>-----Original Message-----
>From: Info-vax <info-vax-bounces@rbnsn.com> On Behalf Of Arne Vajhøj via
>Info-vax
>Sent: March-07-22 3:14 PM
>To: info-vax@rbnsn.com
>Cc: Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk>
>Subject: Re: [Info-vax] Special deals on Tape Drives
>
>On 3/6/2022 2:42 PM, kemain.nospam@gmail.com wrote:
>>> From: Info-vax <info-vax-bounces@rbnsn.com> On Behalf Of Arne Vajhøj
>>> via Info-vax On 3/6/2022 8:56 AM, kemain.nospam@gmail.com wrote:
>>>> "Public Cloud" is just another name for outsourcing parts of your IT
>>>> to other vendors like Microsoft (Azure), Amazon (AWS) in return for
>>>> paying a fee for monthly services your company has contracted with.
>>>>
>>>> Like outsourcing, moving to a public cloud means you are leaving
>>>> behind those portions of your current service model that you decide
>>>> can be done better by someone other than your current provider e.g.
>>>> your internal IT
>>>
>>> I believe that flexibility/scalability and the paying for usage model
>>> is what is driving cloud not a desire to out-source.
>>>
>>
>> The capacity on demand model (COD) has been around for numerous
>> decades and was/is available from many vendors.
>>
>>> But cloud does imply some outsourcing.

[snip]

>It is possible that some outsourcing people like to think about it that way.
>
>But they are totally missing the point.
>
>Cloud and outsourcing are orthogonal aspects.
>
>Cloud is about using another companies hardware.
>
>Outsourcing is about using another companies people.
>
>They can be freely combined.
>

Traditional outsourcers have in the past purchased new HW to run a Customers SW e.g. SAP for them in the outsourcers DC i.e. they used their own HW to run Customer solutions.

They would simply take the new HW/SW purchase costs (internal costs for companies like HP, IBM), add in costs of X management resources, licensing etc. and price them on a monthly basis over a 5-7 year period, then add 25% (estimate) to the monthly cost. They might reduce their resourcing costs by using offshore resources. They will of course know that changes is where they will make their real $'s over the 7 years as each change request (CR) is a real cost to the Customer.

In todays Cloud world, Cloud vendors pitch "IT Lite" solutions like cost per cpu and "only paying for what you use".

That is one of the biggest marketing con's since the 70's when mainframes were charging "pay per use" timesharing solutions.

[snip]
>
>But in the end the number are pretty clear.
>
>IaaS public cloud market is growing around 25% per year. And it is expected to
>continue so for the next 5 years.
>
>Arne
>

Perhaps for S-M companies, but as the Forbes Aug 21 article I quoted, large companies are certainly not following this strategy.

Regards,

Kerry Main
Kerry dot main at starkgaming dot com

--
This email has been checked for viruses by AVG.
https://www.avg.com

On 3/7/2022 5:05 PM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
> On 3/7/22 13:57, Simon Clubley wrote:
>> The problem with that is that VMS isn't easy to manage by current
>> standards although it certainly was by the standards of 25 years ago.
>
> Simon, I pretty much agreed with what you said except for this one part.
>
> 25 years ago I managed Window, Unix and VMS.  Had a nice VAX Cluster and
> about 100 users. VMS was by far the hardest to manage. I could do Unix
> and even windows with no documentation provided by the vendor.  VMS was
> impossible without The Grey Wall.  And, if you had documentation but
> found it inadequate there was a wealth of third party documentation
> available.   lot of it free.  What was there for VMS?  The Grey Wall.
>
> I had management tools for Windows and Unix like CFengine.  For VMS,
> I had The Grey Wall.  Do I really need to go on?  Heck, still had
> RSTS running in those days and even it was easier to manage than VMS.
>
> And, the worst part of it is that nothing has changed other than more
> and maybe better tools and documentation for Windows and Unix.

I must admit that I cannot follow this.

VMS system management is old and it shows.

There are also some odd stuff for historical reasons and
some really poor designed stuff.

But I don't think it is difficult to manage a VMS system.

A one page cheat sheet either in memory for those with VMS
experience or on paper for those without and then use HELP
on commands and inside various utilities for available
options and what they do.

