A Model and Prototype of VMS Using the Mach 3.0 Kernel

Digital's VMS operating system has been a successful software base for their VAX processors since the late 1970's. Existing operating systems are facing many new requirements and challenges in the 1990's and beyond. This has led them to investigate new approaches for designing, implementing, and maintaining VMS. One such effort is described in this paper. Using the Mach 3.0 kernel from Carnegie Mellon University, The authors developed a multi-server model and prototype of VMS that emphasizes platform-independence and internal partitioning. The authors describe the challenges they faced, the model that they evolved to address these challenges, and the prototype that they built to demonstrate feasibility.