Bruce Senn wrote:
> Having lived in Unix space (Ultrix to be specific) for the last five
> years, I would certainly be in favor of a SIGPOSIX.  I'm not coming
> to HPWORLD, nor do I have anything like the experience and expertise
> of those mentioned in the posting.   Nevertheless, I'd like to merge
> what I can do with Unix and what I can do with MPE.
>
> I doubt I will have time to be very active in such a SIG, but I would
> certainly try to be as supportive as possible.
 
The first step here is to "confess" your insecurities, as you seem to have
with MPE.  For most of us here, it's insecurity with unix/posix/etc.  The
people that understand both worlds are *very* few and *very* far between and
unfortunately fast disappearing.  Of the engineers that provided the initial
posix ports on jazz.external.hp.com, all are gone (changed employment or
transferred to other divisions), but that isn't a slam on HP -- those guys did
it voluntarily, it wasn't a corporate mandate.
 
The key to make this fly is make posix friendly enough for the MPE
purist/typical 3000 manager (3000 shops don't have dedicated systems
programmers as a general rule, so high-tech solutions, particularly those
involving traditional unix mindsets -- asking an MPE person to "just
uncompress the file, tar -xfv, edit config.h with vi, and make install" is a
tall order for a unix/posix virgin, but standard procedure for unix gurus.
Similarly, unix gurus hit the posix shell and among other things:
* timezone (TZ) is unconditionally set to GMT0,
* TERM is unconditionally set to hp2392a,
* few standard makefiles work (cc is c89 <for C/iX>; Gnu is better).  The MPE
  make is unreliable; the Gnu make is much better.  All of the above require
  you to tweak the FOS installation and/or edit/replace the standard files.
Most unix wizards discover these (or other) initial quirks and declare the
3000 to be a brain-dead unix wannabe and they abandon their efforts.
 
Neither side is happy in this scenario.
 
We have to bridge this gap NOW, and you should encourage anyone and everyone
involved in these efforts.  We have lost many valuable contributors forever
and I'd welcome any HP insiders to step up to the podium to take their place.
Try calling HPRC with a posix problem and see if you can have a coherent
conversation.  There are a couple in the expert center remaining, but you must
first convince HPRC to escalate the call to the EC level.
 
One critical point (before I pack up and leave for HPWorld)...
 
At the management roundtable at IPROF the question came up of how many people
were using and/or interested in Mark Klein's g++ compiler.  Only a few hands
went up.  For heaven's sake, you're signing your own death certificate by
expressing no interest.  Let me restate the question... "How many of you are
interested in a free C++ compiler, and lots of free software?".  Or maybe
"Would you like the ability to run <most> unix apps on your 3000 (for free)
without having to replace your 3000 and it's current applications?".
 
I think it's the greatest thing since sliced bread.  And Mark Klein is the
last remaining posix savior that I know of -- do you have any idea what he
has accomplished?  and for nothing?  Some people think hp3000-l is great and
I'm something wonderful (in a recent post in jest from Down Under I was
jokingly referred to as a savior/martyr).  Nonsense... it's personal
gratification seeing the open communication; I'm just doing housekeeping.
People like Mark you should stand behind and support -- don't sit there at the
roundtable twiddling your thumbs when the g++ question comes up.  If you don't
understand the implications, you have NO IDEA what you are missing.  Even if
you think you'll never, ever want Posix stuff; you have NO IDEA what you're
missing.  We gripe about MPE/iX license levels and support charges for small
development systems, and here is Mark offering free (and quite functional,
thank you) development environment for unix ports; yet the question comes up
at the roundtable and almost nobody bothers to raise their hand even in the
most non-commital, casual interest/curiosity role.  SHAME!!
 
Don't repeat this scenario at HPWorld.  If you're sitting there afraid of
having a unix box replacing your 3000, posix is your only hope that still
retains some sense of civility.
 
If it helps, think of posix as a potential "compatibility mode Unix".
 
Final thought:  The above paradigm doesn't work the other way around.
 
Jeff Kell <[log in to unmask]>