HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: barmar@think.com (Barry Margolin)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.super
Subject: Re: Supercomputing Review
Date: 13 Dec 92 15:55:15 GMT
Article-I.D.: early-bi.1gfmd3INN1c1
Distribution: inet
Organization: Thinking Machines Corporation, Cambridge MA, USA
NNTP-Posting-Host: gandalf.think.com

In article <1gd2oaINNdi@network.ucsd.edu> spl@ivem.ucsd.edu (Steve Lamont) writes:
>According to a good friend of mine (who was on the masthead of SR as
>some sort of editor), Supercomputing Review is no more.  There was
>some activity to revive it under a new publisher but I believe that,
>unless some miracle occurs, SR is a dead duck.

PCI, the company that publishes Sun Observer, Hp/Apollo World, and other
similar publications, announced in the latest Sun Observer that they have
revived SR, with the new name "High Performance Computing Review".
-- 
Barry Margolin
System Manager, Thinking Machines Corp.

barmar@think.com          {uunet,harvard}!think!barmar
Newsgroups: comp.sys.super
From: ccecks@nuscc.nus.sg (Chua Kong Sian)
Subject: Supercomputing Review
Organization: National University of Singapore
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL4
Date: Sat, 12 Dec 1992 02:20:39 GMT


Just a query on Supercomputing Review.  Has this magazine been stopped?
Or has it taken on a new identity.  We have not received any more issues 
since May (or was it June) where there is a picture of a piece of bended
pipe on the cover.  Not only is our centre not receiving any issues, other
friends in other organizations which subscribe has not received any either.
If the answer is too trivial, please e-mail me privately.  Thanks.

Chua Kong Sian
National University of Singapore
From: fowler@de01.denver.waii.com (Paul Fowler)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.super
Subject: Re: Precision requirements
Date: 11 Dec 92 23:13:29 GMT
Reply-To: fowler@de01.denver.waii.com
Followup-To: comp.sys.super
Organization: Western Geophysical

In article <1992Dec10.164402.17832@news.eng.convex.com>, dodson@convex.COM (Dave Dodson) writes:
|> In article <1992Dec10.141843.2836@cis.uab.edu> hyatt@cis.uab.edu (Robert Hyatt) writes:
|> >I suspect that many forget that there is a second important part to the
|> >precision question.  While 32 bits might work for some applications, *if*
|> >the application needs a supercomputer, it is probably going to iterate 
|> >enough to wipe out most of the 32 bits of accuracy they need.
|> 
|> The oil industry consumes lots of supercomputer cycles doing seismic
|> analysis, and 32 bits is more than enough precision for that.  After
|> all, the seismic data has only 2 or 3 significant digits.  Using more
|> than 32 bits doesn't improve their ability to find oil. 

Much of the routine seismic processing in the oil industry indeed
does not require more than 32 bits (and not even really that 
many - much of the data is originally recorded using only 24 bits.)
Many of the algorithms used in processing the data are not iterative 
at all, but simply apply linear operators (often multidimensional) 
to the data.  The data sets used can be very large (from 10^8 to 10^11 
samples or so per survey and getting even bigger).  I/O bottlenecks 
moving that much data around are often much more of a problem than 
loss of precision.  

For seismic use, it is desirable for machines using 64 bit 
words to provide very efficient support for packing two 32 bit 
floats per word (both in memory and on disk), as well as the ability 
to do arithmetic using these packed floats without incurring major 
overhead cost or programming headaches.  Without such packing, using 
64 bit words can potentially mean doubling the memory and disk 
requirements, the cost of which can easily already dominate the 
price of a computer for seismic processing.

Seismic processing is not the only use for supercomputers in the
oil industry, but it is a major one, and constitutes a large enough
market segment that supercomputer manufacturers are generally aware 
of its particular needs.  I do hope that people who are designing
64 bit microprocessors, and particularly those who want to build 
MPP machines with them, remember that, for some of us, 32 bit 
floats are quite adequate much of the time.  

------------------------------------------------------------------
 Paul Fowler                     Western Geophysical R+D
 fowler@de01.denver.waii.com     Englewood, Colorado      
Newsgroups: comp.sys.super
From: root@wsm.com (System Manager)
Subject: Tape Drives on Cray YMP
Organization: Western Scientific
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL4
Distribution: usa
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 1992 16:50:09 GMT


Hello,

	I hope this is the right group to post in.