You need to know the names of a handful of startup files.

You need to know how to get into Authorize.

You need to know @SYS$UPDATE:VMSINSTAL and PROD INSTALL.

You need to know @SYS$MANAGER:TCP$CONFIG.

And then one can actually get pretty far.

Of course there are advanced topics: non trivial
cluster configs, non standard hardware etc. but that
tend to be tricky on other OS as well.

It should be feasible to teach any IT admin type
basic VMS system management pretty quickly. The
person will probably not be impressed by what he sees,
but it works. And system management is a mean
to an end not a goal in itself.

Sure VMS does not have the tools to manage thousands or tens
of thousands of systems. But I don't think there are any
customers with that many VMS systems, so the practical
impact is none.

Arne

On 3/7/2022 7:13 PM, kemain.nospam@gmail.com wrote:
>> From: Info-vax <info-vax-bounces@rbnsn.com> On Behalf Of Arne Vajhøj via Info-vax
>> Cloud and outsourcing are orthogonal aspects.
>>
>> Cloud is about using another companies hardware.
>>
>> Outsourcing is about using another companies people.
>>
>> They can be freely combined.
>
> Traditional outsourcers have in the past purchased new HW to run a Customers SW e.g. SAP for them in the outsourcers DC i.e. they used their own HW to run Customer solutions.
>
> They would simply take the new HW/SW purchase costs (internal costs
> for companies like HP, IBM), add in costs of X management resources,
> licensing etc. and price them on a monthly basis over a 5-7 year
> period, then add 25% (estimate) to the monthly cost. They might
> reduce their resourcing costs by using offshore resources. They will
> of course know that changes is where they will make their real $'s
> over the 7 years as each change request (CR) is a real cost to the
> Customer.
That is frequently seen in the outsourcing business.

It is practically unheard of in the public cloud business.

You got a menu and that's it. Only cloud customer I know that are
able to get special offerings is the US government.

>> But in the end the number are pretty clear.
>>
>> IaaS public cloud market is growing around 25% per year. And it is expected to
>> continue so for the next 5 years.
>
> Perhaps for S-M companies, but as the Forbes Aug 21 article I quoted,
> large companies are certainly not following this strategy.

Large companies have a real option of going private cloud if
they want to.

But many choose not to.

A few weeks ago we discussed banks and I did a quick search:

Barclays - private cloud
Deutsche Bank - Google cloud
HSBC - Amazon cloud
JP Morgan - multi cloud
Bank of America - IBM cloud
Citibank - private cloud
Goldman Sachs - Amazon cloud
BNP Paribas - private cloud
UBS - Microsoft cloud

1/3 private cloud 2/3 public cloud.

Arne

>-----Original Message-----
>From: Info-vax <info-vax-bounces@rbnsn.com> On Behalf Of Arne Vajhøj via
>Info-vax
>Sent: March-07-22 9:23 PM
>To: info-vax@rbnsn.com
>Cc: Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk>
>Subject: Re: [Info-vax] Special deals on Tape Drives
>
>On 3/7/2022 5:05 PM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>> On 3/7/22 13:57, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>> The problem with that is that VMS isn't easy to manage by current
>>> standards although it certainly was by the standards of 25 years ago.
>>
>> Simon, I pretty much agreed with what you said except for this one part.
>>
>> 25 years ago I managed Window, Unix and VMS. Had a nice VAX Cluster
>> and about 100 users. VMS was by far the hardest to manage. I could do
>> Unix and even windows with no documentation provided by the vendor.
>> VMS was impossible without The Grey Wall. And, if you had
>> documentation but found it inadequate there was a wealth of third
>> party documentation available. lot of it free. What was there for
>VMS? The Grey Wall.
>>
>> I had management tools for Windows and Unix like CFengine. For VMS, I
>> had The Grey Wall. Do I really need to go on? Heck, still had RSTS
>> running in those days and even it was easier to manage than VMS.
>>
>> And, the worst part of it is that nothing has changed other than more
>> and maybe better tools and documentation for Windows and Unix.
>
>I must admit that I cannot follow this.
>
>VMS system management is old and it shows.
>

Better late than never 😊

<https://vmssoftware.com/products/webui/>
<https://vmssoftware.com/openkits/i64opensource/VSI-I64VMS-WEBUI-V0400-2-1-RELEASE-NOTES.PDF>

[snip..]

