INFO-VAX Sun, 01 Jun 2008 Volume 2008 : Issue 304 Contents: Re: China responsible for past major power outages? Where is OpenVMS? Re: China responsible for past major power outages? Where is OpenVMS? Re: CVS on VMS Re: CVS on VMS Re: CVS on VMS Re: LBR function result codes still not available Re: LBR function result codes still not available ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 31 May 2008 11:11:36 -0700 (PDT) From: johnwallace4@yahoo.co.uk Subject: Re: China responsible for past major power outages? Where is OpenVMS? Message-ID: On May 31, 2:08 pm, ultra...@gmail.com wrote: > the power grid used to be controlled by vms, but now that some idiotic > power companies have evidently gone to windoze and linux, that virus > free vms platform that used to exist is now open to chinese > hackers ... > > http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/cs_20080531_6948.php "A computer virus, then in wide circulation, disrupted the communications lines that utility companies use to manage the power grid, and this exacerbated the problem." That would be the MS Blaster worm, which afaik was created by an American citizen/resident. No need for Chinese involvement for MS Blaster to cause chaos; the western Windows monoculture is entirely capable of spreading chaos all on its own, and almost nobody in authority cares, simply because "it's cheap" (as long as the folks deploying Windows never have to pay the costs of the consequential damage). Fwiw, anyone who saw from the inside (as I did) the chaos caused by Blaster in a typical corporate Windows environment, even one allegedly isolated from the Internet, would not be at all surprised if Blaster had actually played a much bigger part in the August 2003 blackout than has been admitted to date. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 31 May 2008 11:46:43 -0700 (PDT) From: johnwallace4@yahoo.co.uk Subject: Re: China responsible for past major power outages? Where is OpenVMS? Message-ID: On May 31, 7:11 pm, johnwalla...@yahoo.co.uk wrote: > On May 31, 2:08 pm, ultra...@gmail.com wrote: > > > the power grid used to be controlled by vms, but now that some idiotic > > power companies have evidently gone to windoze and linux, that virus > > free vms platform that used to exist is now open to chinese > > hackers ... > > >http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/cs_20080531_6948.php > > "A computer virus, then in wide circulation, disrupted the > communications lines that utility companies use to manage the power > grid, and this exacerbated the problem." > > That would be the MS Blaster worm, which afaik was created by an > American citizen/resident. No need for Chinese involvement for MS > Blaster to cause chaos; the western Windows monoculture is entirely > capable of spreading chaos all on its own, and almost nobody in > authority cares, simply because "it's cheap" (as long as the folks > deploying Windows never have to pay the costs of the consequential > damage). > > Fwiw, anyone who saw from the inside (as I did) the chaos caused by > Blaster in a typical corporate Windows environment, even one allegedly > isolated from the Internet, would not be at all surprised if Blaster > had actually played a much bigger part in the August 2003 blackout > than has been admitted to date. Doh. Forgot to wonder what the connection might be between the recent National Journal article, and the recent House Cybersecurity committee report which was rather critical of the North American Electric Reliability Corporation: e.g. http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/146153/lawmakers_see_cyber_threats_to_electrical_grid.html I think that's all (for now). ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 31 May 2008 23:03:14 -0400 From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Arne_Vajh=F8j?= Subject: Re: CVS on VMS Message-ID: <48421171$0$90275$14726298@news.sunsite.dk> Richard Brodie wrote: > wrote in message > news:2f2d994a-c88c-40b0-a575-5a21861cd7a2@e39g2000hsf.googlegroups.com... >> From googling I see that there have been attempts in the past to port >> CVS to VMS. AFAICS this development seems to have wound up in a >> backwater and I am not sure what the current state of play is. Can >> anyone advise please? > > CVS is a bit unfashionable these days. Folks are generally more > interested in ports of SVN or git. There are some reports of good > results with SVNkit. The off the shelf alternative, is Perforce, I guess. > Otherwise, some assembly required. SVN is the standard today. But there are still a lot of CVS users out there. Arne ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 31 May 2008 23:09:43 -0400 From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Arne_Vajh=F8j?