(UNISYS has been mentioned here a few times)

https://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/news/2022/11/08/unisys-stock-plummets-internal-investigation.html

Arne

On Wednesday, November 9, 2022 at 6:30:19 PM UTC-8, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
> (UNISYS has been mentioned here a few times)
> https://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/news/2022/11/08/unisys-stock-plummets-internal-investigation.html
I am not sure about here, but sometimes I mention Unisys as the only ones still
producing and selling ones' complement machines.

I don't think that would cause the stock to plunge.

On 11/9/22 21:30, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
> (UNISYS has been mentioned here a few times)
>
> https://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/news/2022/11/08/unisys-stock-plummets-internal-investigation.html
>

Interesting, but confusing.

How does a $.59 loss on a $5.15 share value workout to be
a "50% plunge"? Guess I don;t really understand the stock
market. Good thing I don't play there nor does my retirement
depend on it. :-)

On another note, having been a UNNIVAC Applications and System
programmer in another life I have followed them (technical side,
not business side) for several decades. While they have done
an amazing job of moving forward while maintaining backwards
compatibility I am surprised they have lasted as long as they
have. Most of what they do is business programming in high
level languages like COBOL and Fortran and their original
strength dates back to the days when mainframes were the only
real powerful machines. Today, I doubt there is much still
running on OS2200 that could not be handled easily on PC
architecture server boxes. At a great reduction of cost.
Also, because of how much COBOL and Fortran is involved I
expect migration would not be overly difficult or risky.
And yet, there they are.

Would make an excellent target for VMS to take a lot of
that business away. Unless, of course, VMS would end out
costing as much as, if not more than, the current UNISYS
cost.

And, yes, I know personally of currently running large UNISYS
systems that date back to Univac 1100/EXEC8 days. Some of
them, after 40 years, still have my name or initials in the
comments. :-)

bill

gah4 <gah4@u.washington.edu> wrote:
>On Wednesday, November 9, 2022 at 6:30:19 PM UTC-8, Arne Vajh=C3=B8j wrote:
>> (UNISYS has been mentioned here a few times)=20
>=20
>> https://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/news/2022/11/08/unisys-stock-plu=
>mmets-internal-investigation.html=20
>=20
>I am not sure about here, but sometimes I mention Unisys as the only ones s=
>till
>producing and selling ones' complement machines.
>
>I don't think that would cause the stock to plunge.

Could be. Last week the stock was at zero but THIS week it's at negative zero!
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

On 11/10/2022 9:04 AM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
> On 11/9/22 21:30, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>> (UNISYS has been mentioned here a few times)
>>
>> https://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/news/2022/11/08/unisys-stock-plummets-internal-investigation.html
>>
>
> Interesting, but confusing.
>
> How does a $.59 loss on a $5.15 share value workout to be
> a "50% plunge"?  Guess I don;t really understand the stock
> market.  Good thing I don't play there nor does my retirement
> depend on it.  :-)

The stock price fell 48%.

"Unisys Corp. shares closed down 48% on Tuesday"

"Shares of the company traded on heavy volume Tuesday and closed at $4.63."

(it was around 8.97 Monday)

They had a loss of 0.59 per outstanding share.

"the company said Tuesday it lost $40.1 million, or 59 cents per share,
in the third quarter."

(a loss of 40 million dollar and about 68 million outstanding shares
gives around 0.59 per share)

> On another note, having been a UNNIVAC Applications and System
> programmer in another life I have followed them (technical side,
> not business side) for several decades.  While they have done
> an amazing job of moving forward while maintaining backwards
> compatibility I am surprised they have lasted as long as they
> have.  Most of what they do is business programming in high
> level languages like COBOL and Fortran and their original
> strength dates back to the days when mainframes were the only
> real powerful machines.  Today, I doubt there is much still
> running on OS2200 that could not be handled easily on PC
> architecture server boxes.  At a great reduction of cost.
> Also, because of how much COBOL and Fortran is involved I
> expect migration would not be overly difficult or risky.
> And yet, there they are.
>
> Would make an excellent target for VMS to take a lot of
> that business away.

True.