Regards,

Kerry Main
Kerry dot main at starkgaming dot com

--
This email has been checked for viruses by AVG.
https://www.avg.com

On 3/7/2022 8:42 PM, kemain.nospam@gmail.com wrote:
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Info-vax <info-vax-bounces@rbnsn.com> On Behalf Of Arne Vajhøj via Info-vax
>> On 3/7/2022 5:05 PM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>>> On 3/7/22 13:57, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>>> The problem with that is that VMS isn't easy to manage by current
>>>> standards although it certainly was by the standards of 25 years ago.
>>>
>>> Simon, I pretty much agreed with what you said except for this one part.
>>>
>>> 25 years ago I managed Window, Unix and VMS. Had a nice VAX Cluster
>>> and about 100 users. VMS was by far the hardest to manage. I could do
>>> Unix and even windows with no documentation provided by the vendor.
>>> VMS was impossible without The Grey Wall. And, if you had
>>> documentation but found it inadequate there was a wealth of third
>>> party documentation available. lot of it free. What was there for
>> VMS? The Grey Wall.
>>>
>>> I had management tools for Windows and Unix like CFengine. For VMS, I
>>> had The Grey Wall. Do I really need to go on? Heck, still had RSTS
>>> running in those days and even it was easier to manage than VMS.
>>>
>>> And, the worst part of it is that nothing has changed other than more
>>> and maybe better tools and documentation for Windows and Unix.
>>
>> I must admit that I cannot follow this.
>>
>> VMS system management is old and it shows.
>>
>
> Better late than never 😊
>
> <https://vmssoftware.com/products/webui/>
> <https://vmssoftware.com/openkits/i64opensource/VSI-I64VMS-WEBUI-V0400-2-1-RELEASE-NOTES.PDF>

I am aware of it.

But it is not my impression that it is widely used.

And one obvious explanation is that maybe the VMS system managers
doesn't see the need because they are OK with what they got.

To me GUI's for system administration is really only useful
in those cases where it is a non-IT person that has to do the
stuff.

Arne

On Sunday, March 6, 2022 at 7:09:28 AM UTC-8, Scott Dorsey wrote:

(snip)

> That's the beauty of virtualization. You can just snapshot the disks,
> you don't need access to the computer or operating system at all. It
> doesn't matter what OS is running, from the standpoint of the backup
> system, it's all just data.

> IBM was able to do this back in the seventies; you could do direct backups
> from disk to tape using just the channel controllers with the CPU shut off.
> But now it's pretty much universal.

Then there was the 3850:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_3850

Den 2022-03-08 kl. 02:53, skrev Arne Vajhøj:
> On 3/7/2022 8:42 PM, kemain.nospam@gmail.com wrote:
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Info-vax <info-vax-bounces@rbnsn.com> On Behalf Of Arne Vajhøj via
>>> Info-vax
>>> On 3/7/2022 5:05 PM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>>>> On 3/7/22 13:57, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>>>> The problem with that is that VMS isn't easy to manage by current
>>>>> standards although it certainly was by the standards of 25 years ago.
>>>>
>>>> Simon, I pretty much agreed with what you said except for this one part.
>>>>
>>>> 25 years ago I managed Window, Unix and VMS.  Had a nice VAX Cluster
>>>> and about 100 users. VMS was by far the hardest to manage. I could do
>>>> Unix and even windows with no documentation provided by the vendor.
>>>> VMS was impossible without The Grey Wall.  And, if you had
>>>> documentation but found it inadequate there was a wealth of third
>>>> party documentation available.   lot of it free.  What was there for
>>> VMS?  The Grey Wall.
>>>>
>>>> I had management tools for Windows and Unix like CFengine.  For VMS, I
>>>> had The Grey Wall.  Do I really need to go on?  Heck, still had RSTS
>>>> running in those days and even it was easier to manage than VMS.
>>>>
>>>> And, the worst part of it is that nothing has changed other than more
>>>> and maybe better tools and documentation for Windows and Unix.
>>>
>>> I must admit that I cannot follow this.
>>>
>>> VMS system management is old and it shows.
>>>
>>
>> Better late than never 😊
>>
>> <https://vmssoftware.com/products/webui/>
>> <https://vmssoftware.com/openkits/i64opensource/VSI-I64VMS-WEBUI-V0400-2-1-RELEASE-NOTES.PDF>
>>
>
> I am aware of it.
>
> But it is not my impression that it is widely used.

