This will take those of us old enough to remember back in time

[Skywave]

Yes, Chris, although Dickens is not an author I tend to read, that quote does indeed say so much that is apposite. (Which novel is it from? 'Little Dorrit', perhaps?) The one that sticks in my mind is from Harold Wilson, when he was Prime Minister: "The white heat of technology": said long before the 'I.T. revolution'.

Yes, hindsight is indeed a wonderful thing, but when I find myself looking back and thinking "if only", often I stop and say to myself:

"Provided that I can honestly say that at those times when I made certain decisions that I did so with a clear mind, used logical thought and based my choices on all the data that was made available to me at that time, then it is unreasonable, now, to criticize the choices that I then made."

A more succinct version of that is:

"This world of ours is full of 'ifs', 'buts' & 'maybes' - and none of them are worth a damn!"

And on that happy note - I'm off to bed! G'night!

Al.

[OldTickTock]

Yes, Chris, although Dickens is not an author I tend to read, that quote does indeed say so much that is apposite. (Which novel is it from? 'Little Dorrit', perhaps?)

The opening lines of " A Tale of Two Cities"

Chris

[Skywave]

Thanks Chris: as soon as I read your reply, it all came flooding back from my early schooling years!

Al.

[Andy - G8MNM]

Those were the days my friends!
The exciting times of computing Clive Sinclair 's ZX80 & 81 followed by the Spectrum, Grundy Newbrain (was to be the BBC computer) but the company folded and the rest is history.
Research machines 380Z 56K CPM with twin 8'Shuggart disk drives (give yourself a hernia lifting them)
Then the RM Nimbus 197k system memory and DOS
Apple 2s, Dragon 64s, Commodore PETs, Vic20s etc.
I had a BBC Computer on permanent loan from the computing dept where I worked at Leic Uni in the 80s also an email address that I didn't know what to do with as only other folk in academic institutions had email addresses then.

Andy

[Brianc]

My first experience with a commercial computer was with a PDP-11 in the early days of video editors by CMX - a 340, ISTR. The memory was a core store (I never went "inside" so never knew how big) and the program input was by punched tape reader. This was in 1980/1. Every time we wanted to do some editing, we had to put the tape onto the reader and press the button - it wizzed through the machine and slowly, the editor came to life. The machines controlled were mostly Ampex, a VR2000, AVR2 (both 2" quad), 2 x VPR2 1" C format and a Fernseh BCN50 1" B format together with an Ampex vision mixer. The system never went wrong or crashed in 2 years, or until I left (have we progressed?).

[Paula A]

Just for a laugh..

digital

MAINDEC-12-D1BA-PB 9/23/69

JMP SELF

DEC Copyright September 1969

€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€€B

a PDP8 paper tape transcript. I have a huge archive of them, and some seem to run quite well on a system emulator a friend wrote a few years back... some are unknown as the leaders are missing.

[standunmj]

hi , anyone ever heard of the halroid or holroid punch card early comp?my sister nearly 70 years ago worked for the irish hospital sweepstakes,and learned to use one of these , i was a tiny little guy and remember playing with the cards, from what i remember the card had one corner angled so that it would only fit into the machine one way
they used a column system printed on one side, and it [the machine ] punched tiny square holes at various positions in these columns , which meant quantities types of items etc ,etc, she later got into the civil service and operated it to process ration cards, and the amount of food stuffs families in the state were entitled to, regards maitiu,

[DODGERN]

hi , anyone ever heard of the halroid or holroid punch card early comp?my sister nearly 70 years ago worked for the irish hospital sweepstakes,and learned to use one of these , i was a tiny little guy and remember playing with the cards, from what i remember the card had one corner angled so that it would only fit into the machine one way
they used a column system printed on one side, and it [the machine ] punched tiny square holes at various positions in these columns , which meant quantities types of items etc ,etc, she later got into the civil service and operated it to process ration cards, and the amount of food stuffs families in the state were entitled to, regards maitiu,

Hi Maitiu,

Back in the 70's my late Mother used to work for Erie Resistor in Gt. Yarmouth. She worked in the Payroll office and she was a 'Hollerith punch card operator'. I assume the employees pay details were contained on these cards. I believe the name Hollerith (or Holroid) was the inventor of the card originally. I imagine the computers were IBM

Roger.

[standunmj]

thanks roger, i do believe we spoke about hollerith comps before some years ago on 'another forum'

ive heard that the u.s government used this comp for a census as far back as 1900, it would conjour up the idea of the music box with all the holes at various positions , regards maitiu.

[DODGERN]

thanks roger, i do believe we spoke about hollerith comps before some years ago on 'another forum'

Not guilty I'm afraid Maitiu. This is my first Forum.

Roger.