[comp.lang.forth] Forth for VMS

D_FELDMAN@UNHH.BITNET (11/27/89)

Greetings,

        How may I obtain a public domain VMS FORTH?  Better, could someone
send me one?  Apologies if this is terra cognita.

                                Thanks,
                                        David Feldman
                                        Department of Mathematics
                                        University of New Hampshire
                                        Durham, New Hampshire
                                                                03824

                                        603-862-2692
                                        D_FELDMAN@UNHH

ir230@sdcc6.ucsd.edu (john wavrik) (11/30/89)

                               FORTH FOR VMS-VAX

\ The following information comes from our on-line help files.
----------------------------------------------------------------------

FORTHDOC



                    The Kitt Peak Forth System for VAX/VMS
                                               Editor:   Jim Rapp
                                               Revised:  May 4, 1988



        The VMS (operating system) version of Kitt Peak Forth may be run  via
   the command:

             $ RUN SD:FORTH

   It is documented in the Forth Reference Manual, prepared by  the  Computer
   Support  Group  at  Kitt  Peak  National Observatory, and available at the
   campus bookstore at U.C.S.D.  A glossary of Forth words in this version is
   contained  in  the  file  SD:GLOSSARY.4TH,  a  listing  of  which  is also
   available at the campus bookstore.

  Additional information available:

  DATA_STRUCTURES
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
 \ The UNIX version is essentially identical, and the manual pages below
 \ contain more information:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

FORTH(1)            UNIX Programmer's Manual             FORTH(1)

NAME
     forth - Kitt Peak Forth system

SYNOPSIS
     forth

DESCRIPTION
     Forth is the standard Kitt Peak National Observatory Forth
     system running under UNIX on the PDP-11 (Forth-11) and the
     VAX-11 (VAX-Forth). Forth-11 will run under Version 7 UNIX,
     however a new terminal ioctl(2) call is required to process
     Forth's ?TER word and the mag-tape words require the Berke-
     ley mt ioctl(2) calls in order to operate.  Vax-Forth runs
     under Berkeley's 4.1bsd system.

     Forth reads from the standard input and writes to the stan-
     dard output (both normal output and error messages).  Both
     Forth-11 and VAX-Forth may be run interactively or in
     ``batch'' (standard input and/or standard output
      redirected).  Vax-Forth supports the jobs(3J) facility of
     the C-Shell, allowing it to be stopped and restarted as
     desired.

FILES
     *.4th               user's Forth source files
     login.4th      user's configuration file
     /usr/local/lib/forth/vax4th/*.4th  VAX-Forth system Forth
     source files

SEE ALSO
     Forth Reference Manual, Computer Support Group, Kitt Peak
     Natl. Obs. in directory /usr/doc/local/forth
     Calling Fortran from Forth, W. Richard Stevens (for VAX-
     Forth)

DIAGNOSTICS
     See Appendix A of the Forth Reference Manual

BUGS
     Great efforts have been made to have Forth-11 and VAX-Forth
     look as similar as possible under all operating environ-
     ments.  However, some inconsistencies are bound to show up.

     The termcap(5) data base should be used under UNIX to sup-
     port more terminals.

     There are occasional problems with the mag-tape words on the
     TS11 tape drive when trying to perform operations such as
     ``backspace from load point''.

     The asynchronous i/o words (tr, trw, adread and the like)
     are not asynchronous under UNIX, since this feature is not

Printed 8/24/87               local                             1

FORTH(1)            UNIX Programmer's Manual             FORTH(1)

     supported by UNIX.

     The precision of the word ms is affected by the granularity
     of the UNIX sleep(3) facility which is measured in multiples
     of one second.  Waits for a fraction of a second are approx-
     imate at best.
Printed 8/24/87               local                             2

---------------------------------------------------------------------

This version of Forth dates from 1982 and is similar to FIG-Forth with
a great many enhancements. It includes 32 and 64-bit floating point,
a block file arrangement similar to F83, and the ability to issue operating
system calls from within the Forth environment. (It is apparently also
possible to link this Forth to programs written in other languages).

It took about a 3 screen prelude to make this look like a 32-bit Forth-79
(some of which involved undoing some "better ideas" like using "endif" for
"then" and prefacing all byte operations with 'b' rather than 'c'). I had no
trouble with compatibility with other versions of Forth -- including 16-bit.
(Kitt Peak anticipated the current ideas for 16/32-bit compatibility.)

I should mention that there may be some installation and revision necessary
to get this running. We had no trouble when we got it in 1982, but some
problems with the shell command developed when we upgraded versions of Unix.
The (assembly language) source code is supplied, but I never had a systems
programmer look in to the problem. VAX-Forth was written for versions of VMS
and Unix that were current in the early 1980's.

I used this for several years for instruction until we obtained a
microcomputer lab. I don't think Kitt Peak is supporting this version any
longer (it was free) but they may be willing to supply it on an "as is" basis.


                                                  John J Wavrik
             jjwavrik@ucsd.edu                    Dept of Math  C-012
                                                  Univ of Calif - San Diego
                                                  La Jolla, CA  92093

jax@well.UUCP (Jack J. Woehr) (12/03/89)

In article <8911271559.AA02954@jade.berkeley.edu> Forth Interest Group International List <FIGI-L%SCFVM.bitnet@jade.berkeley.edu> writes:
>Greetings,
>
>        How may I obtain a public domain VMS FORTH?  Better, could someone
>send me one?  Apologies if this is terra cognita.
>

	A Vax Forth in 11/750 assembly source can be downloaded from
better ForthNet BBSes everywhere. See below for one telephone number.

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