INFO-VAX Sun, 28 Jan 2007 Volume 2007 : Issue 56 Contents: Re: How long to really setup a VMS system ? RE: How long to really setup a VMS system ? Re: OpenSSL & OSU Re: PL/I for Itanium Re: PL/I for Itanium Re: VMS in the HP hierarchy ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 28 Jan 2007 09:03:19 GMT From: "Dave Weatherall" Subject: Re: How long to really setup a VMS system ? Message-ID: On Fri, 26 Jan 2007 18:47:31 UTC, Wilm Boerhout wrote: > on 24-1-2007 6:15 Dave Weatherall wrote... > > > Wilm, I don't see any smiley so I'll retort. > > > > This is one of the attitudes that has led to te demise of VMS and the > > rise of the PC. It encourages the view that VMS , despite name-change, > > is 'closed' and the Win/Mac PC is open. 'They won't let me do it on > > there, I'll do it on the PC' , whether it's a mortgage repayment > > program or a behavioural model is what I've seen happen. > > > > If we believe that VMS is secure system, that the privelege structure > > works so that 'you can only do the harm you've been granted > > privelegefor', then we should be/have been encouraging people to use > > the system. Are their exceptions? Sure. > > I wasn't joking, so Iïll try to respond in style :-) > > I acknowledge your point that real software damage can only be done by > persons who have been granted privileges (on VMS at least). > > On the other hand, any proper production system should be backed IMO by > a comparable test- and development system. Those systems serve other > purposes than the production system does, so they are likely to be > configured in a different manner, with other tools and support programs. > > Again, IMO, this also holds for a production PC -if such a beast exists. > So again: no compilers on a production system. > > /Wilm Wilm, Arne maybe this reflects the difference in our experience in development on/use of VMS. Mine is engineering and airborne software developement. I know nothing of commercial software and the constraints there. The scenario I painted above is one of the reaons why VMS is no longer strong in my area. The bulk of our s/w development (the production activity) is now done on Solaris. Mainly because we now use Rational Apex to do Ada as opposed to Assembler on VMS using the toolset that I maintain. I rarely had the luxury of seperate development and production machines. We had VAX and Alpha when we changed to Alpha, two alphas while moving thro' AXP/VMS 1.5 / 6.2 / 7.1 and something for the Y2K checks. In general, managing Dev/Prod on one machine was done with care and logical naming but it was a relatifvely small task. Hence the line :- > > the system. Are their exceptions? Sure. That cuts both ways. The big VMS machines and the big VMS jobs became thus, or were supported, by the little ones. The big job niche is still there (just) and that appears to be what HP have their attention on. The small area _was_ (in some areas still is) subject to the mistakes I originally commented on. System (or department) managers making it very difficult to use a system that was never particularly vulnerable to the things they used as excuses to keep their VMS systems closed. That niche is occupied by WIndows and Linux. We lose! Just a view from a different part of the dwindling VMS user/developer spectrum. e.g. IKEA still use VMS. Would it have been impossible for them to set up there machines to let employees do simple stuff. Mind you as Richard points out, the real problem with the development of a mortgage repayment program on the company machine would be the cost of the licenses. Unless you did it in Macro-32 :-) On the other side, I know system mangers who kept the system 'closed' on machines I would have described as development...The PC became the tool of choice. -- Cheers - Dave W. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2007 09:47:02 -0500 From: "Main, Kerry" Subject: RE: How long to really setup a VMS system ? Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: Dave Weatherall [mailto:djw-nothere@nospam.nohow]=20 > Sent: January 28, 2007 4:03 AM > To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com > Subject: Re: How long to really setup a VMS system ? [snip...] > Wilm, Arne > maybe this reflects the difference in our =20 > experience in development on/use of VMS. Mine is engineering and=20 > airborne software developement. I know nothing of commercial software=20 > and the constraints there. The scenario I painted above is one of the=20 > reaons why VMS is no longer strong in my area. The bulk of our s/w=20 > development (the production activity) is now done on Solaris. Mainly=20 > because we now use Rational Apex to do Ada as opposed to Assembler on=20 > VMS using the