Can't use it since it requires Python 3.

>
> And one obvious explanation is that maybe the VMS system managers
> doesn't see the need because they are OK with what they got.
>
> To me GUI's for system administration is really only useful
> in those cases where it is a non-IT person that has to do the
> stuff.
>
> Arne
>

On 2022-03-07, Bill Gunshannon <bill.gunshannon@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 3/7/22 13:57, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>
>>
>> The problem with that is that VMS isn't easy to manage by current
>> standards although it certainly was by the standards of 25 years ago.
>>
>
> Simon, I pretty much agreed with what you said except for this one part.
>
> 25 years ago I managed Window, Unix and VMS. Had a nice VAX Cluster and
> about 100 users. VMS was by far the hardest to manage. I could do Unix
> and even windows with no documentation provided by the vendor. VMS was
> impossible without The Grey Wall. And, if you had documentation but
> found it inadequate there was a wealth of third party documentation
> available. lot of it free. What was there for VMS? The Grey Wall.
>

I suppose it's probably based on what else you were doing at that time.

For me, I was still creating modelines for my graphics cards and monitors
in Linux (and doing all kinds of other manual configuration stuff), and,
in the Windows world, Windows 2000 had not yet arrived (Windows 2000
really changed how Windows was used and managed).

BTW, does anyone else think that the Windows 2000 UI was still more
user-friendly than the current fashionable GUI options ?

For that matter, what about GTK 2 on Linux ? At least back then, you
could immediately see what you could click on and the UI elements
really stood out from each other.

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On 3/8/22 13:21, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-03-07, Bill Gunshannon <bill.gunshannon@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 3/7/22 13:57, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> The problem with that is that VMS isn't easy to manage by current
>>> standards although it certainly was by the standards of 25 years ago.
>>>
>>
>> Simon, I pretty much agreed with what you said except for this one part.
>>
>> 25 years ago I managed Window, Unix and VMS. Had a nice VAX Cluster and
>> about 100 users. VMS was by far the hardest to manage. I could do Unix
>> and even windows with no documentation provided by the vendor. VMS was
>> impossible without The Grey Wall. And, if you had documentation but
>> found it inadequate there was a wealth of third party documentation
>> available. lot of it free. What was there for VMS? The Grey Wall.
>>
>
> I suppose it's probably based on what else you were doing at that time.

Basically, VMS or anything else. :-)

>
> For me, I was still creating modelines for my graphics cards and monitors
> in Linux (and doing all kinds of other manual configuration stuff), and,
> in the Windows world, Windows 2000 had not yet arrived (Windows 2000
> really changed how Windows was used and managed).

I guess you didn't like NT. I found it rather good as compared
to its predecessors. Did a lot of 3.51 and 2.0 before 2000 came
along. Didn't really see 2000 as an improvement.

But what I said still applies.
I still have a number of third party documentation examples for
both NT and 2000. Unix books abounded (although I reviewed at
least one that was total crap but it got published anyway.)

bill

On 2022-03-07, Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>
> But I don't think it is difficult to manage a VMS system.
>
> A one page cheat sheet either in memory for those with VMS
> experience or on paper for those without and then use HELP
> on commands and inside various utilities for available
> options and what they do.
>

For starters:

What about applying patches, installing new software with dependencies,
or upgrading the system ?

What is the VMS version of "yum update" or "yum install" ?

What is the VMS version of logwatch (and other monitor tools) ?

Where are the tools to help an inexperienced system manager with
configuration and diagnosis of problems ?

