test-drb September 2015

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

198 participants
312 discussions

by couryhouse＠aol.com

We have 10 years of backups.ed# Sent from my Verizon Wireless 4G LTE smartphone -------- Original message -------- From: Robert Feldman <r_a_feldman at hotmail.com> Date: 09/16/2015 10:40 AM (GMT-07:00) To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Subject: re: Backups [was Re: Is tape dead?] >From: Mouse <mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > >> I think a more important issue in backing up is "How many GENERATIONS > >to you keep around?" > >For many purposes, that's an important consideration, yes.? There's >something (small) I back up weekly for which I keep the most recent >seven backups, the oldest backup in each of the most recent twelve >months, and the oldest backup in any year.? I'm considering something >of the sort for my house backups - live replication to a backup host, >with a once-a-week freeze of the replica, storing past replica drives >on a scheme somewhat like the above. There is a ramsomware variant that encrypts the files but silently decrypts them when they are accessed. It does this for six months before deactivating the on-demand decryption and displaying the ransom message, the theory being that by that time all of the backups will be of the encrypted files, and thus will be useless for restoring good versions. As to how one can become infected, see http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/08/27/malvertising_feature/?page=1. Major sites, such as The New York Times, Reuters, Yahoo!, and Bloomberg, have been serving malware -- including ransomeware -- through hijacked advertisements. No need to click on anything, the ad serves up the malware. BTW, where I work got hit with ransomeware in December. We were lucky that it first hosed the accounting/time tracking database, which generated errors when someone tried to enter her time. When I went to restore a backup of the database, I noticed the ransomware's html ransom note file and shut down the system before too many more files were encypted. We were able to restore everything (except the originally infected user's computer, which we wiped and reinstalled) from an unconnected backup drive. Bob ?? ?

8 years, 10 months

PDP-11 manuals scanned/scanning

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Noel Chiappa > I have also gone through my set of manuals and prepared a list of all > the ones which aren't online. > ... > EK-1184A-TM-PR4 11/84 Technical Reference (Preliminary) > EK-1184E-TM-001 PDP-11/84 System Technical and Reference Manual > EK-1184E-MG PDP-11/84-E User's and Maintenance Guide So I spaced. 1184E-TM-001 _is_ online; not sure how I missed it! > From: Henk Gooijen > I would be very interested in the 11/84 docs, as far as not available. I'm not sure there's much in the other two which isn't in the other 11/84 manuals which are already online - I think the content is mostly the same, just arranged differently. A few minor tweaks (e.g. that sentence I found a while back about the BIAK/BDMG jumpers on the 11/84 backplane), but nothing major. I'll get to them at some point - alas, I bound them, so now I have to un-bind them before I can scan them! Oh well!! > I have EK-KK11A-TM-001 "KK11-A cache memory technical manual" Lyle Bickley made that one available a couple of months back. It doesn't seem to have made it into the repositories, though? Should I upload a copy to my web site, and send along the URL? > From: Jerome H. Fine > However, both of the directories at the next level up are blocked. If > there is any possibility that both these directories could be made > available to allow the other PDF files to be viewed Err, there are no other PDF files there, except the 11/73 CPU board prints, which I mentioned here recently and have now been mirrored. > If not, a list of the actual links to the other PDF files which are > available to be viewed would be appreciated. I should probably throw together a web page with links to all the PDP-11 files there (e.g. the one I just put together, of print sets that are available inside other print sets), and link to that from my home page. > Also, do you have any files of source code or binary distributions of > RT-11 files? Alas, being of the MIT persuasion, we never did anything with DEC software (except TWENEX, on the DECSystem20's), so I have nothing of anything to do with DEC software - Unix all the way! ;-) Noel

8 years, 10 months

12" Floppy Disks

by binarydinosaurs＠gmail.com

Morning folks, I've been contacted by a teacher who's looking for any information about 12" floppies. Am I imagining that they really existed? I'm sure I've seen one or seen adverts for them, maybe at Bletchley Park. Others he's contacted think he's getting confused with 12" laser discs but I'm not so sure. Anyone? -- adrian/witchy Owner of Binary Dinosaurs, the UK's biggest home computer collection? www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk

