[Simh] BLISS ( was Re: 101 Basic Games for RSTS/E (was Re: PDP11 on Simh for public access))

[Johnny Billquist]

On 2018-01-26 18:48, Timothe Litt wrote:
> BLISS-36,-16,-32,-32E,-64E, MIPS, INTEL, IA64, are DEC's common BLISS - 
> evolved (and greatly extended) from BLISS-11, but not (really) 
> source-compatible for non-trivial programs.  "common" means that (with 
> carefully defined exceptions that can be conditionally compiled), the 
> same language is accepted by all, and it's possible to write portable 
> programs.  Including common BLISS itself.  RMS-10/20 is another 
> non-trivial example - same sources as VAX/RMS.  There are a number of 
> targets and host environment combinations that are supported.
> 
> BLISS-16 is hosted on both PDP-10 and VAX, producing PDP-11 object 
> code.  I used both.  I didn't encounter an Alpha-hosted version - but it 
> should have compiled & run there, so it probably existed.  Or was VESTed.

I don't think BLISS-16 ran on PDP-10, but I could be wrong. I've never 
seen or heard anything about BLISS-16 running on Alpha or beyond. I 
guess it could be possible to do, but I sortof doubt anyone did. If 
anyone have the bits, I would be very interested in hearing about it, as 
I would like to recompile some bits and pieces. (Any BLISS-16 compiler 
would be a good start.)

> Most software written in BLISS-10 & -11 was converted to common  BLISS.
> 
> There was an attempt at self-hosting BLISS-16, but it failed - 
> technically, it ran, but there really wasn't enough address space to 
> make it usable.  Cross-compiling wasn't popular (networks were crude), 
> so BLISS-16 was not as widely adopted.

Well, parts of the RSX kernel is written in BLISS-16, and all of RMS-11. 
Also some parts of DECnet-11M-PLUS.
That much I know. I don't know what else might been written in BLISS-16.

	Johnny

-- 
Johnny Billquist                  || "I'm on a bus
                                   ||  on a psychedelic trip
email: bqt at softjar.se             ||  Reading murder books
pdp is alive!                     ||  tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol