[24215] in Hotline Meeting
VAXes at MIT
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Naomi B. Schmidt)
Tue Sep 13 10:39:15 1994
To: jmilgram@minnow.MIT.EDU
Cc: hotline@MIT.EDU, hsolmez@titanic.MIT.EDU, mingqi@MIT.EDU, nschmidt@MIT.EDU
Date: Tue, 13 Sep 1994 10:38:59 EDT
From: "Naomi B. Schmidt" <nschmidt@MIT.EDU>
Hello Jerry -
The Athena Hotline folks have forwarded to me your note of Sept 12 regarding
data files that had been created on Patriot and that are readable only on the
VAX. I'd like to clarify our plans regarding the VAXstation platform, offer
you short term access to a VAXstation that we have in Academic Computing
Services, ask you some questions so that I can understand your problem more
thoroughly, and suggest what I believe is the proper path for you to follow
to insure future access to your data.
First of all, regarding the phasing out of the VAXstations. The plan to
withdraw Athena support from that platform was announced last Spring, both in
an article in the Athena Insider and in a letter from Greg Jackson to all
Department Heads. This is part of our ongoing renewal of the Athena
Computing Environment, replacing our equipment on a 4 year cycle. Academic
Computing Services is using funds provided by the Provost to replace old
equipment that is being used for education with new workstations. It is
under that program that we are replacing the 5 VAXstations in the Ocean
Engineering cluster with Sun workstations.
Enhancements to the Athena System make it very difficult to support the old
platforms that we phase out in addition to the new platforms that we bring
on, and so we have had to be hard-nosed about totally withdrawing support
within approximately 6 months of phasing out a platform. That has happened
in past years with the Microvax II and the IBM RT-PC. This year it is the
VAXstation 3100's turn. In addition to the fact that the older platforms do
not perform well and cannot run our third party software, we just do not have
the staff to support them, and for this reason we will not leave older
workstations around in the departments unless there is an agreement signed by
a computer support person in a department acknowledging that the Athena
operating system will be stripped from the hard disk and replaced by the
vendor operating system. Thus, a few VAXstations have been sold to
departments to be used in effect as X terminals. I strongly discourage this
solution in your case, unless you have a system administrator in your
research group who would be able to load a stripped down version of VAX
Ultrix on a machine that we would sell to you and take responsibility for
managing it on his own, with no calls for assistance to our hotline. Even
this would not be a long term solution if you anticipate continuing to need
access to your data, as no hardware is supported by its vendor forever.
Your note states that you need access to certain data files that were created
on Patriot. For the short term, we can add your name to the password file on
a VAXstation that we have here in ACS so that you can remotely log into that
machine to access your data once we have replaced the machines in the Ocean
Engineering cluster. At the same time, you should be making plans to
convert that data to a form that can be read on whatever equipment you
currently use to do your research. This seems to be your preference as
well, and we are in agreement here. Where are these files currently stored?
On a hard disk on some machine? On tape? In any case, if you were able to
read them a week ago, then you should also be able to write them out in
whatever format you choose. Thus, you can once and for all convert them to a
form that will not rely on outmoded equipment.
Could you give me the name and email address of the individual who was able
to read in the data a week ago? That would be a good place to get started.
We if reach an impasse there, then I will also ask for the current email
address of Dr. Olmez.
In any case, I will ask the hotline folks to proceed with the replacement of
the 5 VAXstations in the Ocean Engineering cluster with the 5 promised Sun
workstations. Please let me know whose name should be added to the password
file on our VAXstation, so that you are able to access that machine remotely
for the short term. I am confident that we can work this out without leaving
an outdated machine in your departmental cluster.
Naomi Schmidt
Mgr, Educational Planning and Support
Academic Computing Services
x3-6884
