UNIX for IBMs

[BRUCE%umdb at sri-unix.UUCP]

From:  Bruce Crabill <BRUCE at umdb>

I have several comments for the individual who requested information about
UNIX for IBMs.  First, I must object to you calling a 4341 a "360 lookalike",
this is much the same as calling a VAX 11/780 a "PDP-11 lookalike"!!!  The
4341 is a member of the System/370 family.  I'm supporting 3 4341s currently
and find them to be very well engineered machines.  And VM is a perfectly
capable operating system.  The virtual machine concept has many benefits, namely
system debugging and security.  Yes, there are at least two versions of UNIX
that run on a IBM.  First, there is a Bell version that runs under TSS.  I'm
not sure that it was ever released, and even if it was, you probably don't
want to use it.  The other version is distributed by Amdahl (for a fairly large
fee) and is called UTS (Universal Timesharing System).  It is a release 7 port.
It will not run standalone but must be run under VM.  It has a C compiler and
is in general supposed to be a pretty good implementation.  Be aware that IBMs
are in general line oriented machines (at least for terminal I/O) and cannot do
character I/O.  So if you are hoping to use your favorite UNIX screen editor,
you may as well forget right now.  It won't work.  UTS does give you a screen
editor that will work with 3270s, but most UTS users who come from a DEC UNIX
environment find it unusable (however, those coming from a IBM environment
don't seem to have to many problems).  As for a standalone C compiler, there
have been a few ports of the Bell compiler into VM, but I can't really tell
you how good they are or who did them.  And of course you need a Bell license
for your 4341 to use them anyway.  The one I am familar with is one sold by
RSI (Relational Software Inc).  We only received their compiler a few months
ago and are still trying to get them to fix all the bugs that we found.  If
I were you, I would hold off on buying their compiler until they have fixed
it.  It has the potential of being a pretty good implementation, but unless
they decide to devote some time to fixing the bugs, it isn't very usable.
You might want to contact them (415-854-7350, ask for Christina Swartz) and
ask them if they have fixed all the bugs yet.  That might get them rolling.

                                       Bruce

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