I have a customer that says he has a  Cray YMP that has an 8mm tape drive
(SCSI) on it. I have not heard of this before (SCSI drives on Cray machines)
I thought they required a Sun or VAX with SCSI drives as a front-end or
something.

	Anyhow could anyone tell me if this interface is Standard SCSI?
This person needs a tape capacity of >3GB for special files they are archiving
(Model files) and they 2.3GB Exabyte 8200 they have is too small and too slow.

	If the SCSI on the Cray is Standard we'll try to put a HP 8GB 4mm
DAT drive in place of the Exabyte.

	If anyone could lend insight to this matter I would appreciate it!

Please Email to jeff@wsm.com

Thanks in Advance,

Jeff Johnson
Western Scientific
jeff@wsm.com
From: stephens@access.digex.com (John Stephens)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.super
Subject: Re: Supercomputing Review
Date: 16 Dec 1992 15:09:59 GMT
Organization: Severn Companies, Inc., Lanham, MD 20706
Distribution: inet
NNTP-Posting-Host: access.digex.com

In article <1gfmd3INN1c1@early-bird.think.com> barmar@think.com (Barry Margolin) writes:
>
>PCI, the company that publishes Sun Observer, Hp/Apollo World, and other
>similar publications, announced in the latest Sun Observer that they have
>revived SR, with the new name "High Performance Computing Review".
>-- 

Yes, that is correct.  I received Volume 1, Issue 1 of
"High-Performance Computing Review", the re-constituted magazine,
a few days ago.  It looks very much the same.

This first issue was put together for Supercomputing-92.  The
first regular monthly issue is supposed to appear in February,
1993.

If you were on the subscription list to Supercomputing Review, I
expect that you will start receiving its replacement.  Tou can
contact the new editor, Larry Storer, by email at 

    storer@pcinews.lonestar.org

or PCI by telephone at 512/250-9023  (fax: 512/331-3900)

Newsgroups: comp.sys.sequent
From: jason@jarthur.claremont.edu (Jason Merrill)
Subject: Parallel programming with gcc?
Organization: Minimal
Date: 11 Dec 92 22:42:05

Is it possible to write programs using parallel programming constructs on
Dynix hosts using gcc/g++?  I'd like to be able to use C++...

--
Jason Merrill					jason@jarthur.claremont.edu
From: stevedc@syma.sussex.ac.uk (Stephen Carter)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.sequent
Subject: Re: Dynix/ptx 1.4.0 in the UK
Date: 11 Dec 92 13:42:18 GMT
Organization: University of Sussex
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL5

Rick Fadler (206) 450-8575 (rfadler@uswnvg.com) wrote:
: Brenda Parsons (parson@coulomb.pcc.oz.au) wrote:
: : One of our 3rd party Software vendors  insists that 
: : Dynix/ptx 1.4.0 isn't available in the UK, is
: : this true?
: 
: We have a customer in the UK that purchased a S2000/250 in June of 92'. It
: was delivered with the ptx 1.4 tapes. They purchased the system from Sequent
: in the UK so I would assume it's been available there since at least June.

We too purchased a system that came with ptx 1.4 already loaded
(including some world writable files that should not have been :-(. 
For reasons I'll not go into here we had to overwrite it with 1.3.

We now want 1.4 for this and our other system, and can we get it, can
we heck!

Come on Sequent corporate readers, tell us why!

Stephen Carter, Systems & Operations Manager, Computing Services, 
 University of Sussex, Brighton BN1 9QJ, UK
  JANET        : S.Carter@uk.ac.sussex.central
Newsgroups: comp.sys.sequent
From: pearce@coulomb.pcc.oz.au (Anthony Pearce)
Subject: rdump hanging at end of filesystem
Organization: Prospect Electricity
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]
Date: Tue, 15 Dec 92 06:23:52 GMT

I am rdumping filesystems on DYNIX/ptx 1.4 to a sun IPX exabyte and ocassionallyI get the dump hanging at the end of the backup not releasing the tape device 
and failing to write the

DUMP : Tape rewinding           message

This happens in a variety of filesystems both level 0 & 9 dumps .

How do the 3 or 4 processes spawned by /etc/rdump control the device ?
Are they prioritised/of differing importance ?

ANthony
Newsgroups: comp.sys.sequent
From: pete@wvus.org (Pete Gregory)
Subject: REPOST: what is PTX 1.4 ?
Organization: World Vision U.S.
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 92 21:38:36 GMT

Hi... we're running five Unisys 6000/70/80's here on PTX 1.3.1.  I see
a lot of news postings from people running PTX 1.4, and wonder:

* whose release is it?  Sequent?  Unisys?  both?

