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From: nmm1 on 27 Jan 2010 04:29 In article <Vr6dnYyTD7AcKsLWnZ2dnUVZ_qWdnZ2d(a)earthlink.com>, Mike <mike(a)mike.net> wrote: > >I have often wonder how modern systems would have evolved in an >alternate universe where IBM did not fund MicroSoft and OS/2 but >instead chose to implement Presentation Manager to provide a GUI on >top of VM/CMS and compete in the micro and workstation arena with a >370 instruction set chip. I was closely involved with that. It was a bigger job than you might think. A multi-user version was infesible, because even CMS couldn't handle the interrupt rate needed for a WIMP GUI (i.e. one of the sort produced by Xerox, Apple, X Windows and PM). It was a major problem (and still is) even with Unix and Windows 3 - and the latter got its performance (such as it was) by running everything in kernel mode! The original variant of 'Presentation Manager' that was designed for CMS was text-only (i.e. the 3270 equivalent of curses). That would have worked (and did). Multiple windows and graphics display would have been fairly easily addable (they were in the design), but not the killer features like dragging with the mouse. It might just have survived with a single user and no background tasks or daemons, but that would have put the existing mainframe users off completely. What would have happened would have been a new lease of life for the 'full screen' interfaces of the 3270/curses variety, but sooner or later GUIs would have come up from outfield and taken over. > In 1984 IBM had a PC/370 but decided it >370 instruction set chip. In 1984 IBM had a PC/370 but decided it >would eat mainframe revenue and limited software licenses to machines >connected to mainframes thus killing their attraction. Did they? Despite being VERY close to IBM, I never tracked that down, and think that it was an urban myth. Yes, there was a design, and it may even have reached silicon, but (as far as I know) it never reached the stage of actually running a full-blown System/370 operating system, even in-house. >Your suggestion of a portable version of CMS is an intriguing >alternate especially if combined with a portable GUI. Just think, an >industrial strength GUI on 370, 801, and S/38 and on PC's to compete >with Windows 3.1. If anyone had delivered a viable form of Unix at an affordable price, that would have eliminated Windows 3.1. They didn't, until far too late, and that was marketing and not technical. I doubt that IBM could have moved fast enough to convert CMS to such a very different style of use. Regards, Nick Maclaren.
From: Terje Mathisen "terje.mathisen at on 27 Jan 2010 04:59 nmm1(a)cam.ac.uk wrote: > In article<Vr6dnYyTD7AcKsLWnZ2dnUVZ_qWdnZ2d(a)earthlink.com>, > Mike<mike(a)mike.net> wrote: >> 370 instruction set chip. In 1984 IBM had a PC/370 but decided it >> would eat mainframe revenue and limited software licenses to machines >> connected to mainframes thus killing their attraction. > > Did they? Despite being VERY close to IBM, I never tracked that down, > and think that it was an urban myth. Yes, there was a design, and it > may even have reached silicon, but (as far as I know) it never reached > the stage of actually running a full-blown System/370 operating system, > even in-house. Huh? I clearly remember a big Byte article showing how it worked, afair it had two 68K cpus, one of them with heavily modified microcode. Are you saying this article must have been written while the product was still a lab design? Terje -- - <Terje.Mathisen at tmsw.no> "almost all programming can be viewed as an exercise in caching"
From: nmm1 on 27 Jan 2010 05:30 In article <acf537-b5i1.ln1(a)ntp.tmsw.no>, Terje Mathisen <"terje.mathisen at tmsw.no"> wrote: >nmm1(a)cam.ac.uk wrote: >> In article<Vr6dnYyTD7AcKsLWnZ2dnUVZ_qWdnZ2d(a)earthlink.com>, >> Mike<mike(a)mike.net> wrote: >>> 370 instruction set chip. In 1984 IBM had a PC/370 but decided it >>> would eat mainframe revenue and limited software licenses to machines >>> connected to mainframes thus killing their attraction. >> >> Did they? Despite being VERY close to IBM, I never tracked that down, >> and think that it was an urban myth. Yes, there was a design, and it >> may even have reached silicon, but (as far as I know) it never reached >> the stage of actually running a full-blown System/370 operating system, >> even in-house. > >Huh? > >I clearly remember a big Byte article showing how it worked, afair it >had two 68K cpus, one of them with heavily modified microcode. > >Are you saying this article must have been written while the product was >still a lab design? As far as I could discover, yes. IBM being IBM, that doesn't mean I was right. During my time with them, I frequently was telling one group what another was up to, and the history of various products that appeared like mushrooms is well known. But I completely failed to track down any hard evidence that there was such a product, or even a pre-product. Regards, Nick Maclaren.
