Talk:MACRO-11

MACN11 and LINK11

I'm interested in MACN11 because I'm trying to help Stephen Casner revive his EPOS operating system he wrote at ISIS. The new link I provided has source code as well as a .DOC file which is close to the previous link. I have checked that it assembles with MACRO and that a small test program generates a good listing, but I don't know if it has all the features Casner needs.

What's more, he also needs CMU's LINK11 with ISI extensions. It was written in the SAIL language. I found a LINK11.SAI file from SAIL (the lab), but it needs more files to build a complete program. Those other files I haven't found. If anyone has any information about these two tools I'd be grateful. Larsbrinkhoff (talk) 20:32, 27 March 2022 (CEST)

According to edit history it looks like MACN11 evolved from MACX11. Maybe "N" means new? Larsbrinkhoff (talk) 20:44, 27 March 2022 (CEST)

Other PDP-10 cross assemblers

There was a plethora of other PDP-10 hosted cross assemblers. PALX was favored on ITS. I have seen MACX11 and MACY11. I suppose since MACN11 was mentioned in the article, it would not be out of place to add the others too. Larsbrinkhoff (talk) 20:36, 27 March 2022 (CEST)

I don't know about the PDP-10 hosted MACRO-11 toolchains. (I don't think I ever used any of them.) If I wanted to get anything written in MACRO-11 running, I'd use the UNIX V6-based MACRO-11 toolchain; it can do anything the PDP-10 based one can, and I know we have all the pieces. Jnc (talk) 21:12, 27 March 2022 (CEST)

I think it's more of a MACRO-11 superset. It was discussed before: https://elists.isoc.org/pipermail/internet-history/2019-February/004859.html, and maybe it's an option. I get the impression Casner would prefer the original tools if they can be found, so I'm posting this here in case (and elsewhere) in case something shows up. Larsbrinkhoff (talk) 22:20, 27 March 2022 (CEST)

OK. Do note that MOS was originally done in the MACN11/LINK11 ecosystem (see here for details in the SRI MOS documentation), and we had to do some work to enhance the pre-existing MACRO-11 ecosystem under UNIX V6 to make MOS fully supported there (mostly to make the symbol table for the built-in PDP-11 DDT work; I don't think MACN11 had any features that our MACRO-11 didn't have). So I'd consider that that shows that the MACN11/LINK11 and UNIX V6 MACRO-11 ecosystems were pretty much equivalent.

I'd started on i) documenting the UNIX V6-based MACRO-11 toolchain (i.e. as a coherent system; there are already man pages for most of the pieces, but nothing 'high-level' which shows how all the pieces fit together), and ii) collecting all the bits (sources and working binary) into a blob which would contain all one would need to use and maintain it.

If LINK11 doesn't show up, it sounds like the choices will be a) re-write LINK11 from scratch (in what, I'd be curious - PDP-10 assembler of some sort, or a modern HLL, or... MDL? :-), or b) use the UNIX MACRO-11 toolchain. Not trying to say anyone has to use the latter - but it's there if needed/wanted. Jnc (talk) 01:23, 28 March 2022 (CEST)

Apparently ISI added many extensions to MACN11, so it wasn't exactly vanilla MACRO-11. A LINK11.SAI file did show up (see above), so c) fill in the missing pieces. I would also consider d) gobble up the listings from MACN11 with whatever modern (scripting) language is most convenient, and stitch them together. But this is a bit of a digression. Larsbrinkhoff (talk) 07:13, 28 March 2022 (CEST)