Arne

On 11/10/2022 9:45 AM, Scott Dorsey wrote:
> gah4 <gah4@u.washington.edu> wrote:
>> On Wednesday, November 9, 2022 at 6:30:19 PM UTC-8, Arne Vajh=C3=B8j wrote:
>>> https://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/news/2022/11/08/unisys-stock-plummets-internal-investigation.html=20
>>
>> I am not sure about here, but sometimes I mention Unisys as the only ones still
>> producing and selling ones' complement machines.
>>
>> I don't think that would cause the stock to plunge.
>
> Could be. Last week the stock was at zero but THIS week it's at negative zero!

But then they would just need to add zero to get back.

:-)

Arne

On Thursday, November 10, 2022 at 12:08:30 PM UTC-8, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
> On 11/10/2022 9:45 AM, Scott Dorsey wrote:

(snip)
> > Could be. Last week the stock was at zero but THIS week it's at negative zero!
> But then they would just need to add zero to get back.

There are two ways usually used to build ones' complement machines.

Some compare +0 and -0 as equal.

Others use a ones' complement subtractor, and complement first for add.

If it is done right, you never get negative zero out, when the operands are
not negative zero.

If you want to see the effect of all this, read the Unisys C compiler manual.

C allows ones' complement for signed integers, which is fine.
But unsigned integers have to work modulo the appropriate power of 2.

The Unisys hardware doesn't do that so well.

In any case, it is not guaranteed that -0 + +0 gives +0.

On 11/10/22 14:42, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
> On 11/10/2022 9:04 AM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>> On 11/9/22 21:30, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>>> (UNISYS has been mentioned here a few times)
>>>
>>> https://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/news/2022/11/08/unisys-stock-plummets-internal-investigation.html
>>>
>>
>> Interesting, but confusing.
>>
>> How does a $.59 loss on a $5.15 share value workout to be
>> a "50% plunge"?  Guess I don;t really understand the stock
>> market.  Good thing I don't play there nor does my retirement
>> depend on it.  :-)
>
> The stock price fell 48%.
>
> "Unisys Corp. shares closed down 48% on Tuesday"
>
> "Shares of the company traded on heavy volume Tuesday and closed at $4.63."
>
> (it was around 8.97 Monday)
>
> They had a loss of 0.59 per outstanding share.
>
> "the company said Tuesday it lost $40.1 million, or 59 cents per share,
> in the third quarter."
>
> (a loss of 40 million dollar and about 68 million outstanding shares
> gives around 0.59 per share)
>

Like I said, I don't get it and that is why I don't play the stock
market and am very glad my retirement doesn't rely on it at all.
Probably a New Math thing. Or maybe it's OOP. :-)

bill

On 11/10/2022 4:06 PM, gah4 wrote:
> On Thursday, November 10, 2022 at 12:08:30 PM UTC-8, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>> On 11/10/2022 9:45 AM, Scott Dorsey wrote:
>
> (snip)
>>> Could be. Last week the stock was at zero but THIS week it's at negative zero!
>> But then they would just need to add zero to get back.
>
> There are two ways usually used to build ones' complement machines.
>
> Some compare +0 and -0 as equal.
>
> Others use a ones' complement subtractor, and complement first for add.
>
> If it is done right, you never get negative zero out, when the operands are
> not negative zero.
>
> If you want to see the effect of all this, read the Unisys C compiler manual.
>
> C allows ones' complement for signed integers, which is fine.
> But unsigned integers have to work modulo the appropriate power of 2.
>
> The Unisys hardware doesn't do that so well.
>
> In any case, it is not guaranteed that -0 + +0 gives +0.

OK.

I think it did on CDC Cyber NOS.

I remember seeing code adding B0 (always zero) to Xn to
ensure that if Xn contained zero then it was plus zero
not minus zero.

Arne

On 2022-11-10 14:04:32 +0000, Bill Gunshannon said:

> On 11/9/22 21:30, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>> (UNISYS has been mentioned here a few times)
>>
>> https://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/news/2022/11/08/unisys-stock-plummets-internal-investigation.html
>>
>>
>
> Interesting, but confusing.
>
> How does a $.59 loss on a $5.15 share value workout to be a "50% plunge"?

The Unisys share price dropped from ~$9 on Tuesday to (for a time)
~$4.50 on Wednesday.

https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/UIS — check the 5 day plot for this
week for the "plunge".

> Guess I don;t really understand the stock market.

Reports of accounting irregularities and delayed 10Q filings will tend
to move stock prices.

> On another note, having been a UNNIVAC Applications and System
> programmer in another life I have followed them...

