TOPS-10 System (Timesharing / Total Operating System-10) is a discontinued

operating system An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware and software resources, and provides common daemon (computing), services for computer programs. Time-sharing operating systems scheduler (computing), schedule tasks for ...

from

Digital Equipment Corporation Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC ), using the trademark Digital, was a major American company in the computer industry from the 1960s to the 1990s. The company was co-founded by Ken Olsen and Harlan Anderson in 1957. Olsen was president until ...

(DEC) for the

PDP-10 Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC)'s PDP-10, later marketed as the DECsystem-10, is a mainframe computer family manufactured beginning in 1966 and discontinued in 1983. 1970s models and beyond were marketed under the DECsystem-10 name, especi ...

(or DECsystem-10)

mainframe computer A mainframe computer, informally called a mainframe or big iron, is a computer used primarily by large organizations for critical applications like bulk data processing for tasks such as censuses, industry and consumer statistics, enterprise ...

family. Launched in 1967, TOPS-10 evolved from the earlier "Monitor" software for the

PDP-6 The PDP-6, short for Programmed Data Processor model 6, is a computer developed by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) during 1963 and first delivered in the summer of 1964. It was an expansion of DEC's existing 18-bit systems to use a 36-bit da ...

and PDP-10 computers; this was renamed to TOPS-10 in 1970.

Overview

TOPS-10 supported shared memory and allowed the development of one of the first true

multiplayer A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system (couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or ...

computer games. The game, called DECWAR, was a text-oriented ''

Star Trek ''Star Trek'' is an American science fiction media franchise created by Gene Roddenberry, which began with the Star Trek: The Original Series, series of the same name and became a worldwide Popular culture, pop-culture Cultural influence of ...

''-type game. Users at terminals typed in commands and fought each other in real time. TOPS-10 was also the home of the original Multi User Dungeon,

MUD Mud (, or Middle Dutch) is loam, silt or clay mixed with water. Mud is usually formed after rainfall or near water sources. Ancient mud deposits hardened over geological time to form sedimentary rock such as shale or mudstone (generally cal ...

, the forerunner to today's MMORPGs. Another groundbreaking application was called ''FORUM''. This application was perhaps the first so-called '' CB Simulator'' that allowed users to converse with one another in what is now known as a

chat room The term chat room, or chatroom (and sometimes group chat; abbreviated as GC), is primarily used to describe any form of synchronous conferencing, occasionally even asynchronous conferencing. The term can thus mean any technology, ranging from ...

. This application showed the potential of multi-user communication and led to the development of CompuServe's chat application. TOPS-10 had a very robust

application programming interface An application programming interface (API) is a connection between computers or between computer programs. It is a type of software Interface (computing), interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that des ...

(API) that used a mechanism called a UUO or ''Unimplemented User Operation''. UUOs implemented operating system calls in a way that made them look like machine instructions. The Monitor Call API was very much ahead of its time, like most of the operating system, and made system programming on DECsystem-10s simple and powerful. The TOPS-10 scheduler supported prioritized run queues, and appended a process onto a queue depending on its priority. The system also included User file and Device independence.

Commands

The following list of commands are supported by TOPS-10. * ASSIGN * ATTACH * BACKSPACE * BACKUP * CCONTINUE * COMPILE * CONTINUE * COPY * CORE * CPUNCH * CREATE * CREDIR * CREF * CSTART * D(eposit) * DAYTIME * DCORE * DDT * DEASSIGN *

DEBUG In engineering, debugging is the process of finding the root cause, workarounds, and possible fixes for bugs. For software, debugging tactics can involve interactive debugging, control flow analysis, log file analysis, monitoring at the ap ...

* DELETE * DETACH * DIRECTORY * DISABLE * DISMOUNT * DSK * DUMP * E(xamine) * EDIT * ENABLE * EOF * EXECUTE * FILCOM * FILE * FINISH * FUDGE * GET * GLOB * HALT *

HELP Help may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Films * Help (2010 film), ''Help'' (2010 film), a Bollywood horror film * Help (2021 theatrical film), ''Help'' (2021 theatrical film), a British psychological thriller film * Help (2021 TV ...

* INITIA * JCONTINUE * KJOB * LABEL * LIST * LOAD * LOCATE * LOGIN * MAKE * MERGE * MIC * MOUNT * NETWORK * NODE * NSAVE * NSSAVE * OPSER * PJOB * PLEASE * PLOT * PRESERVE * PRINT * PROTECT * PUNCH * QUEUE * QUOLST * R * REASSIGN * REATTACH * REENTER * RENAME * RESOURCES * REWIND * RUN * SAVE * SSAVE * SCHED * SEND * SET * SKIP *

START Start can refer to multiple topics: * Takeoff, the phase of flight where an aircraft transitions from moving along the ground to flying through the air * Starting lineup in sports * Track and field#Starts use in race, Starts use in sport race * S ...

* SUBMIT * SYSTAT * TECO * TIME * TPUNCH *

TYPE Type may refer to: Science and technology Computing * Typing, producing text via a keyboard, typewriter, etc. * Data type, collection of values used for computations. * File type * TYPE (DOS command), a command to display contents of a file. * ...

* UNLOAD * USESTAT * VERSION * WHERE * ZERO

History

Release history

The PDP-6 Monitor software was first released in 1964. Support for the PDP-10's KA10 processor was added to the Monitor in release 2.18 in 1967. The TOPS-10 name was first used in 1970 for release 5.01. Release 6.01 (May 1974) was the first TOPS-10 to implement

virtual memory In computing, virtual memory, or virtual storage, is a memory management technique that provides an "idealized abstraction of the storage resources that are actually available on a given machine" which "creates the illusion to users of a ver ...

