization: CenterLine Software, Inc.
	<1992Jul27.162257.11825@ms.uky.edu>
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 22:24:22 GMT

MSO writes:

> Barry Gorman brought up a good point in asking for Prime to release the
> source code to the 'C' Libraries.

I don't think Prime owns the source to the PRIMOS C runtime library
(or the C compiler).  Last I knew (1989), they were licensed to Prime
by Pacer Software of La Jolla, CA, and Westboro, MA.
--
franl@centerline.com   || Fran Litterio                               
uunet!centerline!franl || CenterLine Software R&D                     
617-498-3255           || 10 Fawcett St, Cambridge, MA, USA 02138-1110
From: boone@convex.cl.msu.edu (Dennis Boone)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
Subject: Re: Source
Date: 27 Jul 92 20:01:53 GMT
Organization: Michigan State University, East Lansing

In article <9207271445.AA15088@ccai.clv.oh.us> Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM writes:
>This makes several assumptions. 
>1) Everyone who gets the source will be qualified to change it. keep in mind
>that there WILL be shops that will change the source, break the system, and
>then call Prime. You can put whatever disclaimers in the source that you 
>want, but someone will do this. 

And they can be told that they get no support for problems of their own
creation.  If you're silly enough to shoot your own feet 'cause you don't 
know any better...

>2) There will need to be a central group that will release patches to the 
>operating system, just as Prime does today. Otherwise you will have alot
>people who will publish this fix and that fix without being certain that
>it doesn't break anything else.

Trusting that some third party knows the product well enough had better
be an eyes-wide-open decision.

>4) The 'C' compiler/libraries. see 1 & 2 above. VERY few people are able
>to work on compilers.

That doesn't mean that the source should be locked up.  It's not like
possession of source code makes you armed and dangerous.

>These are some great ideas, but make sure that there is a structure to 
>the system. Is someone willing to take over 'ownership' and maintain,
>test, and distribute the code? Is Prime going to be unable to do this 
>in the future? How far off in the future? And util that time, how much
>support is Prime going to provide? Will it be business as usual for the next
>several years?

At some time in the future, if Prime chooses to quit providing support for
its software, and isn't selling the rights to someone else, they SHOULD
release the source code into the public domain.  It's the only responsible
thing to do--it allows folks to support themselves, if the feel the need.
IBM has been doing it for years.

Until that hypothetical time, there's not much justification for a demand
that they release source.  They are claiming that they will be providing
support for the foreseeable future.  That support is provided by a viable
business unit.

Dennis Boone
--
 == Frustration is portable. ==
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: CHUCK@pel.ac.uk (Chuck Foster)
Subject: clever kids
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1992 20:37:00 GMT

>  While I was entertaining the kids, his precocious
> 4 year old managed to pull down XRN; hit followup;
> type a response in the new window and; do the send
> (among other things). (Actually I think that she
> did pretty good.)

I think most of our staff members wouldn't have done so well ....
:-)

    Chuck


Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: MSO@eeyore.usc.edu
Subject: CPUG
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1992 23:23:54 GMT

Does anyone out there have the dates, location, etc for CPUG?  I seem to have
lost the packet.   --Thanks!
-Mike O'Rear.

Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: cummings@hammer.Prime.COM (Kevin Cummings)
Subject: Re: 500 OLD CONNECTICUT PATH closed??
Organization: Prime Computer R&D
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 16:33:31 GMT

In article <91906@bu.edu>, robw@csa.bu.edu (Robert Winchester) writes:
> 
>    I just read the local paper ("Middlesex News") that stated Prime has
> shutdown building 10 (500 Old Conn Path). I do not have the paper right now
> but it said 400 people have been laid-off and that they should come back 
> Monday for their severance pay. 
>  The paper did also say that some people will be moved to Bedford....
> 
> Oh, well

Well, reports of the death of Bldg 10 (500 Old Conn Path) are pre-mature.
I'm still working there, though a move to Bedford is apparently in the works,
no-one has yet been able to say WHEN it will happen.  Apparently there are
a lot of little details to work out, like WHERE they will put us up there.

What was closed down was the 50-series hardware developement group.  The rest
of us (especially those of us in PrimeService) are still here, and still
hard at work.