8 years, 10 months

Desperately need BA11-N/BA11-S Technical Manual

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

So, I'm trying to fix a broken Power Monitor Boards (the thing that drives ACLO/DCLO) in an H786 (BA11-N power supply), and although I have the prints, I can't make head or tail out of them. (The circuit is a maze of op-amps and 555's. OK, OK, so maybe an analog guy can take one quick look, and understand instantly how it works. But I don't have that gene! :-) So I'm looking for a BA11-N or BA11-S Technical Manual, to explain it to me (my experience is that the DEC Tech Manuals for power supplies are _really_ good at that). (Either the BA11-N or BA11-S since, although the PM boards have different part numbers in the two - 54-12528-0-1 in the BA11-N/H786, and 54-15048-0-1 in the BA11-S/H7861, the circuits in the two seem to be pretty much identical, looking at the prints.) Alas, neither seems to be available online. (The BA11-N is EK-BA11N-TM-001; the BA11-S is in the "PDP-11/23B Mounting Box Technical Manual", EK-23BMB-TM-001.) I have clues to the existence of a couple of copies of the BA11-N one, though. A "David Powell" (then at ICUKnet in the UK) sent out a message saying he had one, but the email address for him at ICUKnet no longer works - I haven't (yet) tried to find him via LinkedIn because it's a common name. I don't suppose anyone here knows him, do they? Also, this page: http://ed-thelen.org/comp-hist/Book-Catalog.html which claims to be the "Book Catalog (incomplete) of the Computer History Museum, as of July 27 2002" says they have one. Would it still be there, and is there any chance that, if so, it can be scanned an put online? Many thanks, in advance, for any help with this - I'm pretty desperate! Noel

8 years, 10 months

Still seeking 3B2 information

by lists＠loomcom.com

Hi everyone, I've made tremendous progress on my 3B2 emulator. It's being implemented under the SIMH simulator platform, which has been a huge help. My WE32100 core is getting closer to being complete. I'd consider it alpha quality right now, but it has enough instruction coverage to pass the 3B2's power-on self tests and to (barely) run some of the 3B2 firmware mode tools. Implementing the WE32100 core has been thanks to the processor manual and assembly language manuals that are available on BitSavers, but outside of the CPU, virtually all of my understanding of the 3B2's architecture has come from studying the ROMs and the SYSVR3 source code. I've also been helped by having remote access to a running 3B2 so I can assemble and disassemble code using the real AT&T tools. Beyond that, I have found precious little documentation. I'm at the point now where I'm pretty well stuck until I can find more information. I understand large chunks of the memory map now and should be able to do things like simulate the floppy and hard disk controller, but there are large gaps in my understanding. There are many undocumented registers that are used by the firmware, but don't appear in the SYSV source code anywhere. What they mean and what they're for is anybody's guess. I've just stubbed them out for now. If anybody has access to schematics, architecture docs, or other memory map information, I'd be eternally grateful if you could share it! -Seth

8 years, 10 months

PDP-11 manuals scanned/scanning

by jhfinedp3k＠compsys.to

>Noel Chiappa wrote: >OK, so I finally got set up to scan manuals, with a scanner with a document >feeder, so I don't have to sit there and feed the beast! So now I can scan in >a number of 'missing' (online, at least) PDP-11 manuals which I happen to >have. > >The first thing through the machine was the DZV11 Technical Manual (which >Paul Anderson was gracious enough to loan out, to enable it to be put online >- thanks Paul!), now available here: > > http://ana-3.lcs.mit.edu/~jnc/tech/pdp11/EK-DZV11-TM-001_Jun78.pdf > >(as always, please download/distribute/replicate to other repositories). >I also did the 11/34 cache board user manual, now here: > > http://ana-3.lcs.mit.edu/~jnc/tech/pdp11/EK-KK11A-UG-001_Oct78.pdf > I was able to look at both manuals. THANK YOU!! However, both of the directories at the next level up are blocked. If there is any possibility that both these directories could be made available to allow the other PDF files to be viewed, that would be appreciated. If not, a list of the actual links to the other PDF files which are available to be viewed would be appreciated. Also, do you have any files of source code or binary distributions of RT-11 files? I have a number of RT-11 DOC sets which I am no longer using: V05.05 RT-11 DOC set V05.04G RT-11 DOC set V05.02 RT-11 DOC set I am not positive about the latter two, but the V05.05 RT-11 DOC set is probably available unless Jay West wants it now rather than waiting for the V05.07 RT-11 DOC set. Since not of these dead tree RT-11 DOC sets are bound, they would be easy to (automatically) scan - except that each of the RT-11 DOC sets is approximately 5,000 pages and both sides must be scanned for a total of about 10,000 pages each. Since the V05.07 RT-11 DOC set is already scanned and available as many PDF files, there may not be any interest in the prior versions. Please let me know. If no one is interested, then I will start discarding them in a few months. I have promised to send the dead tree version of my V05.07 RT-11 DOC set to Jay West, but that will wait until I am on the other side of the green rug - or at least close enough. Jerome Fine

