Ada on OpenVMS, where to have a new beginning

Ada on OpenVMS, where to have a new beginning

[gérard Calliet]

Hello,

I participated in a GNAT Ada build for Itanium OpenVMS 
(https://github.com/AdaLabs/gnat-vms) a few years ago. It is based on a 
GCC 4.7.3 .

I'm coming back to this work to maintain it and make it evolve, in a 
general approach of making Ada available in OpenVMS environments (VAX, 
Alpha, Itanium, and soon x86). (http://www.vmsadaall.org/index.php/en/)

For VAX and Alpha we have at least DEC Ada and Alsys Ada.  On Itanium I 
have to maintain GNAT Ada on GCC. For x86 I have to base on the Gnat Ada 
front end for LLVM, since VSI ports VMS to x86 
(https://vmssoftware.com/updates/state-of-the-port/) basing the 
compilers on LLVM.

I know that Adacore dropped commercial support for Gnat Ada on OpenVMS 
in 2015. It's not the commercial reasons that interest me.

In approaching this project again I would like to know as much as 
possible about how far Adacore's people or helpers have come in their 
developments for OpenVMS, what problems they have dealt with in the GCC 
upgrades they have resolved, only considered, and those they have seen 
as too difficult and blocking. The question arises as well for the 
upgrades (with for example around this time the transition of the GCC 
build to C++) as for the evolution of the debug management.

If the answers raise confidentiality issues, I don't want to put anyone 
in trouble, but I'm looking for indications on who to negotiate with.

It's not impossible that Adacore's people were among the last to develop 
GCC for OpenVMS Itanium. They may also be able to inform me about the 
build of the C and C++ part for GCC OpenVMS. I think indeed to associate 
to my efforts for Ada the exploration of the availability of a C++ GCC 
for Itanium OpenVMS.

This resumption of project is quite at its beginning. My goal is to open 
as much as possible the work and its results to a collaborative work, in 
Open Source standards. One of my first tasks will be to update the 
current repository to allow opened development.

Gérard Calliet

Re: Ada on OpenVMS, where to have a new beginning

[Andreas ZEURCHER]

On Monday, August 17, 2020 at 12:14:20 PM UTC-5, gérard Calliet wrote:
> Hello, 
> 
> I participated in a GNAT Ada build for Itanium OpenVMS 
> (https://github.com/AdaLabs/gnat-vms) a few years ago. It is based on a 
> GCC 4.7.3 . 
> 
> I'm coming back to this work to maintain it and make it evolve, in a 
> general approach of making Ada available in OpenVMS environments (VAX, 
> Alpha, Itanium, and soon x86). (http://www.vmsadaall.org/index.php/en/) 
> 
> For VAX and Alpha we have at least DEC Ada and Alsys Ada. On Itanium I 
> have to maintain GNAT Ada on GCC. For x86 I have to base on the Gnat Ada 
> front end for LLVM, since VSI ports VMS to x86 
> (https://vmssoftware.com/updates/state-of-the-port/) basing the 
> compilers on LLVM. 
> 
> I know that Adacore dropped commercial support for Gnat Ada on OpenVMS 
> in 2015. It's not the commercial reasons that interest me. 
> 
> In approaching this project again I would like to know as much as 
> possible about how far Adacore's people or helpers have come in their 
> developments for OpenVMS, what problems they have dealt with in the GCC 
> upgrades they have resolved, only considered, and those they have seen 
> as too difficult and blocking. The question arises as well for the 
> upgrades (with for example around this time the transition of the GCC 
> build to C++) as for the evolution of the debug management. 
> 
> If the answers raise confidentiality issues, I don't want to put anyone 
> in trouble, but I'm looking for indications on who to negotiate with. 
> 
> It's not impossible that Adacore's people were among the last to develop 
> GCC for OpenVMS Itanium. They may also be able to inform me about the 
> build of the C and C++ part for GCC OpenVMS. I think indeed to associate 
> to my efforts for Ada the exploration of the availability of a C++ GCC 
> for Itanium OpenVMS. 
> 
> This resumption of project is quite at its beginning. My goal is to open 
> as much as possible the work and its results to a collaborative work, in 
> Open Source standards. One of my first tasks will be to update the 
> current repository to allow opened development. 
> 
> Gérard Calliet

For those interested, a hobbyist license of OpenVMS is available from VMS Software, Inc., which is the new owners of VMS instead of HPE.  There is also a free Alpha emulator for Windows 10 as well.

https://training.vmssoftware.com/hobbyist

Re: Ada on OpenVMS, where to have a new beginning

[nobody in particular]

It is unlikely yet perhaps Steve Lionel will have some info on this. 
Although he was not involved with Ada (to my knowledge) he was a fixture 
in the compiler community for Fortran and probably more, at DEC, COMPAQ, 
and HP over a long period and might be able to identify likely suspects 
to contact.

This year the VMS port to Intel X86 was finally completed

https://vmssoftware.com/updates/state-of-the-port/

https://sciinc.com/remotevms/vms_techinfo/vms_news/OpenVMSOnX86-64.asp

I remember a lengthy discussion in the VMS newsgroup many years ago 
regarding the future of Ada on VMS. I believe the guys at the above 
companies were involved. I think the conclusion was they would not or 
could not handle it in-house and I believe the Ada they had on VMS was 
only 95. There were murmurings that they would try to find somebody to 
do it but I did not hear that Adacore ever released anything.

Thank you, I'll follow this thread with interest.


On 17/08/2020 17:14, gérard Calliet wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I participated in a GNAT Ada build for Itanium OpenVMS 
> (https://github.com/AdaLabs/gnat-vms) a few years ago. It is based on a 
> GCC 4.7.3 .
> 
> I'm coming back to this work to maintain it and make it evolve, in a 
> general approach of making Ada available in OpenVMS environments (VAX, 
> Alpha, Itanium, and soon x86). (http://www.vmsadaall.org/index.php/en/)
> 
> For VAX and Alpha we have at least DEC Ada and Alsys Ada.  On Itanium I 
> have to maintain GNAT Ada on GCC. For x86 I have to base on the Gnat Ada 
> front end for LLVM, since VSI ports VMS to x86 
> (https://vmssoftware.com/updates/state-of-the-port/) basing the 
> compilers on LLVM.
> 
> I know that Adacore dropped commercial support for Gnat Ada on OpenVMS 
> in 2015. It's not the commercial reasons that interest me.
> 
> In approaching this project again I would like to know as much as 
> possible about how far Adacore's people or helpers have come in their 
> developments for OpenVMS, what problems they have dealt with in the GCC 
> upgrades they have resolved, only considered, and those they have seen 
> as too difficult and blocking. The question arises as well for the 
> upgrades (with for example around this time the transition of the GCC 
> build to C++) as for the evolution of the debug management.
> 
> If the answers raise confidentiality issues, I don't want to put anyone 
> in trouble, but I'm looking for indications on who to negotiate with.
> 
> It's not impossible that Adacore's people were among the last to develop 
> GCC for OpenVMS Itanium. They may also be able to inform me about the 
> build of the C and C++ part for GCC OpenVMS. I think indeed to associate 
> to my efforts for Ada the exploration of the availability of a C++ GCC 
> for Itanium OpenVMS.
> 
> This resumption of project is quite at its beginning. My goal is to open 
> as much as possible the work and its results to a collaborative work, in 
> Open Source standards. One of my first tasks will be to update the 
> current repository to allow opened development.
> 
> Gérard Calliet