Notes about the RAND Documentation

[PashPaw]

1. The monitor in the documentation isn't the same as TOPS-10. The monitor is actually the input-output unit code and the supervisory unit code. We have SU. We don't have the IOU. There is a third component, the interpreter, that runs on a piece of software called the central processing unit (and not to be confused with the Type 166). This could or couldn't be AID and we may need to modify it to run right. Considering the source of AID was RAND (thanks to the Tymshare tapes), it's possible that it's using the same code.
2. It requires DECDMP to boot. DDT isn't needed but can be used in case there is system trouble.
3. The hardware configuration looks like this:

• Type 166 processor
• Type 162 Fast ACs
• 32kW of Type 163 core memory
• An ASR-35 TTY console acting as a console
• A Type 551 DECtape control with Type 555 DECtape with four drives
• A Type 167 Drum I/O Channel Type 237 drum containing 1,048,576 words
• A Type 270 Discfile control unit that's capable of handling more than one Discfile 5022 disk
• A Type 516 magtape controller with up to 10 Type 50 magtape units
• A Type 760 paper tape reader and 761 punch
• A Type 630 mux
• Type 616 Consoles either supporting hard wired connections or dataphone connections
• Two ASR-33s for talking to the time-sharing system being used for development
• The Line Concentrator made by J. Robins Electronics

4. There is a mention of a separate time-sharing system being used for development and some of the DECtape units were used to store the data onto that.

[PashPaw]

So, some other things I noted: the 1970 edition of the PDP-10 Timesharing Handbook words something very specifically in pg. 4-7 (129 in the PDF):

Digital Equipment Corporation is grateful to The RAND Corporation for permission to adopt the language processors of JOSS for the PDP-10. We also wish to express our appreciation to the programmers and computer scientists who developed the system, and to The RAND Corporation and E.P. Gimble of the Air Force's Sacramento Air Materiel Area for the use of RAND publications in the preparation of this AID manual.

But, it possibly gives us another point of contact for more RAND stuff. It might be the USAF directly since the Sacramento Air Materiel Area shut down in 1995 during a Base Realignment and Closure.

[PashPaw]

I ordered a copy of the JOSS: Accounting and Performance Measurement from RAND. Let's see if they can find it and if I get it.

It's the last JOSS book about the underpinnings (outside of the AWOL distributor) that doesn't seem to be online in any form. I probably won't scan it but I will likely take notes and cite instead.