Difference between revisions of "Simulator"
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Revision as of 13:53, 23 October 2017
A simlator is a program which emulates a particular kind of computer; it reads a file of object code, and processes it to emulate what an actual computer of that type would have done with that object program.
Simulators have had a variety of uses. Early simulators were sometimes written to allow work on the software for a new computer to begin before the hardware is working. Simulators were also used to evaluate different proposed CPU designs.
More recently, simulators have become popular with people interested in older computers. The hardware for machines such as the IBM 7094 (which ran the CTSS operating system), the Honeywell 6180 (which ran Multics) and the PDP-10 (which ran ITS) is either gone completely, or extremely rare. So, for people who wise to experience one of these historic and influential older systems, a simulator is the answer.
Ironically, a simulator running on modern hardware is often considerably faster than the actual machine it is emulating, so fast has been the progress in hardware.
One notable simulator is SIMH, which has modules to simulate many different kinds of older computers.
