26 Nov
2014
26 Nov
'14
5:40 p.m.
Rich,
I briefly had it running on MIT-AI (the KS, not the KA) in 2009 on an RM03,
but the CRAM died and we haven't had the cycles available to do something
about that. It's on deck for next year.
(Yes, MIT-AI. We purchased it from CZ, who rescued it from the AILab skip,
then from the Symbolics skip, then eventually sold it on eBay when he had
to. It still has the MIT de-acquisition sticker on the front panel. It's
next to the Toad-1 in the computer room.)
...
But, completely seriously, ITS is an amazing system,
and although there
are
a few running on simulators, I'm not sure anyone
has it running on real
hardware. That would be Very Cool.
I agree. As I noted in my response to John Wilson, I'm working on it. :-)
I have a good RM03 and a good KS. Get me a pack with ITS on it and I'll
work on it too :-)
Mike
On Thu, Nov 27, 2014 at 2:27 PM, Rich Alderson <
RichA at livingcomputermuseum.org> wrote:
> From: Noel Chiappa
> Sent: Wednesday, November 26, 2014 4:43 PM
>
> >> From: Rich Alderson
>
> >> We have a non-running 1090 here at the museum
>
> > Oh, good, then you have a machine to run ITS on (along with ones for
> WAITS
> > and Tops-10! :-)
>
> Yes, we do, but not that one. "It's dim, Jed."
>
> > Just kidding (mostly); ITS did run on a KL (without hardware mods), but
> I'm
> > not sure which model it was; it was a pretty early one.
>
> ITS ran on exactly 1 KL, MIT-MC. It was a "Model A" system, probably a
> KL10B
> but I'd have to ask the owner. It's currently in storage in Sweden.
>
> > I know it had the external memory bus, and I _think_ it had the RH20s (I
> > know it had RP's of some kind, I think MassBus, because one of them was
> > dual-ported and the console 11 booted off of it, and I don't think it had
> > whatever PDP-10 disk controller the KA's had). I guess it was a KL-B,
> then?
>
> All KL10-based systems have RH20s. The front end 11/40 has an RH11, and
> one
> disk (at least) has to be dual-ported between the front end and the -10.
>
> > Whichever one it was, anyone who wanted to run ITS on a KL would
> probably want
> > the same model - I know ITS had custom microcode (in part to emulate the
> MIT
> > pager, which had a different page size from the BBN/DEC one, and also
> because
> > ITS used some custom instructions which had been added to the KA's), and
> > although one could probably get that to run on a different model KL, it
> might
> > be (an unknown amount of) work.
>
> Yeah, I've thought about how much work it would be. I'd prefer to start
> with
> the MC system if I were going to run ITS on a KL.
>
> But, completely seriously, ITS is an amazing system,
and although there
> are
> > a few running on simulators, I'm not sure anyone has it running on real
> > hardware. That would be Very Cool.
>
> I agree. As I noted in my response to John Wilson, I'm working on it. :-)
>
> Rich
>
>
> Rich Alderson
> Vintage Computing Sr. Systems Engineer
> Living Computer Museum
> 2245 1st Avenue S
> Seattle, WA 98134
>
> mailto:RichA at LivingComputerMuseum.org
>
> http://www.LivingComputerMuseum.org/
>
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