-- 
=================================================================
Kevin J. Cummings                       PrimeService
20 Briarwood Road                       A Computervision Company
Framingham, Mass.                       500 Old Connecticut Path
					Framingham, Mass.
Work:  cummings@primerd.Prime.COM
Home:  cummings@kjc386.framingham.ma.us

Std. Disclaimer: "Mr. McKittrick, after careful consideration,
		  I've come to the conclusion that your new
		  defense system SUCKS..."   --  War Games
=================================================================
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: MSO@eeyore.usc.edu
Subject: PrimeService
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 14:06:03 GMT

Eric Ross of 7Seas+olorado writes:
> Oh, it's a sad state of affairs that makes me wonder:
>
> How important is 50 series to Primeservice?  Does anybody have any sense
> of how large a part of Primeservice's revenue is 50 series based?
>
> Assuming it's significant (how can it not be?), it's got to be real
> important to Primeservice that they assure potential investors that that
> revenue source will continue.
>
The last figure I heard was 60% - 65% of Service's revenue was 50 series
related.
I'm sure that that much revenue is important to them.
My problem now is that I stuck with Prime and feel Jack Shields and Co. has
stabbed us (the 50series people) in the back.  My concern with his attitude
regarding continued service for our Primes is at what point of declining
service revenues will Mr. Shields drop support for our machines?
I'm sure that a lot more people will abandon their Primes now that 'Toons has
been killed.  Many more will move to other platforms over the next several
months.  That means less service $$ spent on 50 series.  At what point will
they sell the required service to a third party?  At what point will service
degrade to a somewhat less than satisfactory level?
What am I gaining by staying with Prime Service at this point?  Especially when
I feel that Shields&Co will drop support as soon as he can get away with it?
Mike O'Rear, working at but not speaking for, USC.

Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: R.KITTREDGE@MD-B.Prime.COM (Roland Kittredge - Marketing 620-2800 x4666, 508)
Subject: User Group Event Calendar
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1992 13:36:40 GMT

                  User Group Calendar of Events
                       ****** 1992 ******

Month           Dates           Location               Contact
September       18(Conf Plng)   NPUG Board Mtg         Judy Cook
                19(Other Comm)  Rancho Las Palmas      (301)490-2056
                20(Board Mtg)   Rancho Mirage, CA

September          29           Northwest PUG          Doug Deckert
                                Seatac Marriott        (206)586-8014
                                Seattle, WA

October         18-20           Central PUG            Debra Norby
                                Crowne Plaza           (708)941-7767
                                Northbrooke, IL

December           08           Northwest PUG          Doug Deckert
                                Seatac Marriott        (206)586-8014
                                Seattle, WA

                       ****** 1993 ******

January         08(Conf Plng)   NPUG Board Mtg         Judy Cook
                09(Conf PLng)   T.B.D.                 (301)290-4056
                10(Other Comm)
                11(Board Mtg)

March           12-14           NPUG Board Mtg         Judy Cook
                                T.B.D.                 (301)290-4056

March           21-23           Northwest PUG          Doug Deckert
                                Seatac Marriott        (206)586-8014
                                Seattle, WA

June            T.B.D.          NPUG'93                Judy Cook
                                T.B.D.                 (301)290-4056
From: MSO@eeyore.usc.edu
Subject: 50series
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1992 16:46:17 GMT

Douglas Rand writes:
> Probably nothing.  Truthfully, there is nothing remarkable and many
> things deplorable in the 50 series architecture,  especially from the
> view of byte languages like C.  Other machines implement protection
> rings (386, 486, PA-RISC) and could support a gated OS.  Most current
> architectures support IEEE FP (a good thing) and have reasonable
> VM models.
>
> What market would such a company mine?  Even ever popular minis like
> the VAX are fading away.  In a world where the desktop is now getting
> to the old mainframe performance levels,  the name of the game is
> distributed processing,  not the grimy dark room.
>
> --
> Douglas S. Rand <drand@osf.org>		OSF/Motif Dev.
> Snail:         11 Cambridge Center,  Cambridge,  MA  02142
> Disclaimer:    I don't know if OSF agrees with me... let's vote on it.
> Amateur Radio: KC1KJ