toolset that I maintain. I rarely had the luxury of=20 > seperate development and production machines. We had VAX and Alpha=20 > when we changed to Alpha, two alphas while moving thro' AXP/VMS 1.5 =20 > / 6.2 / 7.1 and something for the Y2K checks. >=20 > In general, managing Dev/Prod on one machine was done with care and=20 > logical naming but it was a relatifvely small task. Hence the line :- >=20 > > > the system. Are their exceptions? Sure. >=20 > That cuts both ways. >=20 > The big VMS machines and the big VMS jobs became thus, or were=20 > supported, by the little ones. The big job niche is still there (just) > and that appears to be what HP have their attention on. The small area > _was_ (in some areas still is) subject to the mistakes I originally=20 > commented on. System (or department) managers making it very difficult > to use a system that was never particularly vulnerable to the things=20 > they used as excuses to keep their VMS systems closed. That niche is=20 > occupied by WIndows and Linux. We lose! >=20 > Just a view from a different part of the dwindling VMS user/developer=20 > spectrum. >=20 > e.g. IKEA still use VMS. Would it have been impossible for them to set > up there machines to let employees do simple stuff. >=20 > Mind you as Richard points out, the real problem with the development=20 > of a mortgage repayment program on the company machine would be the=20 > cost of the licenses. Unless you did it in Macro-32 :-) >=20 > On the other side, I know system mangers who kept the system 'closed'=20 > on machines I would have described as development...The PC became the=20 > tool of choice. >=20 > --=20 > Cheers - Dave W. >=20 This is the classic argument between formal production systems (Operations) and free wheeling developers who feel controls cramp their "creativity".=20 While "creativity" may have been in style in the distributed world, the reality is that almost all med-large companies are now trying to consolidate those servers back and fix all the "everyone has priv's in prod" scenarios. Bottom line - while many people talk about the security issues associated with the Internet, most security analysts will state something like 50-60% of all security issues are caused by internal issues. Imagine what a disgruntled developer could do who not only understood the inner workings of the application code, but also had elevated priv's in production. In addition, consolidation to fewer, but larger servers is absolutely white hot right now as the average utilization of the mahjority of Windows server in peak time is less than 15%, while UNIX servers are a bit higher - in the neighbourhood of less than 20-25% in peak time. And the biggest cost is the management, licensing, monitoring, monthly patches and app re-certification etc - it is not the base HW costs. The down side to fewer, but larger servers is that you need more formal control of these servers e.g. change control is critical because if something screws up, then a lot more end users (and potentially Customers) are impacted. There are also some mandatory regulatory controls kicking in now as well ie. clear separation of roles and controls in the IT dept. Those who think developers should have elevated priv's in prod systems are in a rapidly shrinking minority. Regards Kerry Main Senior Consultant HP Services Canada Voice: 613-592-4660 Fax: 613-591-4477 kerryDOTmainAThpDOTcom (remove the DOT's and AT)=20 OpenVMS - the secure, multi-site OS that just works. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2007 08:40:07 +0000 (UTC) From: gartmann@nonsense.immunbio.mpg.de (Christoph Gartmann) Subject: Re: OpenSSL & OSU Message-ID: In article , "Malcolm Dunnett" writes: > wrote in >message news:1169650222.301368.141740@v33g2000cwv.googlegroups.com... >| >| Although it isn't a direct answer to you question, I've also had >| problems getting OSU and SSL working. Part of the problem is that in >| order for it to work with current web clients, it requires using the >| SSL_TASK method. > >I've built the OSU 3.10 server on Itanium against the HP supplied SSL >library >(based on SSL 97e) using the SSL MST and it appears to work fine with >"current" web browsers ( Firefox and IE 7 ). Maybe I just haven't found >the problems yet, what sort of issues should I be looking for. > >I use the server on Alpha extensively with the SSL MST and haven't seen >any problems with current web clients but that's with an older version >of the OpenSSL library. The previous version of OpenSSL doesn't support SSL V3. The new Firefox supports only SSL V3. IE7 does support older versions but the support has to be explicitely enabled. This is why I want to upgrade SSL. So I'll try HPs