Go raibh maith agaibh a Chaoimhe is a chairde. 🇮🇪😉 (Thank you Keith and friends)

A bit of history; I grew up in Dublin and studied Engineering Science at Trinity College.  After a Burroughs B1702, an IBM 360 model 44 and DECsystem 20 there, I ended up at Logica in London in 1979. I spent the next 20 years on projects with PDP-11s and RSX-11M, starting with, as a new grad, showing the 1979 BBC election graphics system to the (in)famous Margaret Thatcher, through upgrading Ceefax to four lines at BBC TV Centre, to picture stores, subtitle systems, US teletext systems and London Air Traffic Control's Radar Control and Monitoring System. I wrote an ODT/XDT disassembler in 1k of code and wrote drivers and ACPs and lots of RTL/2 and Macro-11. I never really took to VAXes or used DECnet much. More recently I've worked on ESA satcom links to civil aircraft (ATN/OSI over IPSec over satellite) and such things.

I'm just about to retire and thought I'd like a bit of DEC fun for old times sake.

Thanks for the welcome and the help

Best wishes
Peter Whisker BA BAI CEng MIET
Surrey, UK

On Mon, 13 Feb 2023, 18:45 Keith Halewood, <Keith.Halewood@pitbulluk.org> wrote:

Failte chun na HECnet Peter, Sadhbh agus Cliona.

 

One day I’ll get into RSX.

Incidentally, a long time ago (I was probably around 19 or 20 perhaps) I visited a computer exhibition, at least I think it was a trade type exhibition rather than hobbyist.

A concession had what I can only dimly remember as being a DEC operating system on perhaps a VT100. I remember the guy demonstrating how to ‘get back in’ after I’d messed something up, by using a SET UIC [some numbers] initially. Perhaps it was RSX.

Anyway, the demo which had, up until that point, been continuously running, had an ASCII representation of a robot juggling the flashing cursor.

Does anybody remember ever seeing something like that?

 

Keith

 

From: Peter Whisker [mailto:peter@whisker.org.uk]
Sent: 13 February 2023 15:26
To: 'The Hobbyist DECnet mailing list' <hecnet@lists.dfupdate.se>
Subject: [HECnet] Re: HECnet connection error from RSX-11M-PLUS node

 

Success!

 

MLTNET didn't get updated for some reason so I manually copied the task over and it worked.

 

Thanks to both of you and Keith 😊

Peter

 

>NCP SET CIR IP-0-0 STA ON

> 

15:23:28   Event type 4.10, Circuit up

          Occurred 13-FEB-2023 15:23:28 on node 29.850 (CLIONA)

          Circuit IP-0-0

          Node address = 29.2 (A29RT2)

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se>
Sent: 13 February 2023 15:14
To: hecnet@lists.dfupdate.se
Subject: [HECnet] Re: HECnet connection error from RSX-11M-PLUS node

 

By the way, I would recommend you going with bleeding edge. It is normally very stable and reliable. And I improved the performance of DECnet-over-IP only last night.

 

Don't forget to run through configuration after the update, since you are on something rather old right now.

(And you should probably also allow various RSX patches to be installed...)

 

   Johnny

 

On 2023-02-13 16:10, Johnny Billquist wrote:

> If you want bleeding edge, grab TBQTCP.DSK instead. Or download the

> tape image using RSX, and go through an update, as described in the manual.

>

> Or, going one step further, install RPM, and then use RPM to install

> TCP/IP for you in an even more convenient way.

>

>    Johnny

>

> On 2023-02-13 16:06, Peter Whisker wrote:

>> Oh, OK.

>> 

>> I must have messed up the update - I downloaded the BQTCP.DSK and

>> mounted it and specified it as the kit source.

>> 

>> Thanks

>> Peter

>> 

>> -----Original Message-----

>> From: Johnny Billquist <bqt@softjar.se>

>> Sent: 13 February 2023 15:02

>> To: hecnet@lists.dfupdate.se

>> Subject: [HECnet] Re: HECnet connection error from RSX-11M-PLUS node

>> 

>> Whoa! MLTNET V1.27? That is *very* old. Please update.

>> 

>>     Johnny

>> 

>> On 2023-02-13 15:55, peter@whisker.org.uk wrote:

>>> Hi,

>>> 

>>> I'm attempting to connect to the area 29 node and Keith Halewood has

>>> very helpfully set me up with a listener.