What Douglas seems to miss is the fact that however deplorable the 50 series
architecture may or may not be, it runs and runs *very* well.  It does it's
job.  We average 99.8% uptime across 15 of machines -- year after year.
I want our business to run and could care less about byte languages.
As far as a market, I have a $20 million investment in software which will take
a long time and a LOT of money to convert to anything else.  I will need
to provide more horsepower for an ever increasing demand for cycles for
several years even if the monies could be found for hardware purchases and
software conversions.  I'm sure that if the game is still distributed
processing by the time funding can be found and plans laid, then
distributed processing will be our target.  Games and Names change much
more quickly then in-place paid for systems that work.
Mike O'Rear.  Usual & standard disclaimers. I am me, USC is USC.
i

Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: STEEN@DDS.dent.ohio-state.edu (Steen Hansen)
Subject: My two Cents
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1992 19:44:12 GMT

Eric writes, among other things:

>You all made Prime/Primos a hell of a lot more than just a platform, and
>that made many of us more than just users.

I can only second that. I have also been a Prime user for eight years, at
three different sites in two countries. I would certainly miss the level
of support and friendliness of the Prime people. It was not a suit-and-tie
company as some other computer companies - I wonder if IBM would allow its
technical people to answer questions as freely as we've seen on this list
for instance. I hope PrimeService will continue that practice.

I'm unsure what to think about the future prospects on support from
PrimeService, but since the major part of their revenue is from the 50-series,
I doubt they would dump it intensionally the first couple of years - maybe
we should give them a chance to prove themselves, and take our good time on
converting to another platform instead of make frantic calls to DEC, HP or
whoever. I think we owe those guys still working for PrimeService a chance
while their company diversifies into supporting other platforms, a trend
already well underway. In this city they now also support any Intel 80x86
based platforms. Besides, I'm told there should be a Primos 23.4 on the way,
and they are still making patches to Information, I got one problem fixed
last week.

We are one of the fortunate sites which almost exclusively use Information,
so it will not be too bad to move to Unix, but I really feel for those who
depends on Primos-specific programs. I even feel more for those people who
put their time and effort into Prime, and now find themselves soon on the
street with an experience which is loosing its value rapidly.

When I two weeks ago split my position to spend 60% of my time to support
HP-UX and NeXT's, and only spend 40% of my time running this Prime, I felt
like a traitor, even when I knew it made sense to diversify carrier wise.
And I am getting used to list the segments on the Prime and engaging the
loaded on the HP9000 :-)

Vanilla Unix is not as nice as Primos, but like it or not, that is the area
where development takes place, and new really nice GUI's are emerging, I
guess one can only accept reality, go with the flow, or stay behind.

Steen


PS: Come to think of it, at last BITS I saw a company which advertised they
had a library with would support Prime-style subroutines on Unix, I forgot
the name though.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime
From: GORMAN@POLY-EAST-LONDON.AC.UK (Barry Gorman)
Subject: C and Prime
Reply-To: Info-Prime@Blx-A.Prime.COM
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 18:41:33 GMT

Kevin Yoders writes: why don't we start a C vs every other language war,
        this list has been rather dull lately.

Well if we regard C as being 32ix mode from T1.3 onward to T3.0, C is the
language (apart from some bits of PMA) that I have used to write programs
on prime with the fastest execution times (min cpu). When it comes to
character handling, straight C beats all other languages. Of course, if you want
to cheat, and move eight bytes at a time in a double, you can do that in C
as well.

Fran Litterio writes> ... text line padding ... space compression.

Well, these problems are not unique to prime. You get similar problems with
the humble PC. If you stick to the rules, and only fseek() to an ftell() value
if the file is text, then there seems to be no problem.

...> pointer math works fine so long as you didn't assign a pointer to an
        integer, do math, and assign it back to a pointer.

If you look at the compiled code, you will see that assigning a pointer to an
integer results in a *byte* address being assigned. You *can* do math on this,
because when it is assigned back, it is correctly converted to a halfword
address + E bit. OK strictly speaking, you should not do this, but it works.
However, the code is a bit bloated, and ACP does the job better.

A PROPOSAL
~~~~~~~~~~

I have been less than satisfied in the past with the level of support given to
C library. I cannot see it being *better* in the future. If you want users to
have the confidence to continue to use primes, they *must* see a source (or
sources) of support. One way is public domain.

I challenge prime to release the source of the C library into the public domain
without totally giving up their copyright, just allow enhancement and the right
to re-distribute. Very quickly, those sites capable of quality maintenance will
gain a good reputation.

Barry
.....
Newsgroups: comp.sys.prime