[Simh] "Raw" disk access

[Alexander Schreiber]

On Wed, Apr 12, 2017 at 02:39:58PM -0400, Paul Koning wrote:

> As I recall, on VMS a disk is a file; a file spec consisting only of a device
> name accesses that device.  So unlike some other operating systems where
> special syscalls are needed for raw disk access, on VMS I would expect it to
> be just a matter of accessing DUA1: or whatever.

Well, that is pretty much how it works under Linux, everything is a file
(the old Unix principle).
There isn't really a difference between accessing a file in the filesystem
or accessing a raw block device. Windows appears to have similiar way where
you can access raw block devices via the file API (but that is just from
a quick search).

> 
> I haven't done this in ages, but this is what I recall from when the question
> came up in the context of my FLX program (RSTS file I/O).

Kind regards,
           Alex.
-- 
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 looks like work."                                      -- Thomas A. Edison