Thanks Supratim, I?ve applied for Multinet. This is so exciting. My family think I?ve finally gone mad though :) Keith

Hi Keith, You can use 1.577 for now, till you get your own DECnet address from Johnny. You can also configure Multinet to connect using TCP to 52.23.221.223 port 60003 to get on HECnet for the time being until you establish a "permanent" connection with Johnny. Ususally this means configuring Multinet using the menu or command line, and then manually editing MULTINET:DECNET-CIRCUITS.COM to say something like: $ multinet set /decnet /remote=52.23.221.223 /port=60003 /device=tcpa0: /connect /tcp=connect /buffers=24 Best, Supratim

Hi Johnny, I understand the day job often spilling over into night too. I managed to get Multinet 055 via the hobbyist licence but so far I've not managed to install it. It's a job for later on today I hope. I'm located in west London, connected to the internet via symmetric VDSL2. I'll personally never have 1023 nodes but if an area number is available then it'd be fun to have one. I have the resources to keep SIMH systems up, the bandwidth to offer a few other connections and, when I get it out of storage and fixed up, a real VAX 8650 :) Hope that's enough, Regards, Keith -----Original Message----- From: owner-hecnet at Update.UU.SE [mailto:owner-hecnet at Update.UU.SE] On Behalf Of Johnny Billquist Sent: 23 June 2018 11:45 To: hecnet at Update.UU.SE Subject: Re: [HECnet] Hoping to join HECnet Hi Keith. On 2018-06-21 18:39, Keith Halewood wrote: Apologies if I missed something. Been very busy with work for a while now. Anyway, I saw that Supratim offered a way to connect. How has this gone? Are you online yet, or still working on it? Where are you located? It might be that Supratim is a good point for you to connect to, or we might want to find someone closer. Supratim is on the US east cost, unless my memory fails me. As for node numbers, we might want to set aside a small range for you. So my first question would be if you need a small set of numbers within an existing area, or an area of your own? Area 1 is where Supratim is in, so if you connect through him we'd allocate some numbers in this area. But we first need to establish to where you connect, and some basic needs. And then we figure out the next bits. Johnny -- Johnny Billquist || "I'm on a bus || on a psychedelic trip email: bqt at softjar.se || Reading murder books pdp is alive! || tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol

Hi Johnny, Well that seemed relatively straightforward. Multinet installed, minimal configuration, locked down externally (pretty sure anyway) and a HECnet connection to Supratim's 1.599. "copy known nodes" took me back all those years to when we 'illegally' ran a DECnet over a certain academic X25 network. The local instance of VMS I've hijacked for this experience was (and can be again) a full DECnet routing node. As for the 8650, I'm not sure what its state is, battery or otherwise. The major issue with these machines is the power consumption. I've worked hard over the past few years to lower my power footprint. If I ever get it going, it'll be in the (hopefully rebuilt) garage, operated during the winter months, with the hot air piped through into the house.... this last part may or may not be true :) I'm happy with SIMH at the moment, hosted on a range of kit... and I'll be even happier once I get a working virtual CI with an HSC server. You've no idea how happy I am at the moment. Regards, Keith -----Original Message----- From: owner-hecnet at Update.UU.SE [mailto:owner-hecnet at Update.UU.SE] On Behalf Of Johnny Billquist Sent: 23 June 2018 15:38 To: hecnet at Update.UU.SE Subject: Re: [HECnet] Hoping to join HECnet Hi. On 2018-06-23 15:57, Keith Halewood wrote: Yeah. It happens sometimes. Ok. Let us know how this progress. Hmm. In this case, it might make more sense to connect to Update then, since Update is in Sweden. We can allocate an area. That's not a problem (yet). :-) That will require that you set your machine up as an area router, though. But this is not difficult. If you want to allow access to HECnet through your machines, that's fine. But first we need to get you up and running. A real 8650 would be nice. That would be the second such machine on HECnet. Update have one (well, two actually) 8650 as well. They are not normally on, since they consume lots of power, and generate lots of heat. And cooling have the last few years been an issue for Update. Have you kept the batteries charging in that machine, or do you have the documentation on the hardware fix needed to run without batteries? Otherwise the machine will not start up. The hardware fix is simple, and just require the installation of a single jumper on the backplane. I have the documentation somewhere if needed. Johnny -- Johnny Billquist || "I'm on a bus || on a psychedelic trip email: bqt at softjar.se || Reading murder books pdp is alive! || tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol

