From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: tuhs-bounces@minnie.tuhs.org X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.1 (2015-04-28) on inbox.vuxu.org X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-0.8 required=5.0 tests=HEADER_FROM_DIFFERENT_DOMAINS, MAILING_LIST_MULTI,MIME_QP_LONG_LINE,RCVD_IN_DNSWL_NONE autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.1 Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (minnie.tuhs.org [45.79.103.53]) by inbox.vuxu.org (OpenSMTPD) with ESMTP id 0dfb3dd3 for ; Fri, 22 Jun 2018 17:50:18 +0000 (UTC) Received: by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix, from userid 112) id 6120BA1842; Sat, 23 Jun 2018 03:50:17 +1000 (AEST) Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8FD40A1815; Sat, 23 Jun 2018 03:49:59 +1000 (AEST) Received: by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix, from userid 112) id 31DE59EE0C; Sat, 23 Jun 2018 03:49:57 +1000 (AEST) Received: from cesium.clock.org (cesium.clock.org [157.22.10.65]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 22FD49EDE9 for ; Sat, 23 Jun 2018 03:49:56 +1000 (AEST) Received: from cesium.clock.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by cesium.clock.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D62CDCC19F; Fri, 22 Jun 2018 10:49:54 -0700 (PDT) From: "Erik E. Fair" In-reply-to: <20180622131129.C82D018C073@mercury.lcs.mit.edu> To: jnc@mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa) Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Mime-Version: 1.0 Date: Fri, 22 Jun 2018 10:49:54 -0700 Message-ID: <425.1529689794@cesium.clock.org> Subject: Re: [TUHS] Old mainframe I/O speed (was: core) X-BeenThere: tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.20 Precedence: list List-Id: The Unix Heritage Society mailing list List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Cc: tuhs@tuhs.org Errors-To: tuhs-bounces@minnie.tuhs.org Sender: "TUHS" >Date: Fri, 22 Jun 2018 09:11:29 -0400 (EDT) >From: jnc@mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa) > > > From: "Erik E. Fair" > > > ordered a VAX-8810 to replace two 11/780s on the promise from DEC that > > all our UniBus and MASSbus peripherals would still work ... which we > > knew (from others on the Internet who'd and tried reported their > > experiences) to be a lie. > >Just out of curiousity, why'd you all order something you knew wouldn't work? >So you could get a better deal out of DEC for whatever you ordered instead, >later, as they tried to make it up to you all for trying to sell you something >broken? Precisely. It worked too, at some cost in our time. The DEC salespeople were = willing to put their lie in writing, you see ... One of those 8650s was "apple.com" (host) for quite a number of years, as the = 11/780 before it: DNS primary NS for the domain, SMTP server, NTP server (VAXen = had decent, low-drift hardware clocks), UUCP/USENET host (as "apple" in that = world), NNTP server - it was our public face to the world. I was given the = explicit mandate to make it so when I was hired in 1988. Unix was the OS for a wide range of facilities within Apple. Probably still = is (I've been gone from there since 1997, but I still hear from folks within = from time to time). As hardware got cheaper and more capable, other systems = were added to the mix to provide anonymous FTP (ftp.apple.com started as a = Mac IIci running A/UX under my desk), HTTP service, and so on. The main thing that changed over time was what hardware (and version of Unix) = we were running for whatever task or service (the RISC bloom was wonderful to = see, even if the vendors tried bending Unix in to a proprietary lock-in thing = - it's rather sad that we're mostly stuck with the awful x86 ISA after all = that), and the overall character of the system use. When I arrived, Unix was = used as a now-classical interactive timesharing system (with Macs as terminals = - does anyone else remember the wonderful "UnixWindows" multi-windowing = terminal emulator for MacOS, with its associated Unix back-end?), and by the = time I left, Macs were TCP/IP hosts (peers) themselves, speaking as clients = (IMAP, NNTP, HTTP) over our networks to Unix machines as servers. Erik Fair