From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on inbox.vuxu.org X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.0 required=5.0 tests=MAILING_LIST_MULTI, RCVD_IN_DNSWL_NONE autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 Received: (qmail 14379 invoked from network); 24 Sep 2020 13:04:59 -0000 Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (45.79.103.53) by inbox.vuxu.org with ESMTPUTF8; 24 Sep 2020 13:04:59 -0000 Received: by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix, from userid 112) id 400DD9CEA4; Thu, 24 Sep 2020 23:04:57 +1000 (AEST) Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id E428A9CBCA; Thu, 24 Sep 2020 23:04:08 +1000 (AEST) Received: by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix, from userid 112) id D7BF29CBCA; Thu, 24 Sep 2020 23:04:04 +1000 (AEST) Received: from mercury.lcs.mit.edu (mercury.lcs.mit.edu [18.26.0.122]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 1C85B9CB3A for ; Thu, 24 Sep 2020 23:04:04 +1000 (AEST) Received: by mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Postfix, from userid 11178) id EDE4718C09F; Thu, 24 Sep 2020 09:04:02 -0400 (EDT) To: tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org Message-Id: <20200924130402.EDE4718C09F@mercury.lcs.mit.edu> Date: Thu, 24 Sep 2020 09:04:02 -0400 (EDT) From: jnc@mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa) Subject: Re: [TUHS] Fwd: Choice of Unix for 11/03 and 11/23+ Systems X-BeenThere: tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.26 Precedence: list List-Id: The Unix Heritage Society mailing list List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Cc: jnc@mercury.lcs.mit.edu Errors-To: tuhs-bounces@minnie.tuhs.org Sender: "TUHS" > From: Paul Riley > On my physical '03 I have twin Sykes floppy drives. I note that in the > LSX archives there is a Sykes driver, so I can adapt that I guess. Yes, here: https://www.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=LSX/sys/sykfd.c It looks like it should be a straight drop-in, to run it on Mini-Unix. Not sure if your controller is the exact same model, though? Is there any documentation on yours? (I haven't done any searching.) If you want to boot from it, you'll need to write a bootstrap for it; I poked around, but didn't see one. (Not sure how they booted machines with one, back in the day; maybe it wasn't the only drive, and they booted off something else.) You can probably modify the RX one: https://www.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=LSX/src/rxboot.s https://www.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=LSX/src/rxboot2.s Note that this is a 2-stage bootstrap, apparently as a result of the small hardware block size on the RX. And of course there's still the issue of 'how to get bits onto it'. Can floppies for it be written on some other kind of machine? If so, someone on the Classic Computers list: http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/listinfo/cctalk may be able to help you write those, or an RL02 pack. You should start by getting some experience building V6 OS loads (Mini-Unix will be _very_ similar); use a simulator. I have a lengthy tutorial here: http://www.chiappa.net/~jnc/tech/V6Unix.html It's in terms of Ersatz-11, which I prefer because it has that nice DOS device, which makes it easy to get files into the Unix (so I can use my normal editor on the host machine). However, I gather most people prefer SIMH; there is a tutorial here: https://gunkies.org/wiki/Running_Unix_v6_in_SIMH (I didn't write it; I know nothing of SIMH) for that option. How do people using SIMH get files into a Unix running on one? Larry Allen just wrote a PDP-11 simulator in Rust, and he's thinking about adding a paper-tape reader (connectable to a file), so that if he installs the stock V6 PTR driver, he can just do 'cat /dev/ptr > myfile'; sort of like how VM/370 used the virtual card reader. Noel