This might be of interest to many of the people on the list.
paul
> Begin forwarded message:
>
>
>> Also, ACM has currently opened up all of its digital archives during these pandemic times, ... https://dl.acm.org/action/doSearch
I know this doesn't count as a general purpose computer, but does
anybody have detailed technical information about the Monroe 7860
business calculator/printer? I think it was produced in the early 1980's.
Specifically, I'm looking for information about the rom OS for this
machine. e.g. are there more built-in commands like "dir". Maybe,
is there a basic interpreter I can get at?
On the hardware side, does anybody know about the mag stripe paper
that the machine is supposed to work with? It appears to store user
data on the mag stripe on the paper that it prints on...interesting
idea, although limited.
Thanks.
Bill Newman
Just in the middle of getting a fresh OpenVMS install set up on my
VAXStation (the original having been done years ago when I barely had
any idea what I was doing,) and looking through various repositories
for interesting software to put on there, and I got to thinking about
something I recalled reading about a few years back.
I know from the book "Smalltalk-80: Bits of History, Words of Advice"
- http://sdmeta.gforge.inria.fr/FreeBooks/BitsOfHistory/BitsOfHistory.pdf
- that, back when, there were two implementations of Smalltalk-80 for
VAXen - the first was Unix-based, done by an independent research
group, while the second ran under VMS and was actually developed
within DEC. This version - VAX/Smalltalk-80 - was headed up by Stoney
Ballard and Stephen Shirron; anybody know if there's a surviving copy
out there, if it was ever available outside DEC to begin with?
Date: Mon, 30 Mar 2020 10:58:46 -0400
> From: Bill Gunshannon <bill.gunshannon at hotmail.com <mailto:bill.gunshannon at hotmail.com>>
> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
> <cctalk at classiccmp.org <mailto:cctalk at classiccmp.org>>
> Subject: APL-11
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>
> Haven't given up on DIBOL. May try installing the RT-11 version and
> see if it runs.
>
> But now another language of interest has reared its ugly head. :-)
>
> Anybody have an image of the tape for APL-11? Manual claims it
> runs on all of the PDP-11 OSes and it is another language from
> my past that I haven't touched (other than to read some programs
> out of curiosity) in more than two decades.
Bill,
I have the APL-11 V2.1 source files on a RL02 disk image. I will make it available at http://www.rsx11m.com/apl11.zip <http://www.rsx11m.com/apl11.zip>
Once you mount the disk image with Simh, the are two ready to run task images that will run under RSX11M or M+
In [201,200]APL6OK.TSK and APL7OK.TSK that are the REAL*4 and REAL*8 versions of APL-11. On the disk are the
Original .MAC sources as well as files from a RSX SIG tape that modified APL-11 for I/D under RSX11M+ that increased
The workspace (.BXWA from ~30000 to ~60000 bytes). It also contains a character set for Vt220 for the APL character set.
When you install the APL task experiment with the /INC to maximize the available workspace, On my system, I can
INS APL6.TSK/INC=37000 to max the workspace for the single precision version.
Also, the scanned APL-11 reference manual can be downloaded at http://www.rsx11m.com/APL-11-Ref-Man.pdf <http://www.rsx11m.com/APL-11-Ref-Man.pdf>
and the APL11 installation guide at http://www.rsx11m.com/APL11ins.pdf <http://www.rsx11m.com/APL11ins.pdf>
The RSX SIG files that have the info to change APL-11 to an I/D RSX11M+ task are at [370,360] on the RL02 disk. I remember having this work back in the mid-1980s butI have not been able to get it to work today. If I link it with ODT it seems to blow up when the first overlay is loaded. If anyone could help with that I?d really appreciate it!
Best,
Mark
>
> I have the source to something called APL-11 for Unix but it is
> not the same thing. Actually, not even close. :-)
>
> Would love to see a few pointers.
>
> Oh, and in case anyone is curious about my endeavors....
> The SIMH system I am using now is based on the 11/70 and was built
> with only 2M of memory. Why you would do that under SIMH where there
> is really no memory constraint at all, I can not fathom. I used to
> have a bunch of 11/44's and that has been my favorite since my original
> 11/24 system died long, long ago./ I am going to configure a SIMH
> System using the 11/44 as my model and then reinstall everything in
> order to have a really good system for playing with this stuff.
>
> Sure wish there was a way to find some of the third party stuff from
> the sourcebooks. A lot of nice software that should have been saved
> for historical reasons, if nothing else, has been lost.
>
> bill
