Tools to build and launch Multics in Google Compute

A Project to build and launch Multics in Google Compute, using the SIMH dps8m simulator, and the Multics MR12 release.

These scripts use Google gcloud command line SDK, the SIMH dps8m emulator, and Ubuntu to run the Multics operating system in the cloud.

There are two scripts, both of which depend on the environment variables

• launch-multics.sh - This runs on your Mac or Linux computer (uses bash). It creates the GCP instance, installs Ubuntu into the instance, then copies '5-minute-multics.sh' into the instance and starts it.

• 5-minute-multics.sh - This script is copied into the GCP instance and executed. It downloads and builds the "simh" emulator, downloads the Multics disk image and configuration files and boots Multics twice (see below).

• Install the Google gcloud SDK
• Create a Google Cloud account, with active billing enabled
• Create a Google project started with the Google components and billing activated
• Create (if necessary) SSH keys and install them into your Google cloud account
• Enable oslogin for your Google cloud project

Edit the "configure.ini" file to use your hostname, user names, etc. See FIXME for details. This script will be used by the emulator to configure your Multics system at "first boot".

Edit the "set-private-data.sh" script to set the needed ENVIRONMENT variables. These are specific to your GCP account.

CLOUD_USERNAME - needed since we're going to use Google "OS login"
PROJ - the name of your Google Compute project

If desired, set the tuning parameters for the instance - location, size, etc. These are in the "launch-multics.sh" script

Here are the variables and the defaults:

CLOUDSDK_COMPUTE_ZONE="us-central1-f"
INSTANCENAME="my-multics"
MACHINETYPE="f1-micro"
IMAGEFAMILY="ubuntu-1804-lts"
IMAGEPROJECT="ubuntu-os-cloud"

Run the script:

$ ./launch-multics.sh

You will see the script create the GCP instance, install and update Ubuntu, and begin to install all the packages needed for "dps8m". Then it will actually install "dps8m", gather the Multics distibution and configuration data, and run Multics twice.

Note that the system will start from the disk image provided with the MR12 release. This disk image has already been initialized. If you don't start from this image, well, you're on your own. Good luck building Multics from scratch.

The first Multics run does a one-time configuration of the system, using the information you provided in config.ini. This includes the system name, and the first user account, which will be created as a privileged user in the project "SysAdmin". This all updates the disk image which keeps state between system boots.

The second Multics boot uses the generic ini file provided with the MR12 package, and depends on the system having been configured by the first run. This is the ini file to be used for all subsequent boots.

http://swenson.org/multics_wiki/index.php?title=Getting_Started
https://sourceforge.net/projects/dps8m/files/
http://swenson.org/multics_wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page
http://ringzero.wikidot.com/start
https://github.com/charlesUnixPro/dps8m