* what hardware platforms does it run on?

Thanks!
-- 

Pete Gregory       |  Internet: pete@wvus.org
UNIX SA            |  Bangpath: ames!elroy!wvus!pete
World Vision U.S.  |  Slowpath: 919 W. Huntington Dr., Monrovia, CA 91016
-- 

Pete Gregory       |  Internet: pete@wvus.org
UNIX SA            |  Bangpath: ames!elroy!wvus!pete
World Vision U.S.  |  Slowpath: 919 W. Huntington Dr., Monrovia, CA 91016
Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec,comp.unix.osf.osf1,comp.unix.ultrix
From: de5@ORNL.GOV (Dave Sill)
Subject: Alpha OSF Manager's mailing list
Followup-To: poster
Organization: Oak Ridge National Lab, Oak Ridge, TN
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 21:06:11 GMT

I've created a new mailing list for the managers of DEC Alpha AXP systems
running OSF/1.  The list is modelled after the DECstation-managers list
(which I also run) and the sun-managers list run by Phil LeFabvre.

This list is intended to provide quick turnaround, so there's a policy
describing exactly what is and isn't allowed.  You'll receive a copy of this
policy when you subscribe, but in a nutshell, only questions and summaries
of responses can be sent to the list.  There is *no* discussion permitted.

To subscribe, send a message to majordomo@sws10.ctd.ornl.gov with the
following command in the body, not the "Subject":

	subscribe alpha-osf-managers

If you'd like to set up an alias at your site for redistributing the list,
you can subscribe it by adding it to the command as follows:

	subscribe alpha-osf-managers alpha-osf-managers@foo.bar

You can also get a copy of the policy statement by sending the command:

	info alpha-osf-managers

to majordomo@sws10.ctd.ornl.gov.

-- 
Dave Sill (de5@ornl.gov)                 Computers should work the way beginners
Martin Marietta Energy Systems           expect them to, and one day they will.
Workstation Support                                                -- Ted Nelson
Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec.micro,comp.sys.dec
From: mbg@world.std.com (Megan B Gentry)
Subject: Re: PDP-11 Unibus peripherals
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA
Date: Sat, 12 Dec 1992 20:17:10 GMT


There are listings of lots of places that buy/sell old pdp-11 and
vax equipment.  One of them is (used to be?) American Used Computer,
there is also Eli Heffron in cambridge, MA.

Get any copy of dec professional and in the back you'll find listings
for such companies.

					Megan

Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec.micro
From: epass@nyx.cs.du.edu (Eric Pass)
Subject: Re:Rainbow 100
Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix @ U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 92 15:33:38 GMT

Carl Hoff and Bill Pechter are discussing some of the hardware
characteristics of the Rainbow:

CH> I am in the process of acquiring a retired Rainbow for a friend.
CH> I see the manual and previous posters discuss a couple things. 
CH> First a Z-80 and a 8088/6 >processor. 

BP> The Z80/8088 dual processor configuration is standard in ALL Rainbows.

<Discussion of DEC DOS 2.11 deleted>

CH> is the controller and needed stuff available, cheap, can some/many/all
CH> of the currently available st-412 drives be used with the system
CH> (albeit with limited capacity).

BP> You can use any ST506 drive.  The controller, however is the harder
BP> thing to find.

Amen to this!!  I'm looking for a hard disk controller as well, with
no luck so far.  If anyone knows of a source, could they post or
Email as they see fit.

Thanks,
  Eric.  (epass@nyx.cs.du.edu)
From: bruce@ais.com (Bruce C. Wright)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec.micro
Subject: Re: Rainbow 100+
Date: 11 Dec 92 22:10:53 GMT
Organization: Applied Information Systems, Chapel Hill, NC

In article <1992Dec11.231842.1775@organpipe.uug.arizona.edu>, tom@afthree.as.arizona.edu (Thomas J. Trebisky) writes:
> bruce@ais.com (Bruce C. Wright) writes:
>>I do not believe that the Rainbow ever officially supported that drive;
>>certainly the standard DEC hard disk drive formmater did not know about
>>it.  I didn't necessarily mean that the drive wasn't used in _some_ DEC
>>machines, but it wasn't supported on the Rainbow and the Rainbow software
>>knew _nothing_ about it.  You need third-party software in order to use it.
>>I think the point was that by the time the ST-225 was out, DEC had already
>>effectively given up on the Rainbow.
> 
> Charles is right.  The DEC formatting software can indeed format an
> ST225 (whatever approx. 20M capacity drive they offer works, probably
> the RD-31).  Anyway, I know because I did it long before I ever got my
> hands on Wutil, though that would certainly work too.  As to whether an
> RD-31 is actually a DEC relabelled St225, probably, but who knows!
> I remember hearing that DEC wanted an astronomical price for their
> relabelled drives, but that is another story.  And besides that, my
> second hand ST225 didn't live long  :-(

