HP 3000 Manuals HP 3000 Manuals
Chapter 1 MPE/iX Release 5.0 (X.50.20) Overview
Communicator Summary
by The Core MPE/iX Team
Commercial Systems Division
The MPE/iX Communicator Has a New Look
Welcome to MPE/iX Release 5.0, the release that balances the power of
MPE/iX with POSIX. This Communicator includes the new format, content,
and structure improvements introduced with the first MPE/iX-Express. The
Communicator content and structure improvements are a result of valuable
customer input that we continue to receive from our customer surveys,
user group meetings, and the newly formed Customer Advisory Council
(CAC). These improvements include:
* Important Details Please Read headers within each article that
highlight information you need to understand.
* Table of contents structure that represents our solution focus.
* Pointers to articles within the table of contents that we
recommend you read.
* New page design with main headings in the margin.
A Look at What is Protecting your MPE/iX Investment
MPE/iX Release 5.0 provides both end-users and application developers
access to POSIX.1 interfaces and POSIX.2 commands and utilities. These
new POSIX interfaces provide the MPE/iX user with enhanced file access,
security, and process management capabilities. The standard MPE/iX
intrinsics and commands permit MPE/iX-based applications to seamlessly
coexist with POSIX-based applications. To accomplish this, MPE/iX has
been extended to integrate the new POSIX-based features, including a true
Hierarchical File System (HFS), into the core operating system.
From the non-POSIX MPE/iX user perspective, you can continue to use
MPE/iX the way you always have. The new POSIX features are only
available if you explicitly ask for them. However, if you want to take
advantage of what POSIX has to offer, you can use the following:
* POSIX.1 interfaces provided in the MPE/iX Developer's Kit
* MPE/iX Shell and Utilities
* Extended features of the standard MPE/iX intrinsics and commands
In this way, you can use the power of the new POSIX features while
protecting the investment in your existing MPE/iX applications.
CompatibilityIssues WithMPE/iX
Release 5.0
Most customers using applications on pre-4.5 systems can install these
applications on MPE/iX 5.0 without concerns. However, you need to be
aware that some applications may need to be either changed or updated
with a newer software version or both prior to updating to MPE/iX Release
5.0. Hewlett-Packard recommends that you carefully read all relevant
installation and user documentation before updating and plan accordingly.
The following information briefly describes specific MPE/iX Release 5.0
compatibility issues that may concern you and lists the relevant article
in this Communicator where you can find more detailed information.
* The disk space requirements for MPE/iX Release 5.0 prevent the use
of the HP7933 and HP7935 disk drives as LDEV1 (the system disk).
If you are using a HP7933 or HP7935 as LDEV1 on your system, you
must take some additional steps prior to updating your system to
MPE/iX 5.0. Please refer to the articles "MPE/iX Release 5.0 Disk
Space Requirements" and "HP7933s and HP7935s as LDEV1" for more
details.
* The system message catalog (CATALOG.PUB.SYS) was changed from all
uppercase to mixedcase messages. This may cause problems with
programs that look at these messages. Research to date indicates
that very few applications have problems with this change.
Although the error message text is mixedcase, the error type and
number (for example, CIERR 976) are always uppercase. If this
causes problems with any of your programs then you need to change
your program to upshift the messages or you can upshift the
message catalog after installation. Please refer to the article
"CI Error Message Changes" for more details.
* In the past, if your program accidentally set a bit in the
reserved upper three bits in the FOPTION field of HPFOPEN or FOPEN
it would be ignored. Beginning with MPE/iX Release 4.5, FSERR
454, "(The specified record type is invalid)" will be generated.
This change is a result of the internal implementation of the
Hierarchical File System (HFS). Please refer to the article
"MPE/iX New and Enhanced Intrinsics" for more details.
* As of MPE/iX Release 4.5 the UDC file HPPXUDC.PUB.SYS introduces
several handy POSIX/HFS UDCs, one of which was a UDC to override
the LISTF command. It was discovered this UDC caused problems in
programs calling the HPCICOMMAND intrinsic. Starting with MPE/iX
Release 5.0, the LISTF UDC has been renamed to PLISTF. Please
refer to the article "New CI commands" for more details.
* System logging has been changed to handle the longer HFS filenames
(up to 1023 characters), as well as the opening and closing of
directories (including MPE group and accounts). Specifically, new
logging types such as types 2xx and type 155, specifically for
directory logging have been added. In addition, there are minor
changes in some of the current log file record types; however,
these changes should not cause problems to existing applications.
The way filenames in the MPE namespace are handled by system
logging has changed since MPE/iX Release 4.5. (Refer to the
"System Logging Changes" article in this Communicator.)
* As with all new MPE/iX releases, you should review the disk space
requirements needed for new MPE/iX enhancements and products (such
as new software products and hardware support). Please refer to
the article "MPE/iX Release 5.0 Disk Space Requirements" for more
details.
* As of MPE/iX Release 4.5, system managers have the capability to
create and rename files across account boundaries. This has been
a popular customer request and is necessary for a true HFS
implementation. Please refer to the article "The Hierarchical
File System" for details on using the hierarchical directory
structure.
* STORE/RESTORE has been changed and works differently than it did
in MPE/iX Release 4.5. After close examination and feedback, it
was decided to make the MPE/iX and HFS syntax have the same
meaning, provided the first component of the MPE/iX file name is
@. That is, a STORE @.@.@ now has the same meaning as a STORE /.
Please refer to the article "TurboSTORE/iX Changes" for more
details.
* The PURGE command was converted to native mode and enhanced to
accept wildcards. It is now subject to native mode parsing rules,
which for example, ignore trailing delimiters on commands. Please
refer to the article "Purge Command Accepts Wildcards" for more
details.
* LISTFILE ,4 no longer truncates the file access subjects for READ,
WRITE, and APPEND class when more than four access subjects are
specified on a file. Please refer to the article "New CI
Commands" for more details.