VMS books

[Christopher Browne]

On Wed, Dec 17, 2008 at 2:48 PM, D. Hugh Redelmeier <hugh-pmF8o41NoarQT0dZR+AlfA at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> | From: Tyler Aviss <tjaviss-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org>
>
> | OT, but does anyone know any local bookstores that would carry books
> | on VMS/OpenVMS?
>
> I'm interested: why do you want to learn about VMS?
>
> That might affect what book you want to read.
>
> My impression has been that VMS's time has passed.  This may well be
> because of the circles I travel within.

It appears that that HP is shipping an IA-64-based variation of
OpenVMS, which means that they do have a roadmap for its survival so
long as Intel continues with IA-64...

I agree that it's not a platform that many would be considering for
brand new systems, and I don't expect that it would be terribly easy
to "break in" to VMS opportunities as a new job.

At the more abstract level, VMS has had a number of interesting
services that were fairly ubiquitously-available, unlike on Unix:
 - ACMS, a TP system
 - Rdb, a built-in SQL DBMS
 - Some built-in data storage / communications structuring tools like RMS, FDL
 - Files-11 was a filesystem with a fair bit more functionality than
Unix filesystems tend to offer

> If you just want to learn about different OSes, there are probably
> more worthy ones.

Here's a seeming-self-published book on VMS...

http://www.theminimumyouneedtoknow.com/openvms_application_developer_book_reviews.html

The table of contents seems interesting, and it may well be that
lovingly-created self-published books by people that loved VMS may
provide some useful perspective.  I think there are a couple of books
like this out there.
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