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Subj:	Undocumented VMS stuff

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Date: 24 May 89 02:24:43 GMT
From: munnari!vuwcomp!kosmos!csc!stewart_i@uunet.uu.net
Organization: Wellington City Council
Subject: Undocumented VMS stuff
Message-Id: <13@csc.wcc.govt.nz>
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We are running VMS V5.0-2 and I have noticed the following things:

There are three undocumented system services SYS$PARSE_CLASS,
SYS$FORMAT_CLASS and SYS$CHANGE_CLASS. What do they do ?
(Are they used in VMS 5.1 ?)

There are corresponding macro definitions in $CLSDEF  (STARTLET.MLB and in
BASIC$STARLET/FORSYSDEF for those with BASIC/FORTRAN).

         CLS$B_SECUR_LEV     !  Security level
         CLS$B_INTEG_LEV     !  Integrity level
         CLS$Q_SECUR_CAT     !  Security category mask
         CLS$Q_INTEG_CAT     !  Integrity category mask

      CLS$_SECSTR = 1  !  Textual secrecy/security string
      CLS$_INTSTR = 2  !  Textual integrity string
      CLS$_CLSBLK = 3  !  Simple classification block
      CLS$_MINCLSBLK = 4  !  Minimum classification block
      CLS$_MAXCLSBLK = 5  !  Maximum classification block


They look like they may be some form of protection mechanism in an upcoming
version of VMS. Anyone have any ideas ?

ALSO...

In STARLET.MLB there is also a module called $CHKPNTDEF for checkpointable
processes ?! :

    !  Define flags for calls to create checkpointable processes

      CHKPNT$M_AUTO_RESTART = x'00000001' !  auto-restart detached process
      CHKPNT$M_DEBUG = x'00000002'        !  merge in DEBUG
      CHKPNT$M_ASYNC = x'00000004'        !  asynchronous checkpoint process

It appears that there will be/was going to be a RUN/CHECKPOINT command and
some way to restart a process from a checkpoint. Anyone know anything about
it.

And...

If you create a file, say T.TXT, and then type SET FILE/RU_ACTIVE=4 you get
the following interesting display when you do a DIR/FULL :

  Directory DEV:[DEV.XXX]

  T.TXT;1                       File ID:  (21252,2,2)
  Size:            0/0          Owner:    [XXX,XXX]
  ... etc ...
  Journaling enabled: None
  Active Rcvry Units: by Checkpoint
  ... etc ...

(You seem to be able to only get rid of the file by DELETing it !)
Other values for /RU_ACTIVE give you "Active Rcvry Units: by "
RMS, DBMS, and Rdb.

Is this the Common Journaling Facility which half appeared in version 4 and
seems to have almost disappeared in version 5. There used to be
loads of new system service macros in V4, e.g. $CREJNL, $DELJNL etc which
translated into service calls CJF$CREJNL etc.

Anyone know anything about these things ? (Or is DEC keeping them a closely
guarded secret ?)

Anyone else discovered any other strange/undocumented things in V5 ?

+---------------------------------+------------------------------------------+
| Ian Stewart                     | Domain:   stewart_i@csc.wcc.govt.nz      |
| Consultant                      | PSImail:  PSI%0530147000090::STEWART_I   |
| Computer Services Section       | UUCP:                                    |
| Wellington City Council         | ...!munnari!vuwcomp!kosmos!csc!stewart_i |
| PO Box 2199, Wellington         | Phone:    (64) (4) 733-130 x812          |
| New Zealand                     | FAX:      (64) (4) 733-430               |
+---------------------------------+------------------------------------------+