Hi Johnny, I see that the multinet command to configure and create the interface doesn't preserve the port number and/or tcp vs udp protocol setting so that was an editing job. Yeah, the 8650 is going to be a pandora's box when I finally get around to it. As for a CI, I'm partly on the way. I know/knew MSCP well and the rudiments of its encapsulation over a CI connection. I won't be creating a star coupler or HSC (from a pdp-11 simulation), it'll just be something on the end of a network port that looks like an HSC serving discs.... this is all much more probable than getting an 8650 up and running :) Audit is showing a few 'attempted' logins already. I'll take area 29, thank you very much indeed. Keith -----Original Message----- From: owner-hecnet at Update.UU.SE [mailto:owner-hecnet at Update.UU.SE] On Behalf Of Johnny Billquist Sent: 23 June 2018 18:12 To: hecnet at Update.UU.SE Subject: Re: [HECnet] Hoping to join HECnet Hi, Keith. On 2018-06-23 18:22, Keith Halewood wrote: Excellent. I can see that 1.577 is online. Nice. (And IMPVAX is 1.559, not 1.599 :-) ) If it's been sitting for more than 6 months without power (which I assume it has) then your batteries are going to be shot. And unless you can find new ones (doubtful), you'll have to jumper the backplane. I have never seen anyone implement emulated CI, so don't hold your breath... Nor an HSC. I would bet on running emulated UDA50/KDA50 controllers on the machine, and have your MSCP disks attached that way. And any cluster you want to run, have it run over a normal network, with disks served from VMS. All of this is just for fun. Nice to have one more on board. Now, you wanted your own area? Area 29 is free. Want me to write that one up to you then? Johnny -- Johnny Billquist || "I'm on a bus || on a psychedelic trip email: bqt at softjar.se || Reading murder books pdp is alive! || tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol

On 06/23/2018 01:32 PM, Johnny Billquist wrote: About as much point as running VMS under emulation. I have real HSCs here connecting real hardware, but I'd surely run an emulated HSC connecting emulated hardware if it were available. I'd even be quite excited about it. -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA

I don?t know Dave, I never thought I?d see the day when I?d be using emulation as my primary platform, but I am for both VAX and PDP-11 now. I?m even looking into moving my Compaq XP1000/667 over to an emulator. Most of the data and some of the applications are now on my VAXcluster, which makes good backups easier. PDXVAX is still a VAXstation 4000, but will be moving to SIMH soon. That would have happened this weekend most likely, except my internet is down, so I can?t get the OS for the host system. Zane

Keith, one other thing. If you are interested in it, I can register your node names in my nodename database, which means most other nodes will have them in their nodename databases as well. This is obviously voluntary, and in addition to node names, this database also tries to keep some other information. But that is also not required, but it can be a bit fun and nice if nothing else, to have it. You can see the current content at http:://mim.update.uu.se/nodedb Johnny On 2018-06-23 19:24, Keith Halewood wrote: -- Johnny Billquist || "I'm on a bus || on a psychedelic trip email: bqt at softjar.se || Reading murder books pdp is alive! || tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol

Ok. Let me know when you want some names registered. As for going up and down, that is generally no problem. People do play around and work on things. I guess we can keep this through IMPVAX for now. Looks like communication is fine. Johnny On 2018-06-24 16:07, Keith Halewood wrote: -- Johnny Billquist || "I'm on a bus || on a psychedelic trip email: bqt at softjar.se || Reading murder books pdp is alive! || tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol