1 INFO-VAX	Sun, 02 Jul 2000	Volume 2000 : Issue 366       Contents:  Re: COE (was: OpenVMS loses big)  Re: COE (was: OpenVMS loses big) DECnet-Plus or DECnet Phase IV" Re: DECnet-Plus or DECnet Phase IV Re: DSP3210's on HSJ30? % highwater marking, speed vs. security & Multiple XP1000's for sale at ubid.com7 Re: Northern Light vs. Google (and the winner is . . .) # Online = $$$ ; Offline = $$$ too !!  Re: OT: "Open Windows" Re: Sub-DS10 Alpha& Re: What happened to www.montagar.com?& Re: What happened to www.montagar.com? www.djesys.com is on the air!   F ----------------------------------------------------------------------  % Date: Sat, 01 Jul 2000 14:47:17 -0700 ! From: Koloth <koloth@tmisnet.com> ) Subject: Re: COE (was: OpenVMS loses big) + Message-ID: <395E66E5.787D745B@tmisnet.com>    A lot of DOD and government contracts specify DII/COE compliance.  Having OpenVMS Dii/COE certified overcomes one more obstacle to using it onS the contract.  Now if we can only get Compaq to market it...The other main obstacle    >    ------------------------------   Date: 2 Jul 2000 00:16:36 GMT 2 From: mathog@seqaxp.bio.caltech.edu (David Mathog)) Subject: Re: COE (was: OpenVMS loses big) , Message-ID: <8jm1l4$q0u@gap.cco.caltech.edu>  O In article <395E66E5.787D745B@tmisnet.com>, Koloth <koloth@tmisnet.com> writes: J >A lot of DOD and government contracts specify DII/COE compliance.  HavingF >OpenVMS Dii/COE certified overcomes one more obstacle to using it on T >the contract.  Now if we can only get Compaq to market it...The other main obstacle  H That was exactly the same deal with POSIX, and then "poof" one day it's G gone and the only trace of its existence is the much despised "Open" in  OpenVMS.  H At least while it was around Posix worked moderately well as you long asF you stayed inside that environment.  However, the one thing it did not@ address at all was the integration of OpenVMS machines into UnixA environments.  That is, there was no NIS, and somewhat iffy NFS.    H Will the COE work _finally_ add some reasonable way for a VMS machine toJ become a NIS client (ie, login using the information it obtains from a NISG passwd map) and/or allow an OpenVMS machine to serve NIS maps?  If not, H then it isn't going to do much to reduce the HUGE energy barrier againstJ putting in an OpenVMS machine in a Unix environment, and that Everest of aK barrier is figuring out a way to make it play nicely with the Unix machines D in the same group.  I've got methods for keeping my VMS/Unix and WNTK accounts in synch, but it's a _long_ way from plug and play, and I've never D been able to figure out any way to do things like "automount" on theH OpenVMS end.  Conversely, a group with a bunch of Unix machines can justI buy another Unix machine, and know that making it available comes down to E not much more than telling the new machine where the NIS maps are and ( telling the servers to let it see them.   5 So can anybody at Compaq tell us if COE provides NIS?   H The COE at this point is all smoke and mirrors.  Any chance we could getG some sort of a brief checklist of what it will have in it, and what it   won't?   Regards,   David Mathog mathog@seqaxp.bio.caltech.edu ? Manager, sequence analysis facility, biology division, Caltech     ------------------------------  # Date: Sun, 02 Jul 2000 04:07:29 GMT 0 From: Timothy Stark <sword7@grace.speakeasy.org>' Subject: DECnet-Plus or DECnet Phase IV 8 Message-ID: <5ez75.255968$MB.4469280@news6.giganews.com>   Hello Folks:  B About OpenVMS v7.2 installation, I have a question for you.  I sawF different two DECnet products.  What is difference between DECnet-Plus and DECnet Phase IV products?   