= Subject: Re: CVS on VMS Message-ID: <484212f7$0$90275$14726298@news.sunsite.dk> marlow.andrew@googlemail.com wrote: > From googling I see that there have been attempts in the past to port > CVS to VMS. AFAICS this development seems to have wound up in a > backwater and I am not sure what the current state of play is. Can > anyone advise please? > > The reason I ask is that I am in an environment that uses VMS for > hysterical reasons. It is no longer a strategic platform and on a > project-by-project basis there are attempts to move off it. For > projects that are on it the source tends to be maintained using CMS. I > was wondering if the source could be hosted on a Unix machine where > the CVS server would be and then developers on VMS could use a VMS CVS > client. One benefit is that it would make the source available to more > people that need to see it that are not VMS developers. Any thoughts? I doubt those programmers that are not assigned to work on the VMS code will have time to look at the VMS code. Which raises the question,, that if CMS is solving the real problem then why not stick with it ? Some of the terms used in CMS is a bit oldfashioned, but it is actually a good source control. If you need a web frontend then you need something newer. If you are a huge team then the optimistic locking in CVS/SVN is much better than the pessimistic locking in CMS. If you want to use an IDE on a PC, then you need something newer. But I would be surprised if you really needed any of those given the description. Arne Arne ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 31 May 2008 23:13:00 -0400 From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Arne_Vajh=F8j?= Subject: Re: CVS on VMS Message-ID: <484213bb$0$90275$14726298@news.sunsite.dk> IanMiller wrote: > Searching everyones favourite vms news site I find the following about > SVNkit > http://www.openvms.org/stories.php?story=07/02/07/7115309 > > and also there is Mercurial source code control system > http://www.openvms.org/stories.php?story=07/06/26/8837733 A bit interesting. 1 x Java + 1 x Python No longer all the hacking of C code ... Arne ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 31 May 2008 12:56:24 -0700 (PDT) From: Hein RMS van den Heuvel Subject: Re: LBR function result codes still not available Message-ID: On May 31, 10:57=A0am, Hein RMS van den Heuvel wrote: > On May 30, 8:39=A0pm, Arne Vajh=F8j wrote: > > > IanMiller wrote: > > > lbrdef contains structures and constants needed to call the LBR$ > > > routines. Not the condition values returned. > > > Correct - it don't but it should ! > > Are you sure? > By having the linker resolve them, the library function providers have > the opportunity to change the values without requiring between-version > recompiles I shoudl point out that I lied by omision. You'd still have to re-link which is pretty much unacceptable for OpenVMS folks. Also, the 'globalvalue' whilest documented as the solution is at the same time documented as being a VAXX holdover. It escapse me right now as how to alternatively define a global value. Best I can quickly think of is to define an extern and then compare with the address. Yuck. I must be overlooking somethign simple: #include extern const int LBR$_ILLCREOPT; main() { printf (" LBR$_ILLCREOPT =3D %%x%08x\n", &LBR$_ILLCREOPT ); } btw... if you do want to go the define route, here is a perl 'one- liner' perl -e "foreach (qx(anal/imag sys\$share:lbrshr)){$x=3D$1 if /(\d+)\) $/;print qq(#define $1 $x\n) if/(LBR\$_\w+)/}" > libdef.h Cheers, Hein. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 31 May 2008 23:01:25 -0400 From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Arne_Vajh=F8j?= Subject: Re: LBR function result codes still not available Message-ID: <48421104$0$90275$14726298@news.sunsite.dk> Hein RMS van den Heuvel wrote: > On May 30, 8:39 pm, Arne Vajhøj wrote: >> IanMiller wrote: >>> lbrdef contains structures and constants needed to call the LBR$ >>> routines. Not the condition values returned. >> Correct - it don't but it should ! > > Are you sure? > Ok, I did not think this through too long, but it is not clear to me > those definitions should ever be hardcoded. > > By having the linker resolve them, the library function providers have > the opportunity to change the values without requiring between-version > recompiles. Not that I expect the values will ever change, but they > could. 1) Practically all other return codes seems to be there. 2) If HP decided to change those values, then it would cause a ton of disasters. Arne ------------------------------ End of INFO-VAX 2008.304 ************************