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On 2022-03-08, Jan-Erik Söderholm <jan-erik.soderholm@telia.com> wrote:
> Den 2022-03-08 kl. 02:53, skrev Arne Vajhøj:
>>
>> I am aware of it.
>>
>> But it is not my impression that it is widely used.
>
> Can't use it since it requires Python 3.
>

I had to install Python 3 on my Android phone recently and wanted
to run some proper Unix CLI tools on the phone to go with it. :-)

I did it by installing PRoot into a supported terminal emulator
running on Android, then unpacking a barebones Alpine Linux userland
image on top of that, and then installing Python 3 from the
Alpine software repository.

That's the kind of thing you can now do outside of the VMS world...

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On Tuesday, March 8, 2022 at 1:58:00 PM UTC-5, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-03-08, Jan-Erik Söderholm <jan-erik....@telia.com> wrote:
> > Den 2022-03-08 kl. 02:53, skrev Arne Vajhøj:
> >>
> >> I am aware of it.
> >>
> >> But it is not my impression that it is widely used.
> >
> > Can't use it since it requires Python 3.
> >
> I had to install Python 3 on my Android phone recently and wanted
> to run some proper Unix CLI tools on the phone to go with it. :-)
>
> I did it by installing PRoot into a supported terminal emulator
> running on Android, then unpacking a barebones Alpine Linux userland
> image on top of that, and then installing Python 3 from the
> Alpine software repository.
>
> That's the kind of thing you can now do outside of the VMS world...
> Simon.
>
> --
> Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
> Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

And where did you learn how to do that?

A manual, someone else showing you?

On 2022-03-07, <kemain.nospam@gmail.com> <kemain.nospam@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> In terms of dependency on config files, have you maintained Linux or Linux
> based appliance systems?
>
> Do you think there are not manual config files that need to be maintained?
>

Yes there are, and quite a bit of the time, I just edit them myself but
there are also one hell of a lot of tools to allow people without that
level of knowledge to also edit them.

And there are also a lot of tools that I use myself for some of those
files or carrying out certain operations because it's easier and quicker
than manually editing configuration files or issuing lots of commands
to do the same thing.

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On 2022-03-08, abrsvc <dansabrservices@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Tuesday, March 8, 2022 at 1:58:00 PM UTC-5, Simon Clubley wrote:
>> On 2022-03-08, Jan-Erik Söderholm <jan-erik....@telia.com> wrote:
>> > Den 2022-03-08 kl. 02:53, skrev Arne Vajhøj:
>> >>
>> >> I am aware of it.
>> >>
>> >> But it is not my impression that it is widely used.
>> >
>> > Can't use it since it requires Python 3.
>> >
>> I had to install Python 3 on my Android phone recently and wanted
>> to run some proper Unix CLI tools on the phone to go with it. :-)
>>
>> I did it by installing PRoot into a supported terminal emulator
>> running on Android, then unpacking a barebones Alpine Linux userland
>> image on top of that, and then installing Python 3 from the
>> Alpine software repository.
>>
>> That's the kind of thing you can now do outside of the VMS world...
>
> And where did you learn how to do that?
>
> A manual, someone else showing you?

My Linux/Unix knowledge allowed me to search for the kinds of tools
I thought I would need to achieve this, and was followed by reading
the documentation for those tools once I found them.

Once I had the barebones userland installed on top of the emulation
layer, everything else was just standard Linux system management and
user usage concepts.

I had never used Alpine Linux before, but in the Linux world, while
some management commands and capabilities differ between different
Linux distributions, the general core concepts remain the same.

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On 3/8/2022 1:57 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-03-08, Jan-Erik Söderholm <jan-erik.soderholm@telia.com> wrote:
>> Den 2022-03-08 kl. 02:53, skrev Arne Vajhøj:
>>>
>>> I am aware of it.
>>>
>>> But it is not my impression that it is widely used.
>>
>> Can't use it since it requires Python 3.
>
> I had to install Python 3 on my Android phone recently and wanted
> to run some proper Unix CLI tools on the phone to go with it. :-)
>
> I did it by installing PRoot into a supported terminal emulator
> running on Android, then unpacking a barebones Alpine Linux userland
> image on top of that, and then installing Python 3 from the
> Alpine software repository.
>
> That's the kind of thing you can now do outside of the VMS world...

There are way more people using Linux ARM than VMS Alpha which is why
Python 3 is available for Linux ARM but not for VMS Alpha.