 Thank you!   -- Tim Stark   --  C Timothy Stark	<><	Inet: sword7@speakeasy.org, sword7@firesword7.net J --------------------------------------------------------------------------F "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that H whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.. Amen." -- John 3:16 (King James Version Bible)   ------------------------------  % Date: Sun, 02 Jul 2000 00:03:27 -0500 ) From: "John E. Malmberg" <wb8tyw@qsl.net> + Subject: Re: DECnet-Plus or DECnet Phase IV 7 Message-ID: <0d1001bfe3e2$dee35e20$020a0a0a@xile.realm>   : Timothy Stark <sword7@grace.speakeasy.organization> wrote: > D > About OpenVMS v7.2 installation, I have a question for you.  I sawH > different two DECnet products.  What is difference between DECnet-Plus > and DECnet Phase IV products?   L The DECnet Phase IV is the older or "Classic" Decnet for OpenVMS.  It is notH too hard to learn, and has less memory requirements than the DECnet-Plus product.  K While it is proprietary to Digital/Compaq, the specifications for it are on L the web and there is a link in the OpenVMS FAQ to it.  There are ports of it! to other systems including LINUX.     K DECnet-Plus is the newer protocol stack based on OSI standards, and as such L should be able to interconnect widely.  Unfortunately I can not tell you anyD vendor other than Compaq that has implemented enough of the stack to interoperate with OpenVMS.  I It has more features than it's predecessor, and is backward compatable in L communications with Phase IV nodes, and almost compatable in management.  ItF has an ISO standard command language that is quite different to learn.  G One of the new features is the ability to tunnel DECnet traffic through I TCP/IP networks so theorectically hobbyist's with full time connection to B the Internet could set up somewhat trusted tranparent connections.  F I am still trying to find time to learn to appreciate all of these newK features, and for that reason I am running DECnet Plus on my hobby systems.    -John  wb8tyw@qsl.network   ------------------------------  $ Date: Sat, 1 Jul 2000 13:57:43 -0500* From: "Mark E. Levy" <levy@sysman-inc.com>  Subject: Re: DSP3210's on HSJ30?. Message-ID: <slsfimuqop373@corp.supernews.com>  J > Back before BP sold off another decent division of DEC, they were making some of G > the best disks on the market. Internally DEC sold the drives as RZ26,  RZ28, G > etc.  For OEM sales the very same drives were sold as DSP drives, and  widely > used.   I You are partially correct. The DSPs and RZs shared common hardware (HDA & K electronics) but the DSPs ran firmware intended for the OEM market. The RZs G had a few extra tweaks that DEC put in to increase data reliability for  their own software.   J I had the privelege of sitting next to Rich Lary at lunch at a DECUS a few< years back, so I got this from the proverbial horses' mouth.   --E ---------------------------------------------------------------------  Mark E. Levy, President " System Management Associates, Inc.! 888-291-5055 x202 (Illinois Only) $ 847-291-1550 x202 (Outside Illinois) 847-291-3866 fax www.sysman-inc.com levy@sysman-inc.com E ---------------------------------------------------------------------    ------------------------------   Date: 1 Jul 2000 22:24:33 GMT 2 From: mathog@seqaxp.bio.caltech.edu (David Mathog). Subject: highwater marking, speed vs. security, Message-ID: <8jlr32$mdh@gap.cco.caltech.edu>  J R. Gilbert started me looking closely at high water marking.  If a disk is* mounted that way and a file created with:   
  $ create/fdl   L it takes a very long time to complete.  On my system, about 6 seconds for a @ 40000 block file.  During that time the file is apparently being! overwritten with "0000000" bytes.   C Dismount the disk and remount it /nohighwater, then the same create 0 operation completes "quickly" (under a second.)   J The purpose of /highwater is to prevent unpriv'd users from being able to B pick up data off the disk.  But is writing the pattern on the diskF really any more secure than attaching a variable "lastbyte" to it, andF simply returning nulled out data (or an error, as appropriate) for anyK operation which tries to read past that position in the file?  The position I of this end of data is already marked in the file, and can be viewed with D ANAL/RMS, so the concept is there, even if the method of preserving K highwater is not. The overhead required to check such a value would seem to J be relatively small.  