Longstanding Unisys users are unlikely to port to VSI OpenVMS, given
the longstanding path from UNIVAC and EXEC-8 and follow-ons including
ClearPath Dorado to the newer ClearPath IX and x86-64, and—if not
following the Unisys path—given the plethora of platforms with COBOL
and Fortran support. As for relative company sizes, Unisys 2021
revenues were past two billion, seemingly slightly more than what VSI
has accrued. Slight difference, there. And when last I checked, VSI
didn't have native COBOL or Fortran compilers available for x86-64 as
yet.

--
Pure Personal Opinion | HoffmanLabs LLC

On 11/10/2022 7:10 PM, Stephen Hoffman wrote:
> Longstanding Unisys users are unlikely to port to VSI OpenVMS, given the
> longstanding path from UNIVAC and EXEC-8 and follow-ons including
> ClearPath Dorado to the newer ClearPath IX and x86-64, and—if not
> following the Unisys path—given the plethora of platforms with COBOL and
> Fortran support. As for relative company sizes, Unisys 2021 revenues
> were past two billion, seemingly slightly more than what VSI has
> accrued. Slight difference, there.

It may not be an easy sell.

But it is the type of customers that VSI wants.

Customers that are willing to pay for OS.

Not customers that want free OS.

> And when last I checked, VSI didn't
> have native COBOL or Fortran compilers available for x86-64 as yet.

That is supposedly close.

Arne

On 11/10/22 19:16, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
> On 11/10/2022 7:10 PM, Stephen Hoffman wrote:
>> Longstanding Unisys users are unlikely to port to VSI OpenVMS, given
>> the longstanding path from UNIVAC and EXEC-8 and follow-ons including
>> ClearPath Dorado to the newer ClearPath IX and x86-64, and—if not
>> following the Unisys path—given the plethora of platforms with COBOL
>> and Fortran support. As for relative company sizes, Unisys 2021
>> revenues were past two billion, seemingly slightly more than what VSI
>> has accrued. Slight difference, there.
>
> It may not be an easy sell.
>
> But it is the type of customers that VSI wants.
>
> Customers that are willing to pay for OS.
>
> Not customers that want free OS.
>
>>                                And when last I checked, VSI didn't
>> have native COBOL or Fortran compilers available for x86-64 as yet.
>
> That is supposedly close.
>

Well, if the time came about before my passing I expect I would be
an excellent resource for the move. :-)
And I would really enjoy that kind of work with both COBOL and Fortran.

bill

On Friday, November 11, 2022 at 2:10:22 AM UTC+2, Stephen Hoffman wrote:
> On 2022-11-10 14:04:32 +0000, Bill Gunshannon said:
>
> > On 11/9/22 21:30, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
> >> (UNISYS has been mentioned here a few times)
> >>
> >> https://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/news/2022/11/08/unisys-stock-plummets-internal-investigation.html
> >>
> >>
> >
> > Interesting, but confusing.
> >
> > How does a $.59 loss on a $5.15 share value workout to be a "50% plunge"?
> The Unisys share price dropped from ~$9 on Tuesday to (for a time)
> ~$4.50 on Wednesday.
>
> https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/UIS — check the 5 day plot for this
> week for the "plunge".
> > Guess I don;t really understand the stock market.
> Reports of accounting irregularities and delayed 10Q filings will tend
> to move stock prices.
> > On another note, having been a UNNIVAC Applications and System
> > programmer in another life I have followed them...
>
> Longstanding Unisys users are unlikely to port to VSI OpenVMS, given
> the longstanding path from UNIVAC and EXEC-8 and follow-ons including
> ClearPath Dorado to the newer ClearPath IX and x86-64, and—if not
> following the Unisys path—given the plethora of platforms with COBOL
> and Fortran support. As for relative company sizes, Unisys 2021
> revenues were past two billion, seemingly slightly more than what VSI
> has accrued. Slight difference, there.

I tried to look for any financial information about VSI revenues or any other
numbers, but found nothing except that they have approximately 150 employees.
From their web site it's not even possible to figure out what sort of company
they are. From reading this group I got the impression that they are privately
owned by some Swedish mogul. Is this correct?
It's a lot easier to find info about UNISYS, including the # of employees -
approximately 16,000.
From that number it looks like UNISYS is 100 times bigger than VSI which I
don't consider "slight difference".