From: Peter Dickerson on 27 Jan 2010 06:06 <nmm1(a)cam.ac.uk> wrote in message news:hjp4km$r4v$1(a)smaug.linux.pwf.cam.ac.uk... > In article <acf537-b5i1.ln1(a)ntp.tmsw.no>, > Terje Mathisen <"terje.mathisen at tmsw.no"> wrote: >>nmm1(a)cam.ac.uk wrote: >>> In article<Vr6dnYyTD7AcKsLWnZ2dnUVZ_qWdnZ2d(a)earthlink.com>, >>> Mike<mike(a)mike.net> wrote: >>>> 370 instruction set chip. In 1984 IBM had a PC/370 but decided it >>>> would eat mainframe revenue and limited software licenses to machines >>>> connected to mainframes thus killing their attraction. >>> >>> Did they? Despite being VERY close to IBM, I never tracked that down, >>> and think that it was an urban myth. Yes, there was a design, and it >>> may even have reached silicon, but (as far as I know) it never reached >>> the stage of actually running a full-blown System/370 operating system, >>> even in-house. >> >>Huh? >> >>I clearly remember a big Byte article showing how it worked, afair it >>had two 68K cpus, one of them with heavily modified microcode. >> >>Are you saying this article must have been written while the product was >>still a lab design? > > As far as I could discover, yes. > > IBM being IBM, that doesn't mean I was right. During my time with > them, I frequently was telling one group what another was up to, > and the history of various products that appeared like mushrooms is > well known. But I completely failed to track down any hard evidence > that there was such a product, or even a pre-product. I distinctly recall handling an IBM PC card which ran 370 code and OS. As I recall it was supposedly based on a modified 68K - don't know about two though. When I had it in the mid 80s, say 1986, it was considered scrap. Peter
From: nmm1 on 27 Jan 2010 06:15
In article <hjp6nq$tid$1(a)news.eternal-september.org>, Peter Dickerson <first.last(a)tiscali.invalid> wrote: > >>>>> 370 instruction set chip. In 1984 IBM had a PC/370 but decided it >>>>> would eat mainframe revenue and limited software licenses to machines >>>>> connected to mainframes thus killing their attraction. >>>> >>>> Did they? Despite being VERY close to IBM, I never tracked that down, >>>> and think that it was an urban myth. Yes, there was a design, and it >>>> may even have reached silicon, but (as far as I know) it never reached >>>> the stage of actually running a full-blown System/370 operating system, >>>> even in-house. >>> >>>Huh? >>> >>>I clearly remember a big Byte article showing how it worked, afair it >>>had two 68K cpus, one of them with heavily modified microcode. >>> >>>Are you saying this article must have been written while the product was >>>still a lab design? >> >> As far as I could discover, yes. >> >> IBM being IBM, that doesn't mean I was right. During my time with >> them, I frequently was telling one group what another was up to, >> and the history of various products that appeared like mushrooms is >> well known. But I completely failed to track down any hard evidence >> that there was such a product, or even a pre-product. > >I distinctly recall handling an IBM PC card which ran 370 code and OS. As I >recall it was supposedly based on a modified 68K - don't know about two >though. When I had it in the mid 80s, say 1986, it was considered scrap. Yes. I know about that one, though never saw it. As I understand it, it could run some 370 code but not a 370 operating system, and was regarded as the prototype for the putative "370 on a chip". Do you have any definite evidence that it ran a real 370 operating system, rather than a special lookalike one of its own? Regards, Nick Maclaren. |