But installation wise I think I prefer the VMS way over the above.

Arne

On 3/8/2022 1:50 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-03-07, Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>> But I don't think it is difficult to manage a VMS system.
>>
>> A one page cheat sheet either in memory for those with VMS
>> experience or on paper for those without and then use HELP
>> on commands and inside various utilities for available
>> options and what they do.
>
> For starters:
>
> What about applying patches, installing new software with dependencies,
> or upgrading the system ?
>
> What is the VMS version of "yum update" or "yum install" ?

With the number of installs you do on VMS then VMSINSTAL and
PCSI INSTAL works fine.

You download what you want to install and then install it.

No problems.

> What is the VMS version of logwatch (and other monitor tools) ?

You use the various tools that comes with VMS.

Or you pay for a commercial tool (if they are still sold).

> Where are the tools to help an inexperienced system manager with
> configuration and diagnosis of problems ?

Depends on what kind of problems.

Arne

On 2022-03-08, Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>
> There are way more people using Linux ARM than VMS Alpha which is why
> Python 3 is available for Linux ARM but not for VMS Alpha.
>
> But installation wise I think I prefer the VMS way over the above.
>

You don't find it the slightest bit interesting that there are now
tools to allow you to run normal ARM Linux userland programs (with
some restrictions) on a _phone_ that you carry in your pocket ???

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On 3/8/22 14:50, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-03-08, Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>>
>> There are way more people using Linux ARM than VMS Alpha which is why
>> Python 3 is available for Linux ARM but not for VMS Alpha.
>>
>> But installation wise I think I prefer the VMS way over the above.
>>
>
> You don't find it the slightest bit interesting that there are now
> tools to allow you to run normal ARM Linux userland programs (with
> some restrictions) on a _phone_ that you carry in your pocket ???
>

Didn't someone here once get SIMH and an emulated VAX running VMS
on an Android phone? :-) In both cases, the real question is still:
why?

bill

On 2022-03-08, Bill Gunshannon <bill.gunshannon@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Didn't someone here once get SIMH and an emulated VAX running VMS
> on an Android phone? :-) In both cases, the real question is still:
> why?
>

Because there are certain things I would like to be able to do
while I am outside and not sat at a desk and I am now increasingly
able to do those things without carrying a dedicated laptop.

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

On 3/8/2022 2:50 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-03-08, Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>> There are way more people using Linux ARM than VMS Alpha which is why
>> Python 3 is available for Linux ARM but not for VMS Alpha.
>>
>> But installation wise I think I prefer the VMS way over the above.
>
> You don't find it the slightest bit interesting that there are now
> tools to allow you to run normal ARM Linux userland programs (with
> some restrictions) on a _phone_ that you carry in your pocket ???

As an indication of how computer hardware has evolved: sure.

But I was focusing on the system admin aspect.

Arne

On 3/8/2022 2:20 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-03-08, abrsvc <dansabrservices@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> On Tuesday, March 8, 2022 at 1:58:00 PM UTC-5, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>> On 2022-03-08, Jan-Erik Söderholm <jan-erik....@telia.com> wrote:
>>>> Den 2022-03-08 kl. 02:53, skrev Arne Vajhøj:
>>>>>
>>>>> I am aware of it.
>>>>>
>>>>> But it is not my impression that it is widely used.
>>>>
>>>> Can't use it since it requires Python 3.
>>>>
>>> I had to install Python 3 on my Android phone recently and wanted
>>> to run some proper Unix CLI tools on the phone to go with it. :-)
>>>
>>> I did it by installing PRoot into a supported terminal emulator
>>> running on Android, then unpacking a barebones Alpine Linux userland
>>> image on top of that, and then installing Python 3 from the
>>> Alpine software repository.
>>>
>>> That's the kind of thing you can now do outside of the VMS world...
>>
>> And where did you learn how to do that?
>>
>> A manual, someone else showing you?
>
> My Linux/Unix knowledge allowed me to search for the kinds of tools
> I thought I would need to achieve this, and was followed by reading
> the documentation for those tools once I found them.
>
> Once I had the barebones userland installed on top of the emulation
> layer, everything else was just standard Linux system management and
> user usage concepts.
>
> I had never used Alpine Linux before, but in the Linux world, while
> some management commands and capabilities differ between different
> Linux distributions, the general core concepts remain the same.
>
> Simon.
>

So, you were born with this knowledge about Linux?

