HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: 110 BAUD TELETYPE WANTED (WITH OR WITHOUT TAKE PUNCH)
From: pgut1@cs.aukuni.ac.nz (Peter Gutmann)
Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1993 10:20:55 GMT
 <1993Jan4.132905.20742@Lehigh.EDU> <2B4C83F4.7974@ics.uci.edu>
Organization: Computer Science Dept. University of Auckland

In <2B4C83F4.7974@ics.uci.edu> gshouse@bonnie.ics.uci.edu (George H. Iii Shouse) writes:

>I still have an old KSR-33 w/tape AND modem (rotary dial).  Interface is
>20 ma current loop.  But...  I'm gonna keep it until I get it hooked up to
>my computer as auxillary storage (hey, where does one buy punch tape nowdays?)

I almost ended up using my ASR-33 recently as my only means of communications -
I'd swapped the motherboard on my main machine and was waiting for the
replacement, my two homebrew systems are inoperable (they tend to get
cannibalized for parts every now and then), and my VT55 was having emotional
problems talking to the modem server here.  The only reason I didn't end up
reading my mail off a printout is that none of my modems will go down to
110 bps...also the watercooling on the teletype is a pain to set up (it's a
special hack for heavy-duty use :-).

Peter.
--
 pgut1@cs.aukuni.ac.nz||p_gutmann@cs.aukuni.ac.nz||gutmann_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz
peterg@kcbbs.gen.nz||peter@nacjack.gen.nz||peter@phlarnschlorpht.nacjack.gen.nz
              (In order of preference - one of 'ems bound to work)
           -- Whoever dies with the most email addresses ... wins --
From: lstowell@pyrnova.mis.pyramid.com (Lon Stowell)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: ISDN, was: Re: Proper pronounciation of 'Kibo'
Date: 7 Jan 93 22:57:48 GMT
Reply-To: lstowell@pyrnova.pyramid.com.pyramid.com (Lon Stowell)
Distribution: inet
Organization: Pyramid Technology Corporation

In article <1993Jan7.151426.18684@ericsson.se> etlcrcy@bugs.ericsson.se (Chris Cleverly) writes:
>In article <1993Jan7.120921.21496@nntp.nta.no> styri@nta.no writes:
>>cts1@cec2.wustl.edu (Christopher T. Schuster) writes:
>>> Also, what is ISDN?  I haven't quite gotten that one yet, either!
>>
>>It used to be ~I Still Don't kNow", but I not certain any longer.
>>The acronym is printed on some of our phones. Maybe it's significant.
>>
>
>Ho, ho, ho. Mr. Telecom   :) :) :)
>
    Well, other nominations will likely be less pleasing:

    o  The OSI term for vaporware

    o  A triumph of politics over engineering

    o  Yesterday's technology for tomorrow
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Apple IIGS being discontinued Dec 1992
From: rmk@rmkhome.UUCP (Rick Kelly)
Organization: The Man With Ten Cats
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1993 13:28:22 GMT
Reply-To: rmkhome!rmk@merk.com (Rick Kelly)

In article <1993Jan4.020010.4331@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
>In article <19184@mindlink.bc.ca> Daryl_Spitzer@mindlink.bc.ca (Daryl Spitzer) writes:
>
>>It sounds like Apple has done something right.  Making a computer easy enough
>>to be used by the average layman isn't wimpy, it should be the goal of all of
>>us.
>
>I totally disagree that this is the purpose of a computer or a goal of *any*
>of us.  Applications some dipstick can use is one thing, but making *our*
>task of using the computer for the *process of creating* the means for the
>dipsticks of this world to use their applications is a totally different
>matter.  I profoundly wish that various groups would stop "helping" me in
>the creative process.

It would seem that Steve Jobs and the original Mac design team started
out with the right idea, that is, the masses would run applications on
their Mac, while developers would use the multitasking Lisa to write
software.  You could avoid the GUI, and only load the Mac compatibility
stuff to test your application.

Just to add sum info to a previous thread:

After lengthy discussion on comp.arch and comp.sys.intel, it would
appear that the only reason that NeXTStep won't boot on the Cyrix
486DLC is probably timing.  It probably won't be fixed as Cyrix is
probably not a big concern to NeXT.