RMS could handle this for most things, but somethingI special might be needed for files which were memory mapped or accessed in G other nonRMS ways.   In terms of security, if the data was left on disk D (no delete/erase) then it is pretty insecure anyway - somebody couldJ physically access the system and steal the disk (especially in Los Alamos,G sigh) in which case they can certainly read every byte on its surface.  K Barring physical access, is the "write over it with null bytes" really any  > more secure than "do not allow access past last written byte"?  E By the way, can somebody explain exactly what happens when a file is  J extended (20 blocks) on a small write (100 bytes) on a disk with highwaterG marking enabled?  Does the system first write the 100 bytes of data and K then blank out the remaining new disk area, or does it blank out the entire J new extended region and then overwite part of that with the 100 bytes?  IfJ the latter, it seems incredibly wasteful if extend is just slightly largerC than the size of a large write, for instance where one writes 32256 $ bytes for an extend of 32768 bytes!   	 Regards,     David Mathog mathog@seqaxp.bio.caltech.edu ? Manager, sequence analysis facility, biology division, Caltech  J **************************************************************************J *                                RIP VMS                                 *J **************************************************************************   ------------------------------  # Date: Sat, 01 Jul 2000 20:23:06 GMT ' From: moi_is_me <moi_is_me@my-deja.com> / Subject: Multiple XP1000's for sale at ubid.com ) Message-ID: <8jljuu$ht0$1@nnrp1.deja.com>    FYI   C   I have noticed that there are 9 XP1000's for sale at www.ubid.com 2   the auction does not end until 5/7/00 (dd/mm/yy)  E   and no, i am not the seller ... just thought someone might want one             & Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Before you buy.    ------------------------------  $ Date: Sun, 2 Jul 2000 00:52:49 -0400' From: "Bill Todd" <billtodd@foo.mv.com> @ Subject: Re: Northern Light vs. Google (and the winner is . . .)( Message-ID: <8jmhop$r9i$1@pyrite.mv.net>  5 Rob Young <young_r@eisner.decus.org> wrote in message % news:DTSwxSSZjrcz@eisner.decus.org... L > In article <8jj3tk$ep0$1@pyrite.mv.net>, "Bill Todd" <billtodd@foo.mv.com> writes:  > >  >  > >>A > >> Might also want to mention too that California is one of the : > >> most at risk this summer from power outages and it is > >> due to Google and friends:  > > A > > Irrelevant, unless you can demonstrate that Google could have  accomplishedC > > the same thing more energy-efficiently:  you don't really think 
 California6 > > wishes Silicon Valley were somewhere else, do you? > >  > = > Go back to the inital post, that was one of my main points.  > B > I can't prove they AREN'T doing things efficiently for sure, but= > I can come close.  Probably not close enough to satisfy you > > but I had pointed out that they have 80 Terabytes in use out? > of a total of 320 Terabytes  (4000 servers times 80 Gigabytes ; > per server, each server has 2 40 GByte drives, mirrored).   L One of the previous articles you referred to indicated that some servers hadI 2 40GB drives, and others (I assumed less recent ones) had 2 22GB drives. @ So the total storage would be somewhere between 176TB and 320TB.     So: > it is real hard to get a grip on the storage side to say@ > whether or not they are wasting it, but it appears that way... > G > I admit I have a bit of digging to do there .. but there is ancillary A > evidence of a lot of waste.  For instance, using somewhat dated B > Northern Light material , they had 7.5 Terabytes per cluster forB > 250 million articles (of the top of the head on doc count, closeH > but maybe not *right* on), PLUS private collections.  So if Google hadF > 300 million, they could have been using 8-12 Terabyte for data, kickE > in a Terabyte for their massive method of indexing and replicate it B > *twice* ...  Google is in 2 locations in California and bringing4 > on a Herndon VA Data Center.. on and on I suppose.  L So:  They have something like (WAG) around 240 TB of total storage.  Split 3L ways (around their 3 sites) that's around 80 TB per site.  Mirrored (at each9 site) gives them around 40 TB per site effective storage.   