I do so dislike double standards ...

--
David Froble Tel: 724-529-0450
Dave Froble Enterprises, Inc. E-Mail: davef@tsoft-inc.com
DFE Ultralights, Inc.
170 Grimplin Road
Vanderbilt, PA 15486

>-----Original Message-----
>From: Info-vax <info-vax-bounces@rbnsn.com> On Behalf Of Arne Vajhøj via
>Info-vax
>Sent: March-07-22 9:54 PM
>To: info-vax@rbnsn.com
>Cc: Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk>
>Subject: Re: [Info-vax] Special deals on Tape Drives
>
>On 3/7/2022 8:42 PM, kemain.nospam@gmail.com wrote:
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Info-vax <info-vax-bounces@rbnsn.com> On Behalf Of Arne Vajhøj
>>> via Info-vax On 3/7/2022 5:05 PM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>>>> On 3/7/22 13:57, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>>>> The problem with that is that VMS isn't easy to manage by current
>>>>> standards although it certainly was by the standards of 25 years ago.
>>>>
>>>> Simon, I pretty much agreed with what you said except for this one part.
>>>>
>>>> 25 years ago I managed Window, Unix and VMS. Had a nice VAX Cluster
>>>> and about 100 users. VMS was by far the hardest to manage. I could
>>>> do Unix and even windows with no documentation provided by the
>vendor.
>>>> VMS was impossible without The Grey Wall. And, if you had
>>>> documentation but found it inadequate there was a wealth of third
>>>> party documentation available. lot of it free. What was there for
>>> VMS? The Grey Wall.
>>>>
>>>> I had management tools for Windows and Unix like CFengine. For VMS,
>>>> I had The Grey Wall. Do I really need to go on? Heck, still had
>>>> RSTS running in those days and even it was easier to manage than VMS.
>>>>
>>>> And, the worst part of it is that nothing has changed other than
>>>> more and maybe better tools and documentation for Windows and Unix.
>>>
>>> I must admit that I cannot follow this.
>>>
>>> VMS system management is old and it shows.
>>>
>>
>> Better late than never 😊
>>
>> <https://vmssoftware.com/products/webui/>
>> <https://vmssoftware.com/openkits/i64opensource/VSI-I64VMS-WEBUI-
>V0400
>> -2-1-RELEASE-NOTES.PDF>
>
>I am aware of it.
>
>But it is not my impression that it is widely used.
>

Given it is only in the last year that VSI has made these recent versions available, it is not surprising it is not well known.

I suspect even most comp.os.vms readers were not aware they could use a modern GUI to manage their OpenVMS systems (albeit not A64 yet).

>And one obvious explanation is that maybe the VMS system managers
>doesn't see the need because they are OK with what they got.
>
>To me GUI's for system administration is really only useful in those cases
>where it is a non-IT person that has to do the stuff.
>
>Arne
>

Tell that to all the Windows Admin's - how many do Windows sysadmin duties from the command prompt?

Ever try to admin AD from a command prompt? What about file explorer vs. command prompt to move files around?

Granted, there are typically more advanced things that one can typically do at the command CLI, but for most common Sysadmin activities, most sysadmins would prefer a GUI.

Key point is that this is an additional option for modern operations / help desk staff to manage OpenVMS X86/I64 (hopefully A64?) systems in a way they are used to i.e. via a GUI.

Regards,

Kerry Main
Kerry dot main at starkgaming dot com

--
This email has been checked for viruses by AVG.
https://www.avg.com

On 2022-03-08, Dave Froble <davef@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
>
> So, you were born with this knowledge about Linux?
>
> I do so dislike double standards ...
>

Huh ????

_WHAT_ double standards ?

I pointed out an example of how much technology is advancing outside
of the VMS world and suddenly it's _my_ fault for being curious enough
and motivated enough to do something like that ?

The problem with way too many people around here is that you stopped
learning about 20+ years ago and you think that everyone should remain
at the level of technology you are comfortable with.