>>> 

>>> I've been getting a strange error on the Multinet link and updated

>>> to the latest BQ-IP from December 2022 before posting this. I

>>> continue to have the same problem after the update.

>>> 

>>> My IP stack is fine - I can ping and get the NTPDATE time and I can

>>> access my RSX11M system via Telnet.

>>> 

>>> The Node has the right area and number and I can access it from the

>>> other node using RMT.

>>> 

>>> However when I try to bring up the link to HECNet I keep getting

>>> this error repeating:

>>> 

>>>> NCP SET CIR IP-0-0 STA ON

>>> 14:29:03  COT -- Date is 13-FEB-2023

>>> 14:29:03  MLTNET V1.27  starting.

>>>> 

>>>> 

>>> 14:29:05  MLTNET - IP-0-0 XMIT fail. IOSB=-3

>>> 14:29:10  MLTNET - IP-0-0 XMIT fail. IOSB=-3

>>> 

>>> I can see the traffic leaving on my DSL router to the Area 29 router

>>> and the replies coming back. So I am bit mystified. I think IOSB

>>> error -3 is IE.DNR - Device not ready?

>>> 

>>> Node details:

>>>> NCP SHO KNO NOD

>>> 

>>> Known nodes summary as of 13-FEB-2023 14:32:39

>>> 

>>> Executor node = 29.850 (CLIONA)

>>> 

>>>      State = On, Identification = CLIONA RSX11M+ V4.6

>>> 

>>> Remote                       Active                      Next Node           

>>> State        Links   Delay  Circuit      Node

>>> 

>>> 29.1 (A29RT1)   Unreachable

>>> 29.2 (A29RT2)   Unreachable

>>> 29.852 (SADHBH) Reachable                   UNA-0        29.852

>>> (SADHBH)

>>> 

>>> Below is recent correspondence - I will post it hear as it may be

>>> helpful:

>>> 

>>> Hi

>>> 

>>> It’s set up as a “Level 2 router” – perhaps that is the problem?

>>> I’ve looped in Johnny in case he has anidea where the problem may be?

>>> 

>>> Regards

>>> Peter

>>> 

>>>> ;

>>>> ===================================================================

>>>> == ;  DEC - Section  1 - Define the target and remote nodes ;

>>>> ===================================================================

>>>> ==

>>>> ;

>>>> ; Generating node 29.850 (CLIONA), Id = CLIONA RSX11M+ V4.6 ; Node

>>>> type is level 2 router ; Highest node number in network is 1023 ;

>>>> Highest area number in the network is 63 ; Network command terminal

>>>> and layered product support will be included ; The MACRO-11 and

>>>> FORTRAN/COBOL/BASIC+2 user libraries will be supplied ; ; The

>>>> remote node names are:

>>>> ;      29.852  (SADHBH)

>>>> ;      29.2    (A29RT2)

>>>> ;      29.1    (A29RT1)

>>>> ;

>>>> ; <EOS>  Do you want to:

>>>> *        <RET>-Continue, S-Skip, R-Repeat section, P-Pause, E-Exit [S]:

>>>> ;

>>>> ;

>>> 

>>> From: Keith Halewood <Keith.Halewood@pitbulluk.org>

>>> 

>>> The only thing I can think of is DECnet with more than 1 interface

>>> needs to be an L1 router and not an endnode. Other than that, I’m

>>> notat all familiar with RSX and Johnny’s IP stack.

>>> 

>>> From: Peter Whisker [mailto:peter@whisker.org.uk] I'm getting IOSB

>>> error -3 which I think may be IE.DNR Device not ready.I can see the

>>> IPtraffic going out and back on the interfaces both sidesof my

>>> router. I need to check if I've missed some DECnet configuration.

>>> 

>>> On Mon, 13 Feb 2023, 10:39 Keith Halewood,

>>> <Keith.Halewood@pitbulluk.org> wrote:

>>> I can see your connection attempts. The DECnet router 29.2 is

>>> reporting‘unexpected packet type’, adjacent node 29.850, packet

>>> header

>>> 01 29.850 _______________________________________________

>>> HECnet mailing list -- hecnet@lists.dfupdate.se To unsubscribe send

>>> an email to hecnet-leave@lists.dfupdate.se

>> 

>

 

--

Johnny Billquist                  || "I'm on a bus

                                   ||  on a psychedelic trip

email: bqt@softjar.se             ||  Reading murder books

pdp is alive!                     ||  tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol

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