ActiveMQ on VMS Alpha

[Arne Vajhøj]

Topic came up in recent discussion.

VSI has ActiveMQ 5.15-0 (almost recent, latest is 5.17.2) for VMS I64,
but nothing for VMS Alpha.

For obvious reasons. VMS I64 has a somewhat recent Java 8. VMS Alpha
only got Java 5 (2004!).

But ActiveMQ is an old product so I assumed there would be a
version that ran on Java 5.

And there was. ActiveMQ 5.4.3 comes build for Java 5.

And it can be made running on VMS.

The binary dist copied to VMS with all jar files and
XML config files.

activemq.com:

$ define/nolog java$filename_controls 8
$ define/nolog decc$efs_charset true
$ define/nolog java$filename_match_list
"*.data=shr=get,put","*.log=shr=get,put"
$ activemq_home = "/disk2/arne/amq"
$ java "-Xmx512m" -jar "''activemq_home'/bin/run.jar" start
$ exit

(the shr=get,put thing is necessary because the KahaDB code
does some really funky stuff by opening some files twice both
as "rw" and "r" using java.io.RandomAccessFile)

One code hack needed. To avoid a weird error I had to rebuild
kahadb-5_4_3.jar with a hacked
org.apache.kahadb.journal.DataFileAppender specifically
with line 395 outcommented:

//file.getFD().sync();

(I suspect there is some subtle bug in VMS Java 5)

OpenWire clients worked (tested with Java).

For STOMP clients I had to add STOMP connector
to activemq.xml (one would need to do that on any
platform) and have the client connect using
STOMP 1.0 (not 1.1 or 1.2), but then it
worked (tested with Python)

This is the recipe in case someone want to use
ActiveMQ on VMS Alpha.

Maybe I should create a kit to make it easier.

Arne

[Arne Vajhøj]

There are a few minor issues left. The Jetty component
in ActiveMQ tend to leave some temporary directory with
files. When run interactively and CTRL/Y'ed the process
tend to hang (and have to do STOP/ID=0).

Arne

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 12/11/2022 10:01 PM, Arne Vajhøj wrote:

> Topic came up in recent discussion.
>
> VSI has ActiveMQ 5.15-0 (almost recent, latest is 5.17.2) for VMS I64,
> but nothing for VMS Alpha.
>
> For obvious reasons. VMS I64 has a somewhat recent Java 8. VMS Alpha
> only got Java 5 (2004!).
>
> But ActiveMQ is an old product so I assumed there would be a
> version that ran on Java 5.
>
> And there was. ActiveMQ 5.4.3 comes build for Java 5.
>
> And it can be made running on VMS.

...

> This is the recipe in case someone want to use
> ActiveMQ on VMS Alpha.
>
> Maybe I should create a kit to make it easier.

https://www.vajhoej.dk/arne/temp/amq_axp.zip

Arne

[Arne Vajhøj]

I am reorganizing a bit, so new URL:

https://www.vajhoej.dk/arne/vmsstuff/activemq/

Arne

[issinoho]

Does anyone have a working link to get Java 5 for Alpha? VSI only has the I64 version and Google brings up dead HPE links. Thanks.

[Simon Clubley]

With regards to those dead HPE links, have you tried running them through
the Wayback Machine:

https://archive.org/web/

and then looking at any pages found that are a number of years old ?

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Walking destinations on a map are further away than they appear.

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 3/8/2023 5:07 AM, issinoho wrote:
> Does anyone have a working link to get Java 5 for Alpha? VSI only has
> the I64 version and Google brings up dead HPE links.

The story (read: this is internet gossip) goes that HP/HPE Java
was based on Oracle Java under a commercial license agreement
and that license agreement ran out, because HPE did not want
to pay for Java on a platform they have no interest in any
longer. And VSI preferred to take OpenJDK (same code base!)
under open source license (at no cost) instead of paying Oracle.

Arne

[Stephen Hoffman]

On 2023-03-08 10:07:14 +0000, issinoho said:

> Does anyone have a working link to get Java 5 for Alpha? VSI only has
> the I64 version and Google brings up dead HPE links. Thanks.

Most of the OpenVMS stuff of that era should be available within the HP
FTP server archives.

There's lots of DEC-related stuff in those archives as well, including
Alpha SRM firmware kits, etc.

The two main areas in the HP FTP server archives (for OpenVMS stuff)
are the OpenVMS path and the Alpha path, though Java was elsewhere
(gsy?) as it was organizationally part of some cross-platform effort.

Scrounge up the Java kit name from around here (maybe
ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/gsy/digital/ ?), and use that as a search string
in the archives.

One set of HP FTP server archives are here:
https://archive.org/details/ftp-ftp.hp.com_ftp1

Java 5 will have issues with TLS connections, among other sorts of cruft.


--
Pure Personal Opinion | HoffmanLabs LLC

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 3/8/2023 12:08 PM, Stephen Hoffman wrote:
> Java 5 will have issues with TLS connections, among other sorts of cruft.

Java 5 out of the box only supports TLSv1, which is horrible
obsolete (only TLS v1.2 and TLS v1.3 are acceptable).

But luckily the Java encryption model is pretty flexible and
by just tweaking the command line one can instruct Java to use
a newer encryption provider like BouncyCastle.

BC 159 supports TLS 1.2
BC 168 supports TLS 1.2 and 1.3

Testet on VMS Alpha.

Instructions are here:
https://www.vajhoej.dk/arne/vms/java_howto_sslupg.html

Arne