Computer Log

Why is this so difficult?

The docs show zip -p password -r output.zip dirToZip

But this…

$ zip -p secret -r files.zip test
zip warning: name not matched: files.zip
updating: test/ (stored 0%)
updating: test/3.jpg (deflated 3%)
updating: test/2.jpg (deflated 4%)
updating: test/1.jpg (deflated 12%)
updating: test/0.jpg (deflated 72%)
$

Creates an un-password protected file called secret.zip

WTH?

Many convoluted explanations are in stackoverflow, which I don’t even want to understand. This is the first time I wanted a password protected zip file. And I don’t want a MIT education of how it works. I just want to password protect it so I can send it and move on in life.

I finally found this solution (which uses the -e switch and works and even better, it prompts you for the password, so it doesn’t end up in your history)…

zip -e -r folder.zip folder

Is this vastly different from this?

zip -p secret -r files.zip test

I installed V11 in Software Manager.

About GNU Fortran.

Very useful.

Was going to install V3 on laptop. It use to be a manual install. But it was offered in the Software Manager of Linux Mint 21.1.

Was watching a video where the creator boots RSTS/E V9. I’ve always used V7 because it seems more likely that that is the version I started with.

This guy has a lot of interesting vintage restoration videos.

Anywho the video made me think why I never even tried another version. The startup looked very different. So I went looking for a pre-built V9 and found one. And this is my first attempt…after startup

########################## Startup stuff ##########################
*** From [1,2] on KB0: at 12:00 AM 01-Jan-99     
** RSTS/E is on the air...     




I1/2
Password: 

Jobs detached under this account:
   Job  What  Size  State   Run-time   RTS
    1  ERRCPY 5K    SR           0.1  ...RSX
    3  PBS... 25K   SL           0.0  ...RSX
Job number to attach to? 
Last logged in on 01-Jan-99, 12:00 AM detached.
2 other users are logged in under this account

Your password has not been changed in over 365 days.
Please change it.

$ SYS/S

RSTS V9.3-20 RSTS/E V9.0 status at 01-Jan-99, 12:01 AM Up: 1:51

Job    Who    Where    What    Size    State    Run-Time  Pri/RB   RTS
 1     1,2    Det     ERRCPY   5/32K   SR            0.1    0/6    ...RSX
 2     1,2    KB0     SYSTAT  14/32K   RN Lck        0.0   -8/6    ...RSX
 3     1,2    Det     PBS...  25/32K   SL            0.0   -8/6    ...RSX
$ RUN SHUTUP
SHUTUP   V9.3-19   RSTS V9.3-20 RSTS/E V9.0
...
12:02 AM 01-Jan-99  ########      Final Shutdown Phase      ########

Please wait for system to re-boot itself
...
############################################################################
The below errors don't occur if I comment out the following from supplied pdp11.ini file. I found this out when my laptop complained about the
"set throttle 99%" command.

;set throttle 99%
############################################################################
KW11-L doesn't work.
RSTS/E requires a clock!
 PC=062076 PS=034344 OV=000001 M5=001200 M6=005600 SP=046334
 R0=000000 R1=000000 R2=000000 R3=000000 R4=000002 R5=104530

SP-> 

Fatal RSTS/E system initialization error!
The fatal error occurred during the bootstrap phase
of system initialization; there is no recovery.

HALT instruction, PC: 026320 (JMP @#17002)
sim>

I know many people have done this for years. But this is the first laptop I’ve owned. And there is something very cool about having a complete RSTS/E OS which I was employed to use to run our companies business…back in the day. And to run MVS which I was NOT employed to use…back in the day. We didn’t use MVS because it was a much more expensive OS, and powerful (probably overkill), for our growing little company than the VSE/VM OSs our company ran. Anything VSE could do…MVS could do…and more. MVS was IBMs flagship OS used by big companies and government agencies.

All this software running under emulation on a laptop more powerful than big expensive hardware of that era. A laptop that I can put in a bag and carry anywhere.

MVS was an advancement over MVT which I learned in school. The manuals alone for these OSs would fill many bookshelves. As the Systems Programmer for these OSs I had many bookcases with many books.

I didn’t do extensive testing. However I started both systems. And installed x3270.

I also installed/tested trs80gp. So now I have all the vintage systems from my past.

Reliving the past from time to time gives me joy. However doing all this on Linux proves I still keep up with the present.

Also copied all my Python3 programs over and installed VSCodium.

Apparently my old hosting company QualityHostOnline (I believe I’ve been with them since 2007 according to my About page…so 16 years!) was bought out by Exact Hosting. And my yearly fee has increased by almost 50%. I had to pay because it would take too long to move everything over to another host. I hate this crap.