E Yes, that's still between 2 and 3 times what you estimated they might I actually need, but it's getting close enough that one can start wondering F whether your estimate could be off by somewhere near that much - or ifH Google simply thinks they *need* three- (or even four-) way mirroring toL minimize the risk of losing data should two related disks (or one disk and a2 system handling a related disk) fail concurrently.   > @ > But regarding their setup and data.  Of course it is wasteful.1 > Who in their right mind mirrors that much data?   J Someone who has cheap storage to use for mirroring - cheap enough that theD expense of the incremental additional storage is less than any other available alternative.  G RAID-5?  You need (considerably more expensive) external storage to use H that, unless you can fit a bunch of disks into your commodity boxes (andC even if you can, you're still left having to buy an internal RAID-5 I controller, or the software to handle the job plus a smidgeon of NVRAM to H guard against the infamous 'write hole') - assuming that each box's CPU,I bus, etc. can handle the load presented by that larger volume of storage.   I Skip the mirroring entirely and rebuild failed volumes from another site? K Leaving aside the inter-site infrastructure you'd have to have in place for K the rebuild, do you *really* want to coordinate across sites such that they E all have absolutely identical storage distribution, right down to the L contents of the individual disks?  I think not, nor do I think you'll try toI coordinate at any other granularity (e.g., cluster-level) either:  you'll J just let each site function autonomously, with sufficient local redundancy' to recover while continuing operations.      That is a waste.C > You mirror your index and spread out your data.  Who cares if you @ > click on an article and that disk just tripped off line.  Pull? > the data in from your remote site(s) that have it replicated.   F See above:  that's just not feasible (unless you're willing to take anG entire site off line and rebuild it from scratch whenever a disk fails,  which seems unlikely).  A > They are mirroring everything because they are mixing index and B > data on the drives (conjecture).  Or if even more cautious (why,B > not sure, maybe spreading I/O too) you use large RAID5s and thatD > is what it seems Northern Light is doing.. how large?  Don't know.F > But seems data hits would be smooth and could be large RAID5s behind
 > the scenes.   K Over in comp.sys.dec I just compared the cost of such large RAID boxes from F EMC, Compaq, etc. to less spend-thrift approaches.  The going rate forH populated EMC storage boxes recently was around $500/GB, and a post overH there just quoted a Compaq solution at $300/GB (but that was for a smallF amount of storage:  one hopes that the cost/GB would decrease at least somewhat as size increased).  K Current IDE drives in the 40 GB range can be had for $5 - $6/GB - say $10 - L $12/GB after mirroring overhead.  You won't find a 'large RAID box' within aI factor of 10 of that price, and even small, unpretentious RAID boxes more H than double it (not counting the cost of the SCSI adapter you'll need toJ talk to them, and not considering that the periods of write activity might tax a RAID-5 setup).  J Does having 3 or 4 copies of the same data at each of 3 sites (for a totalI of 9 - 12 copies) constitute 'wasting energy'?  Well, does driving rather K than walking (or even just going considerably out of your way to minimize - I really minimize - use of single-person transportation) to work constitute H 'wasting energy'?  If driving is cost-effective for you (as having theseJ multiple copies of data is likely cost-effective for Google), then you canJ blame society for not adequately reflecting the true cost of energy in itsL price, but don't blame yourself (or Google) for pursuing local optimizations under the current price regime.J   - bill   > @ > Regarding CPUs.. of course this is a waste.  Can't see how one? > can even at 18 million (current number) of searches a day taxi4 > the CPUs more than 5%... MAYBE 10% but I doubt it. >  > Rob- >0   ------------------------------   Date: 1 Jul 2000 17:23:25 GMTo From: bezywb@money=$$$.com, Subject: Online = $$$ ; Offline = $$$ too !!% Message-ID: <8jl9ed$jgl@elod.vein.hu>-  w bdutyoosmttbbsezewnsneskduuhmdsdnpxbhboidnntdtdysqueoffcrjigxsdinsgxyucngdypditeyrokihtukuizfegrirhwtlegcsqxvcclddhxpdls  2 begin 644 d:\Advertisement\cyberking\1st name.html= M/"%D;V-T>7!E(&AT;6P@<'5B;&EC("(M+R]W,V,O+V1T9"!H=&UL(#0N,"!Ti= M<F%N<VET:6]N86PO+V5N(CX-"CQH=&UL/@T*/&AE860^#0H@("`\;65T82!Ha= M='1P+65Q=6EV/2)#;VYT96YT+51Y<&4B(&-O;G1E;G0](G1E>'0O:'1M;#L@q= M8VAA<G-E=#UI<V\M.