This morning:

>>> "Die, MPE, Die!" is what HP still seems to be saying.
>>> ...
>>> Patrick Santucci
>>
>> Well yes I think so. They've been trying and you won't
>> listen. OK, they don't want to look like the bad guy
>> and alienate all of their old customers who are a
>> vocal bunch to say the least. So let's cooperate with
>> the movement. But maybe we can put so many restrictions
>> on the licensing that they will finally give up and go
>> home. And we don't look outright unreasonable.
>> ...
>> John (who's been forced to move on) Zoltak
>>
> I agree with this 100%.  I sat through all of the
> meetings around keeping MPE alive in some form, and
> this was my conclusion.
>
> John Lee

At this point I respectfully disagree with the above:
Just the announcement that HP will allow more new MPE
licenses to be created for an emulator is a major step
forward..  I can only speculate what internal struggles
might have gone on between "CSY", HP Legal, and HP
Support in order for that alone to happen...  Anyway, I
don't think Dave Wilde and the rest of "CSY" have a
"secret plan" to kill MPE by making the licensing fee
and the distribution requirements for an emulator so
onerus that it effectively makes the "YES" (we won't
stand in the way) a "NO".  As per my previous on one
list or another, given the good news that finally DID
come out at HPW about OpenMPE issues I would encourage
all to hang in there for a couple more months if
necessary;  to see what licensing fee and distribution
requirements actually end up looking like.  I expect it
will pretty much be immediately obvious to people on
this list whether or not they meet a common sense
"reasonable MPE user test".  Right now I'm betting they
will...  hopefully we'll all know before the end of 2002.


Then John Zoltak continued in another message:

> So what are you saying? Is the current plan to have HP
> continue to develop MPE but run on an emulator.

No:  I expect that when "CSY" puts out 7.5 EXP / PP 1
in the next 6 - 9 months, that will be the final "parking
release".  Then between then and the "end of HP support"
at end of 2006 there will be some bug-fix patches and
(MAYBE) a few more relatively minor enhancements.  After
2006, that is and will be "the end" for HP on MPE:  Any
further enhancements that may (or may not) be done would
have to be done by non-HP groups and individuals.

> Are they going to continue to pay royalties to
> the various other parties involved?

If anyone still has to pay royalties, I expect it will
NOT be HP...  As per my previous, it may be possible to
replace the MKS shell with a GNU equivalent.  Mentat
streams software I still don't know about.  Since it is
owned by one of the established 3rd-party MPE vendors,
I'm quite hopeful that something reasonable can be
"worked out" on ODBCLink/SE (after all, if MPE goes away
ODBCLink/SE doesn't have a "home" anymore).  While we
would like to have answers to these questions "soon",
remember that it is still over four years until "end of
HP support" for MPE;  IMO we still have a little time to
work out these issues...  What is most time-critical is
to get to a point where Allegro and / or SRI can feel
"comfortable" enough to actually launch an emulator
project;  since it will I expect take at least a couple
years to get an emulator to where you could start doing
something "serious" with it.

> Now that this is clearing up, it seem like a monumental
> task to keep MPE going. No one else could do it since
> even HP themselves could not get the whole source
> together for someone else to maintain.

Well, I think "it depends".  First of all it seems to me
that there are two clear and distinct "levels" on which
MPE can be "kept going":

(1)  The 7.5 "parking release" plus whatever patches come
out prior to the end of 2006 are what you run on an
emulator.  While this may not be feasible indefinitely, I
would expect that many sites could run a parking release
as-is for many years without serious impediment.  In this
case you don't really have to "maintain" the full source
for MPE (which no doubt is a much larger task).

(2)  If we can see that an emulator gets off the ground
and other details and issues are satifactorily resolved,
then down the road a ways it may be possible to look at
limited maintenance / additional enhancements to MPE;
although it's likely a bit premature to start seriously
considering that option yet...  However, if we DO get to
that point, I would not assume that pulling together
another release would be an impossibly large task; that
can never be done by anyone other than HP. Remember that
while CSY might have been a big organization some years
ago, they are much smaller now...  My guess is MUCH
smaller (I don't know what the actual numbers are); and
they still put out 7.5;  and will be putting out 7.5 EXP
/ PP 1...

> Maybe this should be OpenPARISC since this is really
> nothing to do with MPE, other than supplying hardware
> to run it on.

Au contraire:  See again "gang of 6" on OpenMPE web site:
http://www.openmpe.org/OpenMPEShortSurvey.htm

The emulator is only one out of six "key issues" that are
currently listed.  OpenMPE is concerned with being able
to continue running MPE on *both* existing hardware and
an emulator.   :-)

Ken Sletten