8 years, 10 months

Clearpoint Q-RAM 11 chip locations

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

Documentation for the Clearpoint Q-RAM 11 board seems to be rather scarce; all I could find was a user manual, with no technical info (manual or prints or other documentation) online. (I'd be glad to be proved wrong! :-) So as part of a project I needed to figure out which memory chips were which; now that I've worked it out, I'm putting that info online here in the archives, where eventually Google will find it, and make it available to anyone who needs it. So, looking at the card from the component side, with the handle at the top, and the contact fingers at the bottom, there's an array of memory chips 12 columns wide, and 6 rows high; I see no ID system on the card, so I number the columns A-L (from the left), and the rows 0-5 (from the top). The card can have 4 banks of 128KB each, for a max total of 512KB. The chip-bit relationship is pretty random: Bank 0 - Columns A, E, I: 01 I2 02 E5 04 I3 010 A5 020 A4 040 A2 0100 A0 0200 A1 0400 E3 01000 A3 02000 E0 04000 E4 010000 E1 020000 E2 040000 I1 0100000 I0 Bank 1 - Columns B, F, J: Bank 2 - Columns C, G, K: Bank 3 - Columns D, H, L: The banks 2/3 column assignments are a guess, not verified as yet. The bit allocation seems to be the same in all banks; I tried a few in bank 1, and they matched the ones in bank 0 (suitably offset in column, of course). Noel

8 years, 10 months

release dates of early microcomputer operating systems, incl. Intel ISIS

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Dave G4UGM > although ENIAC first ran a program it was stored as acoustic waves I don't think ENIAC used acoustic delay storage? Perhaps what you're thinking of is that in the original ENIAC usage, there was no 'program' as we now think of that term; the machine had to be configured (via connecting up computing units with cables) for each separate problem, i.e. more 'configurable' than 'programmable' (at least in the Turing machine sense). Hence the debate over whether it or the Baby was the first 'computer'. Noel

8 years, 10 months

A poltergeist in my machine?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Jerry Weiss > Check if the -5v charge pump is stable and supplying the correct voltage. > I recall a problem ... in which the on board pump went slowly bad. > Depending on the data content and tolerance margins for the memory > chips, we saw very erratic problems. That doesn't sound like my problem; this board was _consistently_ failing hard (would not write _any_ data, no-how, no-where), and then *poof* it was pretty consistently totally working (passing memory diags, etc). And the change from 'consistently not working at all' to 'working completely' happened when I 'touched' (see below) that pin with a probe. So either i) it was pure coincidence (possible, I suppose), or ii) there was some wierd causality. > From: Jon Elson > 1. There was a conductive hair on the board, and you knocked it off > with the probe. I'd brushed the board pretty comprehensively with a toothbrush to get all the dust off. (Yeah, I know, static - but it's pretty humid here right at the moment! ;-) > 2. There was a bad solder joint and the pressure of the probe broke > through the oxide. ... This is my highest probability guess. ... > 3. The chip has a bad internal wire bond, and the pressure on the lead > made it work. Well, I was using a DIP clip, so the pressure on the pin was pretty consistent before and after. Yeah, attaching the 'scope probe to the second pin would have wiggled the clip a tiny bit, but I'm still dubious. My current best guess, after sleeping on it, relates to the fact that the 'magic' pin was an output from a delay line. Delay lines, in that era, were apparently potted confections of inductors and capacitors. So maybe the extra current drain with the probe on somehow affected one (or more) of the capacitors in the delay line? A total WAG, but it's very mysterious! Noel

8 years, 10 months

release dates of early microcomputer operating systems,

by Wayne.Smith＠warnerbros.com

> Date: Tue, 15 Sep 2015 03:03:05 -0600 > From: Eric Smith <spacewar at gmail.com> > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > Subject: Re: release dates of early microcomputer operating systems, > incl. Intel ISIS > > Are you sure ISIS (one) didn't have disk support? I thought that was > shipped with the first Intel MDS-DOS floppy systems for use on the > MDS-800 in 1975. A 1975 edition of the MDS-DOS Operator's Manual is > listed among other Intel manuals at: > > http://www.intel-vintage.info/aboutme.htm Looked up the copyright registration for the manual and related items: A712678. MDS-DOS diskette operating system operator's manual 79 p. Add. ti: Intel diskette operating system microcomputer development System MDS-DOS operator's manual. (c) Intel Corporation; 22Dec75. A712670. Intel diskette operating system microcomputer development System MDS-DOS hardware reference manual. 1 v. (c) Intel Corporation; 15Dec75.

8 years, 10 months

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test-drb September 2015