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paul.kimpel@digm.com 8b0d19deba Release emulator version 1.00: 
1. Implement new system and disk subsystem configuration mechanism.
2. Implement initial Mark-XIII Cold Start card deck for use with new configuration interfaces.
3. Deprecate use of B5500ColdLoader.html script (replaced by new configuration mechanism and Cold Start deck), but correct and enhance IndexedDB database detection, creation, and deletion in it.
4. Implement "Application Cache" support to allow emulator to run off-line in a browser.
5. Implement web-font support and update all UIs to use DejaVu Sans and DejaVu Sans Mono from downloaded .woff or .ttf font files.
6. Rework some code in Processor OPDC, DESC, and indexDescriptor routines, attempting to resolve Flag Bit errors (issue #23). This appears to result in some improvement, but we still see them occasionally under load.
7. Line Printer:
    - Implement new line printer driver with more realistic UI and operator controls.
    - Implement Algol Glyphs option to render special Algol characters in Unicode.
    - Implement support for optional "greenbar" shading on the "paper".
8. SPO:
    - Redesign SPO driver to accept input from a text <input> element instead of capturing keystrokes directly from the window or "paper" <iframe>. This was done to allow input from tablet and mobile devices that will not pop up a keyboard unless an input-like element has the focus.
    - Implement Unicode Algol Glyphs support on output.
    - Intelligently resize "paper" area when SPO window is resized.
    - Accept "_" as a substitute for "~" as end-of-message on input.
9. Card Punch:
    - Implement Unicode Algol Glyphs support on output.
    - Implement stacker-full annunciators in UI.
10. Card Reader:
    - Implement Unicode Algol Glyphs support on input.
    - Accept "_" as a substitute for "~" on input.
11. Disk:
    - Adapt B5500DiskUnit driver to new configuration mechanism.
    - Implement support for Model-IB (slow) disk and non-DFX disk storage configurations; support up to 20 EUs.
    - Implement check for DKA readiness in cc.load() if not doing card-load-select.
12. Datacom:
    - Rework datacom driver keystroke handling for compatibility with Google Chrome.
    - Correct typo (line 437) in B5500DatacomUnit reported by Peter Grootswagers (issue #28).
13. Magnetic Tape:    
    - Implement more granular tape reel animation in B5500MagTapeDrive.
    - Open the tape loader window on top of its device window.
14. Correct color of NOT READY lamps in peripheral device UIs; convert <progress> bars to <meter> elements.
15. More intelligently resize peripheral UI controls when their window is resized.
16. Implement lamp test during power-on in B5500Console.
17. Illuminate NOT READY light on Console at power-on if certain minimum configuration requirements are not met.
18. Set all HTML <meta> Content-Type character sets to UTF-8 (were ISO-8859-1); correct problem with FireFox requiring the character set to be specified within the first 1024 characters of an HTML file.
19. Clean up and refactor CSS style sheets
20. Split Javascript code out from B5500Console.html to new B5500Console.js.
21. Refactor common UI routines into webUI\B5500Util.js.
22. Move images and fonts to new webUI/resources directory; rearrange files in webUI/tool, tools, tests, source directories of repo.
23. Make significant wiki updates to document the new features in this release.
2014-09-29 15:28:56 +00:00

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<!DOCTYPE html>
<head>
<title>retro-B5500 Mark XIII System Software</title>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<meta name="Author" content="Nigel Williams & Paul Kimpel">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Script-Type" content="text/javascript">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css">
<meta http-equiv="cache-control" content="no-cache">
<meta http-equiv="pragma" content="no-cache">
<link id=defaultStyleSheet rel=stylesheet type="text/css" href="./website.css">
</head>
<body>
<a href="../index.html" title="Click to return to the Home Page">
<img id=retroButton src="../webUI/resources/A-CONTROL.png" alt="retro A-CONTROL logo">
</a>
<h1><img src="../webUI/resources/retro-B5500-Logo.png" alt="retro logo">
<hr>
Burroughs B5500 Mark XIII System Software
</h1>
<h2>Background</h2>
<p>The Burroughs B5000 and B5500 were perhaps the first computer systems designed with the idea that they would require a significant operating system in order to run. Operating systems in the early 1960s were known as <i>control programs</i>. The designers at Burroughs envisioned a program that would automatically administer the entire system's operation, and thus created what became known as the Master Control Program, or <b>MCP</b>.
You can read the story of how this came about in the
<a href="http://purl.umn.edu/107105">1985 B5000 oral history</a> transcription.
