PDP-11 tape question

John Foust jfoust at threedee.com
Wed Jun 24 06:47:32 CDT 2020


At 12:50 AM 6/24/2020, Chuck Guzis via cctalk wrote:
>Thanks for straightening that out--all I know is that the tapes are from
>an 11/70, which isn't much information, admittedly.

A few months ago, I was re-rescuing some files that a friend had
once read from a RSTS tape.  He gave two sets of files.  
I'm not sure what tool or system he was using, but it
probably was newer than the RSTS.

One grabbed the files with the 14 bytes prepended to every file
but without correct filenames, the other rescued the files
with the filenames but without the correct dates.

Once I figured out the nameless files had the 14 byte DOS-11
tape header, I wrote a little C tool that gave the files their
proper filename and date.  You're welcome to it.  For Windows
at least and probably Unix.

My deeper goal was to rescue the files well enough to 
get them running again under SIMH and/or one of the 
JavaScript-based in-browser emulators.  The programs wanted
the FORTRAN compiler environment and BASIC-PLUS, and
finding all those installers of the right version and combination,
learning how to get it all right...  whew, I wasn't sysop-level
back then, and so much time has passed, it's quite a puzzle.

- John



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