Must have been close to the time DEC dropped the Rainbow then.  I'm
quite sure that when we first got ST225's to upgrade from the old 5MB
ST506 drives, that we had to get WUTIL then because the DEC disk
formatting software would not recognize the drive.

Bruce C. Wright
From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec.micro
Subject: Differences between an ST-225 and an RD31 (was Re: Rainbow 100+)
Date: 12 Dec 92 18:59:29 GMT
Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Organization: Columbia University

In article <1992Dec11.231842.1775@organpipe.uug.arizona.edu> tom@afthree.as.arizona.edu (Thomas J. Trebisky) writes:

>                                                  As to whether an
>RD-31 is actually a DEC relabelled St225, probably, but who knows!


I do!  I have them both right here:

ST-225 has a ground clip in the back for a standard narrow fast-on.  For some
unknown reason DEC ordered the drives without it.  The DM II sometimes was
shipped with an explanation that it was OK to leave the ground wire already
in place dangling!

RD31 has an insulating layer applied to the top surface in a few square inches
in an odd pattern.  I now know why:  when the drive is used, such as in a
DECmate III+ where an RX33 (TEAC FD55GFR/V) drive is above the hard disk, this
is just added security to ensure the floppy board doesn't short out on the
hard disk metal surface.  If you are careful to always ensure favoring the
screws to slightly raise the floppy above the hard disk, there is no problem, 
alternatively you could apply contact paper to the ST-225 top surface to 
accomplish pretty much the same thing.  ST-225 is a "fat" half-height drive,
and some TEAC drives are "fat" also, in the underside region, so tolerances
being what they are, this could cause a short circuit.

The RD31 is clearly marked as a Seagate ST-225.  DEC has the standard flaw
chart from Seagate as well.  So, if I transplanted the insulating layer and
removed the ground clip (which I have since restored in the DEC drive :-))
and transferred all of the bar code stickers, you couldn't tell which is
the ST-225 and which is the RD-31.

cjl
From: gezelter@rlgsc.com
Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec.micro
Subject: Re: Rainbow 100+
Date: 15 Dec 92 09:24:14 EST
Organization: Robert Gezelter Software Consultant, Flushing, NY

In article <1992Dec11.113407.5893@ais.com>, bruce@ais.com (Bruce C. Wright) writes:
>> ...
>> Wrong; the ST-225 *is* the RD-31.  It is standard on DECmate III+ and often
>> found in DM II.
> 
> I do not believe that the Rainbow ever officially supported that drive;
> certainly the standard DEC hard disk drive formmater did not know about
> it.  I didn't necessarily mean that the drive wasn't used in _some_ DEC
> machines, but it wasn't supported on the Rainbow and the Rainbow software
> knew _nothing_ about it.  You need third-party software in order to use it.
> I think the point was that by the time the ST-225 was out, DEC had already
> effectively given up on the Rainbow.
> 
> Bruce C. Wright
-- 
Bruce,
 
I can completely state that the Rainbow DID support the RD31. I 
had the "honor" of purchasing the RD31 and controller directly 
from Digital (got a good deal). The package included a revised 
formatting program which was fully capable of formatting the RD31 
(aka ST-225).
 
- Bob
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Robert "Bob" Gezelter                       E-Mail:  gezelter@rlgsc.com  |
| Robert Gezelter Software Consultant         Voice:   +1 718 463 1079     |
| 35-20 167th Street, Suite 215               Fax:       (on Request)      |
| Flushing, New York  11358-1731                                           |
| United States of America                                                 |
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
From: bruce@ais.com (Bruce C. Wright)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec.micro
Subject: Re: Rainbow 100+
Date: 11 Dec 92 11:34:07 GMT
Organization: Applied Information Systems, Chapel Hill, NC