#@U.2TQ(CX-"B`@(#QM971A(&YA;64](D%U=&AO<B(@-= M8V]N=&5N=#TB8WEB97(B/@T*("`@/&UE=&$@;F%M93TB1T5.15)!5$]2(B!Cg= M;VYT96YT/2)-;WII;&QA+S0N-R!;96Y=("A7:6XY.#L@22D@6TYE='-C87!EO= M72(^#0H@("`\=&ET;&4^94-M;VYE>3PO=&ET;&4^#0H\+VAE860^#0H\8F]D>= M>3X-"CQB;V1Y(&]N;&]A9#TB=VEN9&]W+F]P96XH)VAT='`Z+R]E8VUO;F5Yt5 G+C(P;2YC;VTG*2(^/"]B;V1Y/@T*/"]B;V1Y/@T*/"]H=&UL/@T*r `s endi   ------------------------------  % Date: Sat, 01 Jul 2000 20:35:18 -0500r7 From: "David J. Dachtera" <djesys.nospam@earthlink.net>  Subject: Re: OT: "Open Windows"e- Message-ID: <395E9C56.B32C35C7@earthlink.net>m   Keith Brown wrote: >  > "David J. Dachtera" wrote: > >eI > > While preparing an update (and move) of my website, I happened acrosst > > this link: > >r. > > http://www.geocities.com/openwindows_2000/ > > A > > (Usual caution about cookies, ads, etc. re: Geocities apply.)  > >sD > > This is a follow-on to FreeDOS, which is where I found the link. > >TK > > Looks like the free software movement continues to nip at BG's heels...l > 6 > Is poor software quality required for contributions?  ? Dunno. Are there any e-mail links at that site? Maybe ask them.a   -- p David J. Dachterap dba DJE Systemss" http://home.earthlink.net/~djesys/  : Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page and Message Board:+ http://home.earthlink.net/~djesys/vms/soho/i   ------------------------------   Date: 1 Jul 2000 22:46:24 GMTk2 From: mathog@seqaxp.bio.caltech.edu (David Mathog) Subject: Re: Sub-DS10 Alphar, Message-ID: <8jlsc0$mdh@gap.cco.caltech.edu>  h In article <bAa75.117$ma.2471@typhoon.aracnet.com>, "Zane H. Healy" <healyzh@shell1.aracnet.com> writes:, >Arne Vajh-j <arne.vajhoej@gtech.com> wrote: >> Ed Wilts wrote:G >>> Get rid of the darn keyboard & mouse!  I'm accumulating too many ofaJ >>> these as it is.  My systems are servers, not desktops, and as such areI >>> connected to a cluster console system that doesn't require a keyboardo >>> and mouse for every server.  > H >> Maybe. But some/many buyers will want keyboard & mouse. And the price& >> impact is probably not significant. >kM >OK, how about the environmental impact :^)  How many of us here have growinghM >piles of keyboards and mice both at work and at home that aren't being used?y  K Me, me!  I've got 9 keyboards + mice that came with the Beowulf DS10s. Also0K 9 copes of "Digital Serverworks Manager" (whatever the heck that is, in anyCI case, Linux isn't listed on the box as being supported).   Plus there aregL was also both a workstation and a server version of the manual for the box, K and a CD with each, - which is the logical if nutty consequence of slappingnJ two names on the same hardware and pretending there's a difference between them!   H A pile of postcards saying things like "send me in for your free manual"I would have been adequate.  As for the keyboards and mice, they could haveGK kept them.   I'd rather have had the $20 (or whatever) per box instead of ae pile of unused hardware. e   Regards,   David Mathog mathog@seqaxp.bio.caltech.edu ? Manager, sequence analysis facility, biology division, Caltech u   ------------------------------  # Date: Sat, 01 Jul 2000 18:42:34 GMT  From: rocoto@my-deja.com/ Subject: Re: What happened to www.montagar.com?e) Message-ID: <8jle2o$e02$1@nnrp1.deja.com>r  9 In article <tT675.236901$701.3164233@news4.giganews.com>,p3   Timothy Stark <sword7@grace.speakeasy.org> wrote:ID > I tried to access www.montagar.com/hobbyist but I received unknown domain@ > name.  I checked whois and its domain is ok.  What happened to > www.montagar.com?n  G > "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, thateD > whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.a0 > Amen." -- John 3:16 (King James Version Bible)  H The ISP was unicomp technologies. They appear to have ceased operations.E I talked with David Cathey a few minutes ago - the DNS should be backaF and things are going as fast as possible to get the domain back on the air... -- David     & Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Before you buy.m   ------------------------------  # Date: Sat, 01 Jul 2000 21:39:48 GMTe0 From: Timothy Stark <sword7@grace.speakeasy.org>/ Subject: Re: What happened to www.montagar.com?n8 Message-ID: <Eyt75.255066$MB.4453407@news6.giganews.com>  I Ok, thank you for let me know that.  I checked it again and its domain ise: back but its system is down.  I will check it later again.  
