State of the Port

OpenVMS on x86 was made available to the first customer on May 15, 2020. The 14-April Release V9.0-H, the ninth overall, is another good one with more functionality and many improvements. VSI also added five additional EAK testers (making 53 in all) and there may be a few more in the coming days.

With each release more features become available along with increased stability. As of the V9.0-H release, all users run x86 OpenVMS as a Virtual Box, KVM, or VMware guest. VSI provides an appliance file (.OVA) which the customer downloads and imports. Release Notes and updated documentation are also provided. Components of the Cross Tools Kit are updated as needed with each release. The appliance is a preconfigured OpenVMS system. After importing the appliance, the customer simply starts the guest and OpenVMS boots. After executing the standard startup procedure, the system is ready for user login. The configuration may be changed by the customer; any guidelines noted by VSI must be followed.

The appliance has SSL and VSI TCPIP Services installed and the customer does a standard network configuration specific to their local network address. TELNET and FTP are the only network applications available in this release. DECset (CMS, DTM, ENV), FMS, SSMgr, DWMOTIF, KERBEROS, CSWS (Apache), RTR, MOSQUITTO, and DECnet IV kits are on the appliance and can be installed.

With each release more core operating system features will be available. Also, layered products and additional compiler updates (in the Cross Tools Kit) will be ready for use.

See more information on the x86 port here.