Time to look for another host. Same thing happened last year but when I was going through the process of moving to another host, someone from QualityHostOnline contacted me and gave me the old price because they saw I was an old customer. A old customer who rarely contacts them, in other words…low maintenance! That has to mean something. Surely they looked at the PITA factor, before offering me that deal. Perhaps I’ll look at NameCheap again, the hosting company I almost switched to last year). They had equivalent features as my current host for a better price…at the time.

Well if I’m home…I’ll use my desktop computer. Otherwise I mostly see using it short term if anything happens to my desktop computer. It was sheer hell a while back when my desktop computer died and I had to do everything from my phone. Including looking for computer parts! If it was 2007 when Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone…I’d think having the option of accessing the Internet from my phone was very cool. And really it still is. But cumbersome today for fat fingers and not the best vision. Also my phone is in pretty sorry condition. Not just my words but the words of a Cricket employee when I brought my phone in because of problems and the worker attempted to use it, who said…”you need a new phone”. Very aggravating!

Also recently I lost my phone (turns out it was on silent in a bag), my daughter called me but I heard nothing. The Google “find my phone” feature will ring loud even if speaker is turned off. I really could have used that feature then. But panic set in wondering if I left it somewhere unlocked.

Abracadabra…I turned a useless MS-Windows computer into a useful Linux computer.

Looking back if there is one thing I wish I learned at my company…it was the Data General mini computer. I believe the Model was Nova 3. This computer was probably the most significant piece of our companies early success. I’m guessing at all this, it was there before I started, and I never asked many questions about it. It predated the PDP-11.

On the other hand I believe learning a computer has as much to do with learning the OS as any thing. You can’t just say you know IBM mainframes. Which aspect? There were two, similar in concept, but different IBM OS’s at the time. MVS, which became z/OS and VSE, often VM played a part too, We used VM/VSE…MVS’s little brother.

Our Data General used an obscure OS called BLIS/COBOL, a very unusual OS written in…COBOL. So even if I learned the DG as we called it…I wouldn’t be able to relate to most DG users.

Doing some research for this post. Wikipedia seems to point to RDOS as the bundled OS for the DG Nova 3.

Looking at the RDOS commands, I see Algol, ASM, BASIC and FORTRAN but no mention of COBOL. The head of our department came from a IBM mainframe environment. So I’m guessing he was looking for something IBMish. And COBOL was a proven business language.

Oddly, to my mind when we transitioned to the PDP-11 the applications were written in RSTS/E’s bundled Basic-Plus language. And I know COBOL was an option for RSTS/E. However I really don’t know what version of COBOL was available for what version of RSTS/E. So perhaps COBOL wasn’t even an option at the time. I usually use RSTS/E version 7 on simh because I’m guessing that is what I used when I was first exposed to RSTS/E on my school’s computer before I started at my first real full-time computer job.

Apparently RDOS is available for use with the popular simh minicomputer emulator, that I used to emulate a PDP-11 minicomputer.

So I think it’s safe to say if you were talking to an old time DG Nova 3 user, it’s most likely they used RDOS to interact with the machine.

I don’t think I ever talked about this. And I must for future days where I forget everything. But I really wanted to learn every aspect of the computer side of my company. Eventually we transitioned from the PDP-11 to a IBM mainframe. I was very fortunate for the opportunities the company I worked for gave me. They hired a person to write CICS programs on the mainframe. Of course I wanted to learn that too. I was never taught CICS in school, so they sent me to New York for a week to learn CICS.

When I got back I started using some of the things I learned. One of the first things I found out using CICS commands such as CEDF and CEMT…it’s been too long so I don’t remember if it was one of those or another command (but they all began with C), was all these existing programs sitting there, using memory, inactive waiting for interaction. I knew that wasn’t good. It’s been so long but I believe the term was conversational and the programs should have been written non-conversational. I’m really reaching back in my mind here, but I believe the main difference is that non-conversational CICS programs use a transaction-id to remember their state. So they do their thing then go away releasing memory, until they are needed again to continue or finish the transaction by associating the transaction-id. So I reported this to the powers that be and this CICS programmer had to rewrite their programs.

Why the existing Systems Programmer never noticed this…I don’t know. Actually he probably did, but didn’t realize the meaning. More likely he came from a shop where the programmers wrote their programs correctly so it was never an issue. Technically writing conversational CICS programs isn’t wrong. But if there are a lot of programs doing this, for example a room full of customer service people querying customer info it can eat up a lot of memory.