Simh is highly configurable, and though it might be daunting at first, some of its
special features are worth knowing. You will likely use boot.ini to enable storage
devices and attach disk/tape image files to them, and end with a boot command to
start the freshly configured PDP-11. But you can also enter a program through the ini
file, even using PDP-11 mnemonics. That is a great way to write a bare-metal program
in fact; see systems/idled/boot.ini as an example. In short, read the two simh
manuals: the general simh manual and the simh-PDP11 manual. It's not complicated
but quite a bit to understand. Just start with hitting CTRL-E and experiment a bit with
the simh command line.
I tried “experimenting a bit with the simh command line” but one problem is you can’t scroll backwards. So many commands such as show version, scrolls much of the info off the screen.
Some commands don’t even work. For example…
PWD (it’s in HELP).
sim> pwd
Unknown command
sim> Thankfully I know it works on my local system…
sim> pwd
/home/bill/MyStuff/Computer_Simulator_Emulator/Emulators/Mini/simh/PDP-11/RT-11/rtv53swre(works)
sim> DIR doesn’t work… but CAT does. So if you happen to know what files are in your directory… you can list them. But again if they’re longer than the screen, you’ll only see the end.
It’s old but this may be useful.