-- 

Rick Kelly    rmkhome!rmk@merk.com    merk!rmkhome!rmk    rmk@frog.UUCP
From: daniel@mertwig.uucp (Daniel Drucker)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: PI
Date: Mon, 04 Jan 93 15:41:59 EST
Reply-To: daniel%mertwig@uunet.uu.net  (Daniel Drucker)
Organization: Abnormalities of Reality

entropy@gnu.ai.mit.edu (maximum entropy) writes:

> In article <NP4XVB4w165w@mertwig.uucp> daniel@mertwig.uucp (Daniel Drucker) w
> >Actually, the program I wrote got as far as 1048577 digits before dying.
> >I just didn't think it would be a good idea to start mailing people millions
> >of digits.
> 
> So why didn't you just mail out the program instead of the data?

Hey, anyone can write the program; some people (almost 200) would
rather have the handy premade version.

Entropy? Hey, I know you.... call PB and leave me mail...



--
Daniel Drucker        N2SXX       Coconut seashells whispering to me
daniel%mertwig@uunet.uu.net         "Forever, forever, my Coda..."
From: azog@spatula.rent.com (Billy D'Augustine)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Anyone care to brag?
Date: 10 Jan 93 17:29:33 GMT
Organization: A kitchen utensil somewhere in central New Jersey

In article <3D33wB1w165w@vector0.SAC.CA.US> jon@vector0.SAC.CA.US (Dazed N. Confused) writes:
>     I have to ask: does anyone want to brag?  I'd like to hear
>about YOUR JOB.  Mine's relatively simple, managing a 10-station
>Novell network of 286s on call, yay (but still a lucky [if you
>call having to manage Novell "lucky"] break for someone still in
>community college).
>
>     How did you get to be the stunning piece of hackific work
>you are today?

Well, it aint really bragging, and Im not very stunning :-)

My current job status is pretty hazy. I am supposed to be a computer
operator on an IBM ES/9000, but somewhere along the way, I picked up
VAX admin duties...

Prior to this, I was working at an electronics tech, and finally got
sick of my boss, and walked out. Talking to a benchmate later on, he
told me to contact a friend who works for the county government and
that have an opening. So I went to the interview, and three weeks later,
I had a new job.

The whole thing pretty much fell into my lap... Now when I get to the
new place, it seems that six month prior to my arrival, they got a 
new VAX system, that noone knows anything about. All the procedures
were pretty stupid. Every night, an operator would mount up to 18
reels of tape on the TU81+ drive to complete the backups (at this point
in time, we had only 100 users, and 4 RA82s (400+ mb drives). So like
any kid who thinks he knows more than anyone else, I learned VMS, and
started changing the procedures. Now, instead of logging everyone off
by hand (with STOP/ID), I had a command proc that did it. After doing
some nifty things, I was able to get some 8mm tape drives purchased, and
even more stuff made things move about. The system grew, to almost 300
users, and 4 RA92s (1.2gb) and 4 RA82s (above). 

As it stands, we currently run no weekend staff anymore (prior, we had 
two 8 hour shifts, both sat and sun). The code Ive hacked together is
pretty hairy stuff, and keeps me on my toes just documenting and updating
it. Its fairly tight code, if I must say so myself... It only fails when
the moon is full on the last sunday of each even numbered month, on an
presidential election year... unfortunatly for me, I am on 24 hour call
now, but dont get called often.

Lately, Ive also taken it upon myself to admin a PathWorks network. 
Luckiliy, this is easy, as so far, I am the only node on the network:-)
(and I like to astound my officemates by showing them that I have 4gb
on my PC:-)

-- 
Billy D'Augustine 
azog@spatula.rent.com

Hell is an endless loop of 'Three's Company' episodes.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: jfc@athena.mit.edu (John F Carr)
Subject: Re: Acronym ISDN
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Date: Sun, 10 Jan 1993 00:00:13 GMT


When I asked the network managers around here for a reference on ISDN one of
them gave me a book on computer networks.  I looked in the index under ISDN.
The first subtopic under ISDN was "already obsolete".

--
    John Carr (jfc@athena.mit.edu)
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.computers:18746 sci.math:17836
From: cet1@cus.cam.ac.uk (C.E. Thompson)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,sci.math
Subject: Re: Number of numbers (Was Re: PI)
Date: 8 Jan 93 14:56:08 GMT
Organization: U of Cambridge, England

In article <C0G8n5.KvC@knot.ccs.queensu.ca>, hausner@qucis.queensu.ca 
(Alejo Hausner) writes:
|>
|> How about Euler's improvement,
|> 
|>    pi = 4 * (5 * atan(1/7) + atan(3/79)) ?

