Yesterday was researching the origins of the processor architecture
of the 1970s small systems. Three-chip Fairchild PMOS CPUs show up a
lot, documentation is confusing. The parts are collectable now
because they look 'cool'. So far, I haven't found anyone who will
answer my questions on the subject. They were known as the Mini-D or Burroughs Basic Data System (BDS) micro-processor Most of what I know
so far has been pushed to bitsavers. The chip stuff is somewhat
confusingly under
http://bitsavers.org/pdf/burroughs/military/D-machine to keep all the information in one place.
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Burroughs Mini-D
From: Al Kossow <[email protected]>
To:
Date: Wed May 10 2023 09:03:05 GMT-0700 (Pacific Daylight Time)
Yesterday was researching the origins of the processor architecture
of the 1970s small systems. Three-chip Fairchild PMOS CPUs show up a
lot, documentation is confusing. The parts are collectable now
because they look 'cool'. So far, I haven't found anyone who will
answer my questions on the subject. They were known as the Mini-D or
Burroughs Basic Data System (BDS) micro-processor Most of what I know
so far has been pushed to bitsavers. The chip stuff is somewhat
confusingly under
http://bitsavers.org/pdf/burroughs/military/D-machine to keep all the
information in one place.
There's a capitalization problem in the link above. The correct link is:
http://bitsavers.org/pdf/burroughs/Military/D_Machine/
I worked for Burroughs in the Paoli (Philadelphia) area during the early >'70s, and certainly heard about the D and Mini-D machines, but never
knew much about them. I believe the full D machine was used in the >B700/800/900, and knew that it was a very soft architecture, but that's
about it. I have reached out to some colleagues from that time and we'll
see what they have to say.
Paul Kimpel <[email protected]> writes:
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Burroughs Mini-D
From: Al Kossow <[email protected]>
To:
Date: Wed May 10 2023 09:03:05 GMT-0700 (Pacific Daylight Time)
Yesterday was researching the origins of the processor architecture
of the 1970s small systems. Three-chip Fairchild PMOS CPUs show up a
lot, documentation is confusing. The parts are collectable now
because they look 'cool'. So far, I haven't found anyone who will
answer my questions on the subject. They were known as the Mini-D or
Burroughs Basic Data System (BDS) micro-processor Most of what I know
so far has been pushed to bitsavers. The chip stuff is somewhat
confusingly under
http://bitsavers.org/pdf/burroughs/military/D-machine to keep all the
information in one place.
There's a capitalization problem in the link above. The correct link is:
http://bitsavers.org/pdf/burroughs/Military/D_Machine/
I worked for Burroughs in the Paoli (Philadelphia) area during the early >'70s, and certainly heard about the D and Mini-D machines, but neverIn Pasadena we had the B774/B874 which were used as data communications processor (DCP) front-ends for the medium systems mainframes. Aside
knew much about them. I believe the full D machine was used in the >B700/800/900, and knew that it was a very soft architecture, but that's >about it. I have reached out to some colleagues from that time and we'll >see what they have to say.
from once using MSNDL to compile a network definition, I don't know
much about the underlying architecture.
On Thursday, May 11, 2023 at 12:04:33 PM UTC-4, Scott Lurndal wrote:
Paul Kimpel <[email protected]> writes:
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Burroughs Mini-D
From: Al Kossow <[email protected]>
To:
Date: Wed May 10 2023 09:03:05 GMT-0700 (Pacific Daylight Time)
Yesterday was researching the origins of the processor architecture
of the 1970s small systems. Three-chip Fairchild PMOS CPUs show up a
lot, documentation is confusing. The parts are collectable now
because they look 'cool'. So far, I haven't found anyone who will
answer my questions on the subject. They were known as the Mini-D or
Burroughs Basic Data System (BDS) micro-processor Most of what I know >> so far has been pushed to bitsavers. The chip stuff is somewhat
confusingly under
http://bitsavers.org/pdf/burroughs/military/D-machine to keep all the >> information in one place.
There's a capitalization problem in the link above. The correct link is:
http://bitsavers.org/pdf/burroughs/Military/D_Machine/
I knew somebody who helped design the D-machine, unfortunately he died about 20 years ago.I worked for Burroughs in the Paoli (Philadelphia) area during the early >'70s, and certainly heard about the D and Mini-D machines, but never >knew much about them. I believe the full D machine was used in the >B700/800/900, and knew that it was a very soft architecture, but that's >about it. I have reached out to some colleagues from that time and we'll >see what they have to say.In Pasadena we had the B774/B874 which were used as data communications processor (DCP) front-ends for the medium systems mainframes. Aside
from once using MSNDL to compile a network definition, I don't know
much about the underlying architecture.
(nice guy, it was a loss).
I believe it was originally built for a defense contract (or two) and was later adopted
by the B800/B900 (aka. Small System) group. I think some/all of the Small System
development was located in Boca Raton, FL at one time (at least, some other co-workers
came from there when they closed down SS development).
- Tim
I forgot to mention, the B800/B900 claim to fame was that it changed its instruction
set depending on what programming language you used. So, there was a Fortran instruction set, and a Cobol instruction set, etc.
- Tim
On Thursday, June 1, 2023 at 4:25:06=E2=80=AFPM UTC-7, Al Kossow wrote:
=20
I'm becoming concerned that what may have been produced about these syste= >ms has been lost.
I went back and looked at the implementations information I have for the 70= >0/800/80/90 systems last night and
they do run an interpreted system language on top of a microcoded 16 bit pr= >ocessor. Even on the B1000 side with
the internal memos that I have there was apparently no detailed documents o= >n how the systems actually worked
beyond the communicates and data structures which changed with each release= >.
I'm assuming if you had the need to know, you would just look at the source=
code and none of this information was
really ever released to customers.
The situation is much worse for the non-B1000 small systems. I've not even = >been able to find field service documentation
beyond some schematic sets for those systems.
I'm becoming concerned that what may have been produced about these systems has been lost.
On Thursday, June 1, 2023 at 4:25:06 PM UTC-7, Al Kossow wrote:
I'm becoming concerned that what may have been produced about these systems has been lost.I went back and looked at the implementations information I have for the 700/800/80/90 systems last night and
they do run an interpreted system language on top of a microcoded 16 bit processor. Even on the B1000 side with
the internal memos that I have there was apparently no detailed documents on how the systems actually worked
beyond the communicates and data structures which changed with each release. I'm assuming if you had the need to know, you would just look at the source code and none of this information was
really ever released to customers.
The situation is much worse for the non-B1000 small systems. I've not even been able to find field service documentation
beyond some schematic sets for those systems.
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