SSL. Regards, Christoph Gartmann -- Max-Planck-Institut fuer Phone : +49-761-5108-464 Fax: -452 Immunbiologie Postfach 1169 Internet: gartmann@immunbio dot mpg dot de D-79011 Freiburg, Germany http://www.immunbio.mpg.de/home/menue.html ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2007 10:25:34 +0100 From: Michael Kraemer Subject: Re: PL/I for Itanium Message-ID: Arne Vajhøj schrieb: > > Java and C# have both passed C++/C for new development. I don't see this. Maybe in your part of the universe, but not in mine. > > It is not obvious to me that it is technical reasons > that makes PL/I a mainframe and VMS/VAX thing. Of course it is. Not having a PL/I compiler available is certainly a technical reason. There were no such compilers available on early PCs and most Unix workstations. > I suspect it is more a history/people/educational > thing. Doesn't matter at the end of the day. A PL/I compiler is a bigger deal than a C compiler, so PL/I wasn't available from day 1 on said platforms. People use what they can get, and that was e.g. C and possibly Pascal. > Another complex language is Ada and it is AFAIK widely > used on Unix and embedded platforms. Define "widely used". I never saw somebody use ADA for any purpose on Unix, let alone embedded systems. Doesn't mean that there aren't people out there actually using it, but again, it depends where you live. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2007 04:56:02 -0800 From: "Tom Linden" Subject: Re: PL/I for Itanium Message-ID: On Sun, 28 Jan 2007 01:25:34 -0800, Michael Kraemer wrote: > Arne Vajhøj schrieb: > >> Java and C# have both passed C++/C for new development. > > I don't see this. > Maybe in your part of the universe, > but not in mine. > >> It is not obvious to me that it is technical reasons >> that makes PL/I a mainframe and VMS/VAX thing. > > Of course it is. Not having a PL/I compiler available > is certainly a technical reason. There were > no such compilers available on early PCs and > most Unix workstations. Not true. The compiler we licensed to Liant was ported to a number of unix work stations, Sun, HP-UX, AIX. We also ported PL/I to Tru64 > >> I suspect it is more a history/people/educational >> thing. > > Doesn't matter at the end of the day. > A PL/I compiler is a bigger deal > than a C compiler, so > PL/I wasn't available from day 1 on said platforms. > People use what they can get, and that was e.g. C and possibly Pascal. > >> Another complex language is Ada and it is AFAIK widely >> used on Unix and embedded platforms. I don't thinks so. In fact we probably have more PL/I code in the government than Ada, and that is particularly tru in the inteligence community. > > Define "widely used". > I never saw somebody use ADA for any purpose on Unix, > let alone embedded systems. > Doesn't mean that there aren't people out there actually > using it, but again, it depends where you live. > -- Using Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/mail/ ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2007 07:08:59 -0500 From: Bill Todd Subject: Re: VMS in the HP hierarchy Message-ID: Richard B. Gilbert wrote: > Bill Todd wrote: > >> JF Mezei wrote: >> >>> johnhreinhardt@yahoo.com wrote: >>> >>>> Both Sue and Hoff actually work(ed) for the company for a good long >>>> time. They both know what the Org Chart actually looks like and I'd >>>> expect they have a good idea if it works or not. >>> >>> >>> Fact is that VMS is not marketed. Fact is that efforts done at the >>> lower levels are obviously not having an effect since HP has not >>> changed its mind with regards to marketing VMS. >> >> >> Why on earth do you consider this evidence of a functional failure in >> the hierarchy rather than simply the result of an intentional policy? >> Stop squawking and accept the reality that VMS is going absolutely >> nowhere save into retirement - and that this has been the intent for >> almost 8 years now, the only question being exactly when the gold >> watch will be presented. >> >> - bill > > More than 8 years now!!! The ax fell at the 1995 spring DECUS > symposium when "Unix" appeared in letters three feet high on a banner > hanging outside the convention center. VMS was nowhere mentioned. A VP > told us that VMS was a "niche O/S" and that Unix was the wave of the > future. While anyone who remembers the infamous 'affinity' period should be well aware that there were times prior to 1999 when VMS was slated for a trip to the glue factory, my comment referred to the *unbroken* span of years that started after Pfeiffer (who seemed to be attempting to reverse that direction) got ousted. - bill ------------------------------ End of INFO-VAX 2007.056 ************************