(demand paging), enabling programs larger than physical memory to be run. From release 7.00 onwards, symmetrical multiprocessing was available (as opposed to the master/slave arrangement used before). The final release of TOPS-10 was 7.04 in 1988.

TOPS-10 today

Hobbyists are now entitled to set up and use TOPS-10 under a Hobbyist's License. The easiest way for the hobbyist to run TOPS-10 is to acquire a suitable

emulator In computing, an emulator is Computer hardware, hardware or software that enables one computer system (called the ''host'') to behave like another computer system (called the ''guest''). An emulator typically enables the host system to run sof ...

and an operating system image. TOPS-10 may also be generated from archived original distribution "tapes".

Paul Allen Paul Gardner Allen (January 21, 1953 – October 15, 2018) was an American businessman, computer programmer, and investor. He co-founded Microsoft, Microsoft Corporation with his childhood friend Bill Gates in 1975, which was followed by the ...

maintained several publicly accessible historic computer systems, including a DECsystem-2065 running TOPS-10.

Software

Implemented programming languages

The TOPS-10 assembler, MACRO-10, was bundled with the TOPS-10 distribution. The following

programming language A programming language is a system of notation for writing computer programs. Programming languages are described in terms of their Syntax (programming languages), syntax (form) and semantics (computer science), semantics (meaning), usually def ...

s were implemented on TOPS-10 as layered products: *

ALGOL ALGOL (; short for "Algorithmic Language") is a family of imperative computer programming languages originally developed in 1958. ALGOL heavily influenced many other languages and was the standard method for algorithm description used by the ...

, as ALGOL-10 v10B, a compiler used for general computing * APL, as APL-SF V2, an interpreter used for mathematical modelling *

BASIC Basic or BASIC may refer to: Science and technology * BASIC, a computer programming language * Basic (chemistry), having the properties of a base * Basic access authentication, in HTTP Entertainment * Basic (film), ''Basic'' (film), a 2003 film ...

, as BASIC-10 v17F, an interpreter used for general computing *

BLISS BLISS is a system programming language developed at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) by W. A. Wulf, D. B. Russell, and A. N. Habermann around 1970. It was perhaps the best known system language until C debuted a few years later. Since then, C ...

, as BLISS-10 and BLISS-36, compilers used for systems programming *

COBOL COBOL (; an acronym for "common business-oriented language") is a compiled English-like computer programming language designed for business use. It is an imperative, procedural, and, since 2002, object-oriented language. COBOL is primarily ...

, as COBOL-68 and COBOL-74, compilers used for business computing * Fortran, as FORTRAN-10 v11, a compiler used for numerical computing The following programming languages were implemented on TOPS-10 as contributions from DECUS members: * FOCAL, as FOCAL-10 * Forth, a threaded interpreted language * IMP72 *

Lisp Lisp (historically LISP, an abbreviation of "list processing") is a family of programming languages with a long history and a distinctive, fully parenthesized Polish notation#Explanation, prefix notation. Originally specified in the late 1950s, ...

, an interpreter used for AI programming * Pascal, a compiler used for computing education *

PILOT An aircraft pilot or aviator is a person who controls the flight of an aircraft by operating its Aircraft flight control system, directional flight controls. Some other aircrew, aircrew members, such as navigators or flight engineers, are al ...

* SAM76 *

Simula Simula is the name of two simulation programming languages, Simula I and Simula 67, developed in the 1960s at the Norwegian Computing Center in Oslo, by Ole-Johan Dahl and Kristen Nygaard. Syntactically, it is an approximate superset of AL ...

, a compiler used for modeling *

SNOBOL SNOBOL ("StriNg Oriented and symBOlic Language") is a series of programming languages developed between 1962 and 1967 at AT&T Bell Laboratories by David J. Farber, Ralph Griswold and Ivan P. Polonsky, culminating in SNOBOL4. It was one of a ...

, an interpreter used for string processing *

BCPL BCPL ("Basic Combined Programming Language") is a procedural, imperative, and structured programming language. Originally intended for writing compilers for other languages, BCPL is no longer in common use. However, its influence is still f ...

, a compiler implemented by Essex University

Implemented user utilities

The following major user utilities were implemented on TOPS-10: * RMS (Records Management Services) * IQL (Interactive Query language) * DBMS-10 (

CODASYL CODASYL, the Conference/Committee on Data Systems Languages, was a consortium formed in 1959 to guide the development of a standard programming language that could be used on many computers. This effort led to the development of the programming ...

Database Management System In computing, a database is an organized collection of data or a type of data store based on the use of a database management system (DBMS), the software that interacts with end users, applications, and the database itself to capture and an ...

)

Notable games implemented on TOPS-10

* ADVENT * DECWAR, as noted above * FORUM, as noted above * HAUNT, an early role-playing game * Mac Hack, a

chess Chess is a board game for two players. It is an abstract strategy game that involves Perfect information, no hidden information and no elements of game of chance, chance. It is played on a square chessboard, board consisting of 64 squares arran ...

program by Richard Greenblatt *

Legacy

MS-DOS MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few op ...

was heavily influenced by TOPS-10. Identical elements include three characters long

file extension File or filing may refer to: Mechanical tools and processes * File (tool), a tool used to remove fine amounts of material from a workpiece. ** Filing (metalworking), a material removal process in manufacturing ** Nail file, a tool used to gen ...

s, several standard extensions (e.g., EXE, TXT), the asterisk () as a wildcard, the usage of the slash () as a switch separator and more.

References

{{Time-sharing operating systems DEC operating systems Time-sharing operating systems 1964 software