Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2012/12/21
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Hi Piers, your software could have been running alongside mine then, since I was at IC! Your card punching was much more onerous than ours though, at Imperial there was a room with half a dozen punch machines we could use (as long as there was one free). Frank >________________________________ > From: Piers Hemy <piers.hemy at gmail.com> >To: 'Leica Users Group' <lug at leica-users.org> >Sent: Friday, 21 December 2012, 17:23 >Subject: Re: [Leica] Some artifacts at the Computer History Museum IMG: > >1970-71? > >Me too, but in my last year at (high) school, taking an elective course. The >school had something like 30 minutes each month on the Imperial College >mainframe in London, which involved gathering together the punched cards >from the class, sending down to London by Royal Mail, receiving back the >print out which was then split out to each user. I should clarify that the >cards were pre-semi-punched, meaning that the user had to use a pin to push >out the chads from each row/column by hand to code the desired character. > >It took a while to do one line of code, even after the time it took to learn >the fundamentals of Fortran IV programming! > >And then it took a while to get the response back from the mainframe. > >By post. > >Two ways. > >(I guess that was half-duplex transmission!). > >I remember the impatient waiting for the print-out to come back, but my >memory of reading it is very clear... > >XXX SYNTAX ERROR LINE 100 XXX > >The school later graduated to having its own ICL1900 (if memory serves) on >site, long after I had left. Wouldn't have made any difference to my >skill-level! > >Piers > >-----Original Message----- >From: lug-bounces+piers.hemy=gmail.com at leica-users.org >[mailto:lug-bounces+piers.hemy=gmail.com at leica-users.org] On Behalf Of >FRANK >DERNIE >Sent: 21 December 2012 08:31 >To: Leica Users Group >Subject: Re: [Leica] Some artifacts at the Computer History Museum IMG: > >Hi Nathan, >that -was- sadistic! >I started writing software in 1970/71. All on punched cards. I also never >dropped a stack, but I know people who did! >Back then the university had 2 computers, an IBM 370 and a CDC 6600 IIRC, >for the entire university. Mind you only engineers and other scientists used >computers there. >FD > > > >>________________________________ >> From: Nathan Wajsman <photo at frozenlight.eu> >>To: Leica Users Group <lug at leica-users.org> >>Sent: Friday, 21 December 2012, 6:18 >>Subject: Re: [Leica] Some artifacts at the Computer History Museum IMG: >> >>Fascinating! I had a sadistic computer science teacher in my first semester >of university, in 1980, who made us punch cards because he wanted us >experience how things were done when he was young...fortunately, I never had >the experience of dropping the stack on the floor. >> >>Cheers, >>Nathan >> >>Nathan Wajsman >>Alicante, Spain >>http://www.frozenlight.eu >>http://www.greatpix.eu >>PICTURE OF THE WEEK: http://www.fotocycle.dk/paws >>Blog: http://nathansmusings.wordpress.com/ >> >> >>YNWA >> >> >> >> >>On Dec 21, 2012, at 6:55 AM, Herbert Kanner wrote: >> >>> Fellow LUGers, >>> >>> I have been a volunteer at the Computer History Museum since 2003, >starting as a documenter of artifacts. That is, in collaboration with a >partner, the partner often being a paid staff member, we would enter >characteristics of the object in question into a horribly complex database. >Things such as dimensions, weight (if it was small enough to be picked up), >place of manufacture, etc., etc., including all numbers that could be found >on the object: model numbers, serial numbers, goddam numbers, you name it. >Then we would photograph it with a point & shoot. >>> >>> One of the tasks for which I eventually volunteered was editing those >damn photographs. Considering how foolproof a P$S is, I was just amazed at >how badly some of the volunteers would handle a camera. Many of the pix just >had to be thrown out. >>> >>> After a couple of years of this, I thought it would be fun to become a >docent. At the time, all that could be seen by visitors was in one large >room, and the formal docent training was an hour in which they showed us >where all the emergency exits from the building were. >>> >>> In 2012 a brand new $20 million exhibit opened ($15 having been >contributed by Bill Gates) and some formal docent training ensued, led by a >lady who had trained docents at two art museums: Getty and Cantor) >>> >>> I took a few pictures yesterday of museum artifacts. Not wanting to >overwhelm people, I will post them two or three at a time, with a bit of >explanation of what they are. The light in there is really weird, being a >mixture of ordinary incandescent, window light, and deliberately colored >light. Also, some, not today's, had to be shot at ISO 2600 (flash not >permitted, and I've given it up anyway), so we'll see how good noise >reduction is. >>> >>> For today: >>> >>> The Babbage Difference Engine #2. This is a working machine, and we >demonstrate it once each day that the Museum is open. There are two of them >in the world; the other is in the London Science Museum. We are the only >ones who still demonstrate it regularly, as a result of which it requires >regular maintenance with occasional major repairs. What the machine does is >by addition only, it evaluates seventh degree polynomials to seven places of >accuracy--such polynomials can be satisfactory approximations to other >functions such as logarithms and trig functions. >>> >>> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1002678.jpg.html >>> >>> The U.S. Constitution requires a census every ten years. That word does >not actually appear there; it's called "enumeration". The purpose is to >establish how many Representatives a state is entitled to. In the >Constitution a (white) person counted as one, a slave as 3/5 of a person, >and a red-skin didn't count at all. Now Congress in it's wisdom decided that >if these guys were out counting heads, they might as well ask a few useful >questions. The resulting data, in 1880, took seven years to process. Because >the population was growing, the most optimistic estimate was that it would >take eleven years to process the data in 1890. Herman Hollerith proposed a >method of dealing with the data by using punched cards, which by no >coincidence turned out to be the same size and shape as the currency at the >time. Here is the machine which read the cards. The card was put on a >platform and the handle depressed. Wherever there was a hole, a pin would go >through the >hole and complete an e >>le >>> ctric circuit. The counters that you see are like clocks, which a large >hand and a small one. Each clock could count up to ten thousand. >>> >>> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1002660.jpg.html >>> >>> Here is a crude device that was used to punch the cards, a pantograph. >>> >>> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1002662.jpg.html >>> >>> After Hollerith retired, some investors who had already bought a company >that made time clock and a calculating grocery scale bought Hollerith's >company. Eventually they hired as CEO a guy who had been fired by National >Cash Register. That guy got rid of the clocks and scales and eventually >renamed the company International Business Machines, later renamed IBM. His >name was Thomas J. Watson. >>> >>> Enjoy, >>> >>> Herb >>> >>> >>> Herbert Kanner >>> kanner at acm.org >>> 650-326-8204 >>> >>> Question authority and the authorities will question you. >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> Leica Users Group. >>> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information >>> >> >> >>_______________________________________________ >>Leica Users Group. >>See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information >> >> >> > >_______________________________________________ >Leica Users Group. >See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information > > >_______________________________________________ >Leica Users Group. >See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information > > >