Make that

      pi = 4 * (5 * atan(1/7) + 2 * atan(3/79)) 

|> this one is especially suited to calculations using base-10
|> notation.  This fact is clear if we use Euler's formula,
|> 
|>              x           2        2 x 4  2    2 x 4 x 6  3
|>   atan(x) = --- ( 1  +  --- y  +  ----- y  +  --------- y  + ...)
|>              y           3        3 x 5       3 x 5 x 7
               ^^^

This factor should be (y/x), not (x/y).

|> 
|> where y = x^2/(1+x^2).
|>
|> You get a series where y = 1/50, and another where
|> y = 7 x 8 / 50000, both of which make for very fast
       ^^^^^^^^^^^^^

9 * 8 / 50000, or 144/10^5.

|> divisions in base-10.

Chris Thompson
JANET:    cet1@uk.ac.cam.phx
Internet: cet1@phx.cam.ac.uk
From: john@gu.uwa.edu.au (John West)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Game machine processors (was Re: Is 4004 the first microprocessor ?)
Date: 4 Jan 1993 12:31:11 GMT
Organization: The University of Western Australia
NNTP-Posting-Host: mackerel.gu.uwa.edu.au

pw@panix.com (Paul Wallich) writes:

>The Odyssey may have used an F-8 at one point (earliest ones were
>hardwired) but the VCS CPU was a 6502 variant, with 128 bytes of
>RAM onboard (6507 comes to mind). The VCS graphics chip, Stella

The RAM wasn't in fact on the CPU - it was on a separate chip, which supplied
RAM, I/O, and a timer (didn't they call it RIOT or something?). The RAM
was mirrored in the top of page zero (6502s like having things in page zero -
most instructions have a special shorter, faster form for accessing it), and
also in the top of page 1 (where the 6502 wants to see the stack). The
graphics registers were in the bottom of both pages (I have seen a program
that changes the stack pointer and pushes values into the registers). 

>and the CPU address space was in fact 16 bits, but the designers saved
>$.50 a unit in manufacturing costs by using a narrower cartridge connector.)

The software could pretend it had 64K, but only 13 address lines made it off
the chip (this, and a few other missing pins, made it possible to fit it into
a 28 pin chip). The top bit was used to select the ROM, giving 4K of ROM space.
They didn't use decoding logic - just sent address lines straight to chip
select lines. It means you have to use ROMs with an active high chip select,
but it saves putting unwanted glue in the box.
With the kind of volume they sold those beasties in, $0.50 per box adds up to
more money than most of us will ever see.

John West
-- 
For the humour impaired: Insert a :-) after every third word
--
For the humour impaired: Insert a :-) after every third word
From: eijkhout@cupid.cs.utk.edu (Victor Eijkhout)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: REQUEST "Shoot yourself in the foot!..
Date: 10 Jan 93 17:38:45
Organization: /pearl/homes/eijkhout/.organization
NNTP-Posting-Host: cupid.cs.utk.edu
In-reply-to: edb51@bih.no's message of Fri, 8 Jan 93 11:15:41 GMT

In article <1993Jan8.111541.473@alf.uib.no> edb51@bih.no (Christian Stange) writes:

   I used to have two different versions of some text explaining the difference
   between programing - languages, in the form " C is like  shooting yourself
   in the foot

Hm. I thought I had this. Instead I found the following:

WHAT DRIVING TO THE STORE WOULD BE LIKE IF OPERATING SYSTEMS RAN YOUR CAR

MS-DOS:  You get in the car and try to remember where you put your keys.

Windows:  You get in the car and drive to the store very slowly, because 
attached to the back of the car is a freight train.

Macintosh System 7:  You get in the car to go to the store, and the car drives 
you to church.

UNIX:  You get in the car and type "grep store".  After reaching speeds of 200 
miles per hour en route, you arrive at the barber shop.

Windows NT:  You get in the car and write a letter that says, "go to the store".
Then you get out of the car and mail the letter to your dashboard.

Tailget/Pink:  You walk to the store with Ricardo Montalban, who tells you how 
wonderful it will be when he can fly you to the store in his Learjet.

OS/2:  After fueling up with 6000 gallons of gas, you get in the car and drive 
to the store with a motercycle escort and a marching band in procession.  
Halfway there, the car blows up, killing everybody in town.

S/36 SSP {mainframe, obv.]:  You get in the car and drive to the store.  Halfway
there you run out of gas.  While walking the rest of the way, you are run over 
by kids on mopeds.