In article <1992Dec10.003626.599@news.columbia.edu>, lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
> In article <1992Dec8.210008.5888@ais.com> bruce@ais.com (Bruce C. Wright) writes:
>>In article <1992Dec7.222607.3388@newstand.syr.edu>, amichiel@rodan.acs.syr.edu (Allen J Michielsen) writes:
>>> 
>>>  If there is the DEC DOS 2.11 version available, usually for free, and the
>>> system isn't compatible, why would anybody buy a dos 3.1 or code blue.
>>
>>Several reasons:
>>
>>    1) DOS 3.1 can handle larger hard disk drive partitions.  DEC DOS 2.11
>>	couldn't handle partitions larger than 8MB as I recall;  DOS 3.1
>>	can handle up to 32MB.  This makes dealing with reasonable-sized
>>	hard disks more tolerable.
> 
> DECmate MS-DOS 2.11 can handle up to about 11 MB bootable partitions and
> 32 MB non-bootable partitions.  I suspect that Rainbow MS-DOS does about
> as well, but few Rainbows have enough disk present to test this out.

I'm _quite_ sure that DEC MS-DOS 2.11 for the Rainbow did not support 32MB
partitions, but I don't remember exactly where the cutoff was.  I _think_
it was 8MB -- I distinctly remember that when we had 20MB drives on the
Rainbow running DOS 2.11, we had to break them up into several partitions;
3 as I recall.  The DECmate MS-DOS apparently was less crippled.

> It is noteworthy that there at least two MS-DOS 3.10 versions, only one from
> Suitable Solutions.  The other is from DEC itself.

The DEC version of MS-DOS 3.1 was an internal project that was never
officially available outside of DEC.  There was never an end-user version
of it marketed and there is no documentation available.  The Suitable
Solutions MS-DOS 3.1 was derived from the DEC version (DEC licensed the
rights to the code to Suitable Solutions under some undisclosed licensing
arrangement), and was so far as I know the only version of DOS 3.1 that
was actually _sold_ to end-users.

>>You can use most drives with an ST506 interface on the Rainbow.  So you
>>can use an ST-225 as a 5 or 10MB drive, though I'd rather use it as a
>>20MB drive :-).  The Rainbow does support that, although you do have to
>>get one of the PD disk formatting programs for it like WUTIL (the standard
>>DEC disk formatting program didn't support anything but DEC drives, and
>>the ST-225 doesn't have the same geometry as any DEC drive).
> 
> Wrong; the ST-225 *is* the RD-31.  It is standard on DECmate III+ and often
> found in DM II.

I do not believe that the Rainbow ever officially supported that drive;
certainly the standard DEC hard disk drive formmater did not know about
it.  I didn't necessarily mean that the drive wasn't used in _some_ DEC
machines, but it wasn't supported on the Rainbow and the Rainbow software
knew _nothing_ about it.  You need third-party software in order to use it.
I think the point was that by the time the ST-225 was out, DEC had already
effectively given up on the Rainbow.

Bruce C. Wright
From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec.micro
Subject: Re: Rainbow 100+
Date: 12 Dec 92 19:06:43 GMT
Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Organization: Columbia University

In article <1992Dec11.221053.5894@ais.com> bruce@ais.com (Bruce C. Wright) writes:
>
>Must have been close to the time DEC dropped the Rainbow then.  I'm
>quite sure that when we first got ST225's to upgrade from the old 5MB
>ST506 drives, that we had to get WUTIL then because the DEC disk
>formatting software would not recognize the drive.

I don't remember which drives, but there was a DECdirect catalog claiming
Rainbow disk upgrades, and I believe that RD-31 was one of the listed drives.
In any case, it claimed that whatever was needed was provided, and this was
certainly for larger drives than the 5 and 10.  (I am certain one was the
RD-52.)

cjl
Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec.micro
From: mfroedge@lunatix.uucp (Maxwell Froedge)
Subject: Micro PDP 11
Organization: Lexington Public Access Unix. -KY- (606) 255-9121
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 02:19:41 GMT



I would information on the DEC Micro PDP 11.  I have inherited 2
of them without documentation or software.  The only software I


have is RT11 installed on the HD.  I also have a 11/83
processor card.  My questions are this:

1.  Where can I find software and documentation for these guys?

2.  Can I change the floppies to 1.2 meg drives.  I seem to
remember a DEC PDP with a 1.2 meg floppy.

3.  These are 11/23 processors.  I have 256K NEC 3rd cards
installed.  What is the maxium memory these support (both the NEC
cards and the 11/23 processor.)  The system is a Q-bus.