> And when last I checked, VSI
> didn't have native COBOL or Fortran compilers available for x86-64 as
> yet.
>
>
>
>
> --
> Pure Personal Opinion | HoffmanLabs LLC

=?UTF-8?Q?Arne_Vajh=c3=b8j?= <arne@vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>
>I think it did on CDC Cyber NOS.
>
>I remember seeing code adding B0 (always zero) to Xn to
>ensure that if Xn contained zero then it was plus zero
>not minus zero.

AARGH! COMPASS! ONE'S COMPLEMENT! ADDRESS REGISTERS LINKED TO X
REGISTERS! SIX BIT BYTES! USING FLOATING POINT NORMALIZE INSTRUCTIONS
TO PROCESS STRINGS! MAKE IT GO AWAY! I'm hiding under my desk now.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

On 2022-11-11 13:26:56 +0000, Michael S said:

> On Friday, November 11, 2022 at 2:10:22 AM UTC+2, Stephen Hoffman wrote:
>>> Longstanding Unisys users are unlikely to port to VSI OpenVMS, given
>>> the longstanding path from UNIVAC and EXEC-8 and follow-ons including
>>> ClearPath Dorado to the newer ClearPath IX and x86-64, and—if not
>>> following the Unisys path—given the plethora of platforms with COBOL
>>> and Fortran support. As for relative company sizes, Unisys 2021
>>> revenues were past two billion, seemingly slightly more than what VSI
>>> has accrued. Slight difference, there.
>
> I tried to look for any financial information about VSI revenues or any
> other numbers, but found nothing except that they have approximately
> 150 employees. From their web site it's not even possible to figure out
> what sort of company they are. From reading this group I got the
> impression that they are privately owned by some Swedish mogul. Is this
> correct?

Correct. Johan Gedda. Also co-founded Rocket Software. Various other
investments, as well.

> It's a lot easier to find info about UNISYS, including the # of
> employees -approximately 16,000.

A feature-competitive operating system project tends to be a large undertaking.

I'd want probably 20 times the current VSI staff, were I trying to
maintain a feature-competitive operating system.

And that's still what I'd consider a small staff for the scale of the
effort involved. But that staffing is expensive.

Unlike VSI, Unisys also produces their own hardware. An endeavor which
also involves staff and spending.

> From that number it looks like UNISYS is 100 times bigger than VSI...

VSI are privately held. They have stated "150+. colleagues working in
15 cities ; 112. partners in our ecosystem ; 2K. clients served across
more than 30 countries."

> ...which I don't consider "slight difference".

¿Discussions of litotes otra vez? That might lead to discussions of
sarcasm and irony. And then the grammarians arrive, and start checking
all of our licenses for sarcasm and irony. And we wouldn't want that.
Right, Simon?

--
Pure Personal Opinion | HoffmanLabs LLC

On 11/11/2022 3:23 PM, Scott Dorsey wrote:
> =?UTF-8?Q?Arne_Vajh=c3=b8j?= <arne@vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>> I think it did on CDC Cyber NOS.
>>
>> I remember seeing code adding B0 (always zero) to Xn to
>> ensure that if Xn contained zero then it was plus zero
>> not minus zero.
>
>
> AARGH! COMPASS! ONE'S COMPLEMENT! ADDRESS REGISTERS LINKED TO X
> REGISTERS! SIX BIT BYTES! USING FLOATING POINT NORMALIZE INSTRUCTIONS
> TO PROCESS STRINGS! MAKE IT GO AWAY! I'm hiding under my desk now.

Switching from Compass to Macro-32 was a huge step forward.

:-)

Arne

On Friday, November 11, 2022 at 3:23:29 PM UTC-5, Scott Dorsey wrote:
> =?UTF-8?Q?Arne_Vajh=c3=b8j?= <ar...@vajhoej.dk> wrote:
> >
> >I think it did on CDC Cyber NOS.
> >
> >I remember seeing code adding B0 (always zero) to Xn to
> >ensure that if Xn contained zero then it was plus zero
> >not minus zero.
> AARGH! COMPASS! ONE'S COMPLEMENT! ADDRESS REGISTERS LINKED TO X
> REGISTERS! SIX BIT BYTES! USING FLOATING POINT NORMALIZE INSTRUCTIONS
> TO PROCESS STRINGS! MAKE IT GO AWAY! I'm hiding under my desk now.
> --scott
>
> --
> "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
My first assembly language I learned was COMPASS on a CDC-6500 (in 1979). I still have my COMPASS manual. Besides traditional "macros", the "micros" were intersting.