I, OTOH, use my knowledge to (1) do things that were not possible even
10 years ago, (2) do things that can be done in a far better way these
days, and (3) also use the same knowledge to recognise when something
new is a bad idea and use an alternative instead.

I hope I never become like those of you here that have stopped learning
and are happy to simply ossify. I love learning new things and I feel
sorry for those of you who no longer feel like that.

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

Den 2022-03-09 kl. 00:45, skrev Simon Clubley:
> On 2022-03-08, Dave Froble <davef@tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
>>
>> So, you were born with this knowledge about Linux?
>>
>> I do so dislike double standards ...
>>
>
> Huh ????
>
> _WHAT_ double standards ?
>
> I pointed out an example of how much technology is advancing outside
> of the VMS world and suddenly it's _my_ fault for being curious enough
> and motivated enough to do something like that ?
>
> The problem with way too many people around here is that you stopped
> learning about 20+ years ago and you think that everyone should remain
> at the level of technology you are comfortable with.
>
> I, OTOH, use my knowledge to (1) do things that were not possible even
> 10 years ago, (2) do things that can be done in a far better way these
> days, and (3) also use the same knowledge to recognise when something
> new is a bad idea and use an alternative instead.
>
> I hope I never become like those of you here that have stopped learning
> and are happy to simply ossify. I love learning new things and I feel
> sorry for those of you who no longer feel like that.
>
> Simon.
>

Yes, but...

Being able to learn new things (which I never have had any trouble with)
has little to do with VMS as such. It has everything to do with each
person.

And an Android phone? I do not think you can run z/OS on it either.
Does those using z/OS care about that?

Should all our phones have been running VMS instead of Android?
MS tried with Windows and that did not work that well.

The fact is that 99.99 % of all phone users just couldn't care less what is
running inside their phone. It is all about the usage.

Your problem is that you are so focused on finding something that is
"different" in VMS that your examples sometimes just becomes jokes.

On 3/8/2022 6:08 PM, kemain.nospam@gmail.com wrote:
>> From: Info-vax <info-vax-bounces@rbnsn.com> On Behalf Of Arne Vajhøj via Info-vax
>> On 3/7/2022 8:42 PM, kemain.nospam@gmail.com wrote:
>>>> From: Info-vax <info-vax-bounces@rbnsn.com> On Behalf Of Arne Vajhøj
>>>> I must admit that I cannot follow this.
>>>>
>>>> VMS system management is old and it shows.
>>>
>>> Better late than never 😊
>>>
>>> <https://vmssoftware.com/products/webui/>
>>> <https://vmssoftware.com/openkits/i64opensource/VSI-I64VMS-WEBUI-V0400-2-1-RELEASE-NOTES.PDF>
>>
>> I am aware of it.
>>
>> But it is not my impression that it is widely used.
>
> Given it is only in the last year that VSI has made these recent
> versions available, it is not surprising it is not well known.
>
> I suspect even most comp.os.vms readers were not aware they could use
> a modern GUI to manage their OpenVMS systems (albeit not A64 yet).
That is of course also a possible explanation.

But I believe more in mine:

>> And one obvious explanation is that maybe the VMS system managers
>> doesn't see the need because they are OK with what they got.
>>
>> To me GUI's for system administration is really only useful in those cases
>> where it is a non-IT person that has to do the stuff.
>
> Tell that to all the Windows Admin's - how many do Windows sysadmin
> duties from the command prompt?
>
> Ever try to admin AD from a command prompt? What about file explorer
> vs. command prompt to move files around?
>
> Granted, there are typically more advanced things that one can
> typically do at the command CLI, but for most common Sysadmin
> activities, most sysadmins would prefer a GUI.

I would expect the majority of the good Windows admin to use
CLI and PS.

If they are managing Windows Core then they don't have
the option of GUI.

> Key point is that this is an additional option for modern operations
> / help desk staff to manage OpenVMS X86/I64 (hopefully A64?) systems
> in a way they are used to i.e. via a GUI.

Most modern stuff is actually command line based.

For all the container stuff then command line and various
scripts/config files is the normal (for whatever reason those
people tend to like YAML files).

I consider click system administration to be a bit 00'ish.

Arne