After 47 years, OpenVMS gets a package manager (VSP)
40 comments
·March 17, 2025whartung
I wonder if someone could have ported pkgsrc to it, create a POSIXish compatibility shim library (maybe there already is one), and, I wonder how much of the denizens lingering in the pkgsrc would have ported over “for free”.
bbatha
VMS has had posix compatibility since the 90s. You can install gnu tools on it as well.
raincom
How many OpenVMS systems are out there in production?
datadeft
A lot. Problem is that sometimes the hardware is lost due to renovation to the building.
https://www.theregister.com/2001/04/12/missing_novell_server...
icedchai
I haven't seen one since the early 2000's. That company has since ported their code to Linux and AIX.
metaphor
We still operate hundreds of legacy (2nd and 3rd gen) systems with Alpha hosts running OpenVMS in airgapped prod environments across the country.
The portfolio of apps we developed/maintain for these legacy systems have all been ported to their modern replacement systems years ago, but we still regularly release updates targeting legacy that maintain feature parity with modern releases.
Scramblejams
What’s that like? Fun? Annoying? Interesting? Boring?
icedchai
Curious how you handle hardware failures for all that old equipment, etc. Do you have a huge depot of spare parts? Ebay? etc
icedchai
It doesn't support my VAX!
vaxman
"Translate all custom C, BLISS, FORTRAN and DATATRIEVE applications on this VAX into Golang and reconfigure all custom DCL scripts to run in BASH on Linux. Output the results as a bootable disk image for GB10 processors."
ajsnigrutin
yay!
Both openvms users will be ecstatic!
unit149
[dead]
spl757
oh my
rat87
But the real question is can you add a Firefox ppa? /jk
robin_reala
It’s considerably out of date, but theoretically yes? https://h41379.www4.hpe.com/openvms/products/ips/firefox/
speed_spread
Congratulations on the new package manager. But despite its name, OpenVMS is still actually not open.
skissane
> But despite its name, OpenVMS is still actually not open.
This is a very anachronistic complaint - DEC renamed VMS to OpenVMS in 1992, and at the time “open” had nothing to do with “open source” since that phrase wasn’t even coined until 1998.
In 1992, “Open” meant “open standards”/“open systems” - support for industry standards instead of proprietary ones - most importantly POSIX. VMS became OpenVMS when it acquired POSIX compatibility. And other vendors used the same branding-IBM offered mainframe POSIX compatibility under the names OpenEdition (MVS) and OpenExtensions (VM)
technothrasher
> since that phrase wasn’t even coined until 1998.
This idea that Christine Peterson invented the term open source in 1998 is revisionist history. I personally remember the term being used during the early 90's, and here's a Usenet thread from 1990 that backs up my memory:
https://web.archive.org/web/20220213152832/https://www.tech-...
(The relevant text is a little way down in the thread: "BSD's open source policy meant that user developed software could be ported among platforms...")
Heck, here's a Caldera press release from 1996 that argues directly against your point that OpenVMS couldn't have been confused with open source. In the press release, Caldera announce their "OpenDOS" which is, they say, an "OPEN SOURCE CODE MODEL FOR DOS"
https://web.archive.org/web/20200521004332/http://www.xent.c...
skissane
I don’t agree it is “revisionist” history. Yes, people used phrases like “open source code” prior to 1998, but without a clear and universally agreed meaning - pre-1998, “open source” could just mean the source code was available under unspecified terms, possibly with significant strings attached (e.g. commercial use requires paid license, no redistribution of modified versions, etc). It was only circa 1998 that “open source” came to clearly mean the Open Source Definition
In fact, in a pre-1998 sense, VMS (“Open” or not) had “open source” in that customers could order source listings. Yes we’d now call that something more like “source available” but that category wasn’t clearly distinguished from “open source” back then
In any event, go read trade magazines from the early 1990s, you’ll find talk of “open systems” in almost every issue, the phrase “open source” rarely if ever occurs
icedchai
I agree and remember similar. I wouldn't be surprised if someone else says that "open source" doesn't mean "Open Source" in the "official" (whatever that means) sense. Wikipedia seems to support the revisionist history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source
p_ing
Per their wiki -
> The operating system originally called VAX/VMS was renamed to OpenVMS around 1991 to reflect the high degree of support for industry standards such as POSIX.
> This prefix is now generally regarded as silent by OpenVMS users and developers calling the operating system "VMS".
tombert
Yeah, that has always confused me. When I first started playing with Linux and BSD, I would see OpenVMS popping up in my searches, only to find that it wasn't actually open.
I'm sure there's legacy reasons for that, but it always sort of annoyed me because I wanted play with it
bitwize
It's "open" in the sense of the Open Software Foundation, OPENSTEP, or OpenGL. Back in the pre-CATB days, "open" meant "developed by a consortium rather than a vendor", or perhaps even just "ported to more than one CPU architecture". This latter sense is what is meant in OpenVMS, as it was ported to DEC Alpha CPUs in the mid-90s.
flomo
I believe in this case, "open" = supports UNIX/POSIX apis.
null
actionfromafar
And that there was documentation on how it worked.
tom_
Always bothered me too. At least POSIX is actually a POS.
It already has a package manager. Emacs.