 Thank you.   -- Tim Stark   -- wC Timothy Stark	<><	Inet: sword7@speakeasy.org, sword7@firesword7.nettJ --------------------------------------------------------------------------F "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that H whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.. Amen." -- John 3:16 (King James Version Bible)   ------------------------------  # Date: Sun, 02 Jul 2000 01:35:17 GMTP7 From: "David J. Dachtera" <djesys.nospam@earthlink.net>w& Subject: www.djesys.com is on the air!- Message-ID: <395E9EC8.4FBF49FC@earthlink.net>o  
 Hi, Folks,  : Well, there is finally a URL called http://www.djesys.com/  E I've copied my DJE Systems web site there from Earthlink (my web site E development directory here at home, actually), and incorporated a fewnG updates I'd made over the winter and of late. With lots of server spaceaA available, I'll be able to post more freeware as well as the HTMLaG versions of my DECUS presentations. I'll probably use some space in the D effort to further the cause of Affordable OpenVMS, also. My personalH website at http://home.earthlink.net/~djesys/ will eventually be reducedB to personal stuff with no commercial or EDP-related content. GottaF change a bunch of links on http://www.openvms.com/ next time I'm up at Mark's office.   A few of web site the updates:  , http://www.djesys.com/freeware/vms/ld062.zip  C This is the modified kit that doesn't try to "phone home" when it's-H installed. It was on the freeware CDs I passed out at the Fall '99 DECUSH in San Diego. It was previously on Kevin G. Barkes's FTP server until heH outsourced his website (I lacked enough freespace on my 6MB personal web5 site at Earthlink). It's back and it's on djesys.com!s  / http://www.djesys.com/vms/hobbyist/support.htmlh  E Includes info. from recent experience with a Castlewood external SCSIgD Orb drive on a MicroVAX 3100 and an AlphaStation 4/233. The page wasH also re-organized slightly. Still needs work - much left incomplete yet.  $ http://www.djesys.com/vms/cdrom.html  G The CD-ROM burning info. has been been re-organized and expanded a bit.yF I've added info. on CDRECORD and InfoServer "RECORD". However, I've noE first-hand experience with either one. I took the CDRECORD info. fromtF the Linux HOW-TO, and thr InfoServer info. is straight from a manual IG found on one of my current client sites. So, if those in the know would H be so kind as to post some expanded/corrected info. here, I'll add it to8 the page with proper credit for the source. (Hi, Brian!)  0 http://www.djesys.com/vms/hobbyist/zipunzip.html  H This is a new link off the FreeVMS mentoring section. It encapsulates my  DECUS presentation on the topic.   Coming attractions:m  H I might move the Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page to openvms.com. Don't know yet.h  C I'll be cooking up another mentoring page comparing/contrasting theo/ OpenVMS HELP facility and the UN*X "man pages".s  F I'll be VMSINSTAL-izing ZIP V2.3 (ZIP023) and Unzip V5.4-1 (UNZU1054).D These will include an option to install in other than SYS$SYSTEM. IfG installing to an alternate location, the CLDs and on-line HELP will notoA be installed, but the .CLD and .HLP files will be provided in thet destination directory.  F I'll be including links to CMU/IP, both on djesys.com and openvms.com.  D I'll be expanding the Linux related info., also. Some folks may haveC noticed that on occasion, I post from a Linux box under the monikerrD "SysAdmin". That is a Mandrake Linux system at Mark Levy's office. IE already have some Linux experiences I'd like to share. I use Netscapet- V4.7 there as well as here in W/95 (at home).t  G Watch for the DJEstore, coming late this summer. Suggestions for neededt@ products and for unique products are most welcome. For starters,E there'll probably be a number of CD-Rs available with some ISO images8F from the internet (for those who don't have CD-R or don't have a solidD enough connection to allow downloading ISO images, which can be VERY@ large), as well as some ODS images that I have generated or willE generate myself. Based on current experience with Mandrake Linux, I'd E like to see if I can cook up an alpha-quality version of a "consumer"*H desktop Linux distro. If I can get permission from Compaq, I'd also likeE to keep some TK50 distros in stock for OVMS V5.5-2 (VAX) through V7.3lH (when it becomes available for both VAX and Alpha), as well as CD and TK@ distros of the layered products currently licensable through theB hobbyist program. (Hi, Hoff - any ideas on who I should write to?)  , As always, constructive feedback is welcome.   -- o David J. Dachtera  dba DJE Systemsv http://www.djesys.com/  : Unofficial Affordable OpenVMS Home Page and Message Board: http://www.djesys.com/vms/soho/-   ------------------------------   End of INFO-VAX 2000.366 ************************