virtualhub.eu.org/docs/1970s/1970/pdp7unix/simh/index.md

keywords	image	description	sidebar_position	sidebar_label
PDP7 Unix PDP-7 SIMH 1970s 1970	./pdp7unix-SIMH-4.webp	We can run ! PDP7 Unix on the SIMH PDP-7 emulator. First, we need to download the ! PDP7 Unix kit. You can download the kit needed to run it on the SIMH PDP-7 emulator from our GitHub repo.	1	! PDP7 Unix on SIMH

How to install ! PDP7 Unix on SIMH?

We can run ! PDP7 Unix on the SIMH PDP-7 emulator. First, we need to download the ! PDP7 Unix kit.

Downloads

You can download the kit needed to run ! PDP7 Unix on the SIMH PDP-7 emulator from our GitHub repo fork of the original project to resurrect Unix on the PDP-7 from a scan of the original assembly code:

• ! PDP7 Unix kit

If you want to build the kit yourself, refer to our guide on how to do so.

Using ! PDP7 Unix

:::tip

If you have not already installed SIMH PDP-7 emulator, see the VirtualHub Setup tutorial on how to do so on Linux and Windows.

:::

Extract the kit you downloaded. Inside you will find two files. Create a folder somewhere to store the files for this VM and move those two files named boot.rim and image.fs into it.

Now we will create a config file for our VM. Create a text file called pdp7.ini with the following content in the VM folder:

set cpu 8k
set cpu eae
set cpu history=100
show cpu
set tti unix
set rb ena
att rb image.fs
set g2in ena
att -U g2in 12345
set lpt disa
set drm disa
set dt disa
show dev
load boot.rim 010000
go

Now open a terminal and move to the VM folder. Run the following command to start the emulator:

pdp7

After the emulator starts, login using the ID ken and password ken. You will see the following screen:

:::tip

There are other user accounts on the image like dmr (password: dmr). Do you know who dmr and ken were? Check the first comment to find out, or search it on the web!

:::

Type ls followed by enter. It will list all the files available on the disk.

That's it! We used ! PDP7 Unix. We can create a shell script to make it easy to launch the VM.

Linux

Create a file called pdp7unix.sh with the following content:

#!/bin/bash
pdp7

Now make the file executable:

chmod +x pdp7unix.sh

Now you can start the VM using the shell script. For example, on KDE you can right-click the file and choose Run in Konsole or on GNOME, where you can right-click the file and choose Run as executable. The VM will start.

See the manuals section on the main ! PDP7 Unix page to learn how to use it.

Windows

Create a file called pdp7unix.bat with the following content:

pdp7

Now you can start the VM by double-clicking the shell script. See the manuals section on the main ! PDP7 Unix page to learn how to use it.

Credits

• The disk image and other files used above are from a kit built from the project to resurrect Unix on the PDP-7 from a scan of the original assembly code.

Video tutorial

Do you want to follow the tutorial by watching a video? We will post a video on our YouTube channel soon.

Archives of this tutorial are available on Wayback Machine.