<p>As a result of that design approach more than 50 years ago, having a B5500 emulator today is not all that interesting unless you also have the associated system software to make it do something. Alas, software was maintained in those days on punched cards and 7-track, open-reel magnetic tape, neither of which have seen much use in the last 30 years. Open-reel magnetic tape, in particular, is not known for having long-term archival qualities.
<p>Fortunately for us, Sid McHarg of Seattle, Washington (US) had preserved a set Burroughs 7-track release tapes for the B5500 Mark XIII (October 1971) version of the system software. Even more fortunately, Sid was able to work with Paul Pierce of Portland, Oregon (US) to recover the data from those tapes. We are indebted to Sid and Paul for their work in recovering those tapes and making the resulting data available.
<p>Burroughs became part of Unisys Corporation in 1986. Unisys still owns and holds copyrights on the B5500 system software, so Sid worked with Bob Supnik, VP of Engineering and Supply Chain at Unisys, to arrange an educational/hobbyist license for this software. We have acquired such a license, and are thus indebted to Bob and Unisys for generously allowing us to use the B5500 Mark XIII software under the
<a href="./Unisys-B5500-Software-License.pdf">terms of that license</a>.
<h2>Downloading the Tape Images</h2>
<p>Our license with Unisys allows us to make the Mark XIII software available to others under the terms of that license. There are three tape images, as enumerated below. To download one of the images, please click its corresponding link below. The resulting page will display the applicable terms of the Unisys license and a directory of the files on that image. Confirm your acceptance of the license terms to begin the download. You will need to download at least the <b>SYSTEM</b> image in order to run the emulator.
<dl>
<dt><a href="./TapeImage-SYSTEM.html"><b>SYSTEM</b></a> image (2.6MiB <code>.zip</code>)
<dd><code>SYSTEM</code> contains object code for the release, including the Datacom MCP, Timesharing MCP, System Intrinsics, CANDE timesharing system, compilers, and utility programs. It also contains source files for a few utilities, and a set of source-level patch files for the release.
<dt><a href="./TapeImage-SYMBOL1.html"><b>SYMBOL1</b></a> image (2.2MiB <code>.zip</code>)
<dd><code>SYMBOL1</code> contains the source code for the Datacom MCP, System Intrinsics, and compilers.
<dt><a href="./TapeImage-SYMBOL2.html"><b>SYMBOL2</b></a> image (2.1MiB <code>.zip</code>)
<dd><code>SYMBOL2</code> contains the remaining source code for the release, including the Timesharing MCP, CANDE, and utility programs.
</dl>
<h2>Format of the Tape Image Files</h2>
<p>Each of the tape images above is a standard ZIP archive file containing a single "<code>.bcd</code>" file. That file is a binary octet stream, i.e., a blob of 8-bit bytes. Each octet represents one data frame (6-bit character) from the 7-track tape. The low-order six bits of each octet contain the binary data from the tape frame. The next-higher bit is the odd-parity bit. The high-order bit in the octet will be a <code>1</code> if that frame is the first one in a physical tape block, and <code>0</code> otherwise. A tape mark (EOF) is represented by a block containing a single octet with the hexadecimal code 8F.
<p>The files on the tape image are formatted in B5500 "Library/Maintenance" format, which is described in the
<a href="http://bitsavers.org/pdf/burroughs/B5000_5500_5700/1042462_B5500_MCP_Reference_Jun69.pdf">B5500 MCP Reference Manual</a>, 1042462 (June 1969), page 8-1. Tape label records are described in Appendix B of that reference.
The format of disk file headers is described in the
<a href="http://bitsavers.org/pdf/burroughs/B5000_5500_5700/1024916_B5500_B5700_OperMan_Sep68.pdf">B5500 Operation Manual</a>, 1024916 (September 1968, revised June 1971, PCN 015), page 5-41. B5500 character codes are described in Appendix A of that reference.
<p>We have developed a few HTML/Javascript utilities to read these tape images and decode their data. See
<a href="../tools/B5500LibMaintDir.html">B5500LibMaintDir.html</a>,
<a href="../tools/B5500LibMaintDecoder.html">B5500LibMaintDecoder.html</a>, and
<a href="../tools/B5500LibMaintExtract.html">B5500LibMaintExtract.html</a>
in the /tools directory.
<p>&nbsp;
<div id=footerDiv>
Copyright (c) 2013, Nigel Williams and Paul Kimpel &bull; Licensed under the MIT License
</div>
<div id=lastModDiv>Revised
2013-07-20
</div>
</body>
</html>
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