On Saturday, November 12, 2022 at 4:53:58 PM UTC-8, xyzz...@gmail.com wrote:

(snip)

> My first assembly language I learned was COMPASS on a CDC-6500
> (in 1979). I still have my COMPASS manual.
> Besides traditional "macros", the "micros" were intersting.

Just wondering, where was the 6500?

On Saturday, November 12, 2022 at 9:12:23 PM UTC-5, gah4 wrote:
> On Saturday, November 12, 2022 at 4:53:58 PM UTC-8, xyzz...@gmail.com wrote:
>
> (snip)
> > My first assembly language I learned was COMPASS on a CDC-6500
> > (in 1979). I still have my COMPASS manual.
> > Besides traditional "macros", the "micros" were intersting.
> Just wondering, where was the 6500?
At Purdue, it was in the 3rd basement of the MathSci building.

After being disassembled, it has moved around but is now at the Living Computers Museum in Seattle
currently closed. https://www.livingcomputers.org/

On Sunday, November 13, 2022 at 4:54:42 PM UTC-8, xyzz...@gmail.com wrote:

(snip, I wrote)

> > Just wondering, where was the 6500?
> At Purdue, it was in the 3rd basement of the MathSci building.

> After being disassembled, it has moved around but is now at the Living Computers Museum in Seattle
> currently closed. https://www.livingcomputers.org/

I have been to the museum (when it was open) and saw the 6500.

I wondered if that was the one!

I do hope they reopen.

On 2022-11-11, Stephen Hoffman <seaohveh@hoffmanlabs.invalid> wrote:
> On 2022-11-11 13:26:56 +0000, Michael S said:
>
>> ...which I don't consider "slight difference".
>

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

> ¿Discussions of litotes otra vez? That might lead to discussions of
> sarcasm and irony. And then the grammarians arrive, and start checking
> all of our licenses for sarcasm and irony. And we wouldn't want that.
> Right, Simon?
>

Hey!

What have I done to you today ? :-)

Simon.

PS: It's licence, not license. :-)

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

On 2022-11-11, Scott Dorsey <kludge@panix.com> wrote:
>=?UTF-8?Q?Arne_Vajh=c3=b8j?= <arne@vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>>
>>I think it did on CDC Cyber NOS.
>>
>>I remember seeing code adding B0 (always zero) to Xn to
>>ensure that if Xn contained zero then it was plus zero
>>not minus zero.
>
>
> SIX BIT BYTES!

I will mention at this point: Radix 50. :-)

> USING FLOATING POINT NORMALIZE INSTRUCTIONS
> TO PROCESS STRINGS! MAKE IT GO AWAY! I'm hiding under my desk now.

There's a certain "modern" language that likes to use floating point
numbers for everything it can...

For anyone else not aware of this, the following might be of interest:

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Data_structures#number_type

And _this_ is the language used as part of the planet's critical websites. :-(

Simon.

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

> https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Data_structures#number_type

https://www.destroyallsoftware.com/talks/wat

De

On 2022-11-15, Dennis Boone <drb@ihatespam.msu.edu> wrote:
>
> > https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Data_structures#number_type
>
> https://www.destroyallsoftware.com/talks/wat
>

Thanks.

That JS behaviour is so bad it's not even funny. :-(

It's probably going to take some major disaster before all the web
stuff finally gets subject to the same engineering discipline as the
rest of the computing world.

Simon.

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

On 11/15/2022 1:30 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-11-15, Dennis Boone <drb@ihatespam.msu.edu> wrote:
>>> https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Data_structures#number_type
>>
>> https://www.destroyallsoftware.com/talks/wat

> That JS behaviour is so bad it's not even funny. :-(
>
> It's probably going to take some major disaster before all the web
> stuff finally gets subject to the same engineering discipline as the
> rest of the computing world.

JavaScript is 26 years old, it is estimated that there are
approx. 17.5 million JavaScript developer and its presence
server side (node.js) is increasing fast.

Expecting JavaScript to fail is ignoring all observable
facts about what is happening in the real world.

Arne