Tag Archives: retro

Retro emulation

I have written about a number of projects that I have done in recreating old computers like the HP2000/Access and the DEC PDP-10. To give this some impact and a sense of how these might have been used in the … Continue reading

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Building MUD 86 from source

To build the 86 source you first need to get the MUD sources to your TOPS-10 host. I suggest that you use kermit to transfer it to a PPN of [2011,2776] as that is where we need to work. Alternatively create … Continue reading

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Building MUD 84 from source

To build the 84 source you first need to restore the MUD.TAP tape to your TOPS-10 host. I suggest that you restore it to a PPN of [2011,2776] as that is where we need to work. See the FAQ for … Continue reading

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A drier part of the Swamp

Since getting a working version of MUD on my TOPS-10 system using the binaries from the MUD tape, I have been wondering why I can’t get it to work from source. Whilst investigating this I have found a number of … Continue reading

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MUD from Tape

In my last journey towards MUD I found that the source files in the zip archive from Stanford are incomplete. I managed to get hold of a key missing file as scanned hardcopy, but this still had errors in it … Continue reading

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Fixing BCPL

The BCPL compiler to executes successfully and the BCL: ersatz device exists in the monitor but the compiler seems to be producing code which is executing at an illegal memory address. So how do we fix that? Not being familiar … Continue reading

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Installing BCPL

Having completed the pre-requisites for BCPL, it should be a simple matter to install BCPL using the BUILD.CTL job that is included with the BCPL files on tape. First, boot Tops-10 with the amended system that was generated with MONGEN … Continue reading

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Essex BCPL pre-requisites

Having restored the BCPL tape, before you can properly install BCPL you must undertake some pre-requisite work. Fortunately the pre-requisites are stated in the BUILD.CTL file that ships on the tape and boil down to three things: Check the code … Continue reading

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Essex BCPL restore

Now that I have a working TOPS-10 environment, in order to truly start the journey to MUD the first step is to install the Essex university BCPL compiler from the 1970’s. This compiler was lost for many years, and even … Continue reading

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May the Fortran be with you.

If you have your own Tops-10 system up and running you might want to do something useful with it. So, the first step for me was to install the Fortran and BASIC programming languages, partly to prove they would work … Continue reading

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