OS/400:  An attendant locks you into the car and then drives you to the store, 
where you get to watch everybody else buy filet mignons.

   
                                             pulled off of @AppleLink.Apple.COM

--
Victor Eijkhout ................................ `There are also a few bugs,
Department of Computer Science .......... though not as many as I've come to
University of Tennessee ............... expect in new [MS]Windows products.'
Knoxville TN 37919 ................................ (from a software review)
From: mark-r@spec0.ee.man.ac.uk (Mark Robinson (JO PhD))
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Whatever happened to ... SC/MP
Date: 6 Jan 93 11:17:56 GMT
Organization: Dept Electrical and Electronic Eng, Manchester University, UK

All this talk of old micros has reminded me..

Three questions, 5 points each, here's your starter for 10...

1. What was the proper numeric title of the SC/MP (Single
Chip / Microprocessor - often called SCaMP, SCaMPy, SCruMPy, etc).
Was it the 1802?

2. Why was it so popular in hobbyist SBC kits and evaluation
boards in the mid-late 70's, but then died such an abrupt death?

3. Any details about architecture/instruction set/idiosyncracies
would be interesting. Has anybody built anything round this thing
recently?

TIA
Mark
mark-r@spec0.ee.man.ac.uk

--
______________________________________________________________________
Multimedia Information Systems Lab | I'm a slug and I'm alright
Dept. Of Electrical Engineering    | That's 'cos I'm hermaphrodite
University of Manchester           | It bothers me not that I have no
Dover St. Manchester. M13 9PL      |                     friends
England                            | 'Cos I have fun with both my ends
From: pechter@ocpt.ccur.com (Bill Pechter)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Mass Bus
Date: 8 Jan 93 21:00:12 GMT
Organization: Concurrent Computer Corp.,Information Services

In article <1993Jan7.072148.1480@netcom.com> sspatter@netcom.com (Samuel Scott Patterson) writes:
>'lo.
>
>     anybody out there got any idea what Mass Bus is?  I have a card in
>my Unibus PDP-11/34a that has a jack on it and the card is labeled, 

Ah the good old days.

The Massbus is a 32 bit bus used for disk and tape drives.  It's 
a syncronous  (I think) bus that was specific to the DEC RM02/3/5
RP04/5/6 disk drives and TU16/TE16/TU45/TU77/TU78 tape drives.

The controller was an RH11 (PDP11), RH70 (PDP11/70 PDP11/74), RH780
or RH750 (I'm skipping the KA/KL 36 bit stuff like the RH20 'cause 
I never had much to do with them and I don't want to mislead).

The Massbus was DEC's answer to IBM BUS and TAG cables and channel adapters.
They were proprietary.  The connectors were also subject to failure from
improper use.

The RH11 was supposed to be too slow for RM03's  and RM05's so they were 
never sold officially for PDP11's below the 11/70.  However we had an 
11/34 at DEC Princeton running 2 RM05's and an RM03.

DEC had an RM02 which was a 2500 RPM RM03 (CDC9762).  I wondered if they
ever had an RM04 (2500 RPM RM05 - 9766)?

I've got a Massbus terminator I use for a paperweight if anyone needs one.
The Massbus was quite nice on the 11's and Vaxes and until the CI replaced
them with HSC's.  I never did like the UDA50 when it replaced the RM/RP's
on PDP11's.

Bill
(ex-DEC Field Circus, keeper of the VT180 printset)



-- 
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Bill Pechter, N2RDI           | The postmaster always pings twice.
        Concurrent Computer Corp.     | pechter@ocpt.ccur.com
        2 Crescent Place, Oceanport, NJ 07757 - Tel:908-870-4780
From: osterber@husc8.harvard.edu (Richard Osterberg)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Anyone care to brag?
Date: 9 Jan 93 18:13:48 GMT

jon@vector0.SAC.CA.US  (Dazed N. Confused) writes:

>     I have to ask: does anyone want to brag?  I'd like to hear
>about YOUR JOB.  Mine's relatively simple, managing a 10-station
>Novell network of 286s on call, yay (but still a lucky [if you

OK... I'll bite. For four years, I've been sole
manager/administrator/"supervisor" or a ~20 station Novell Netware 2.15c
SFT network at a law firm in Boston. Basically, anything computer related
is my responsibility, except that they have a hardware service contract
with another person, who is responsible forkeeping the hardware working,
and through whom we purchase most of the hardware (and network OS
software). I've also been owner/president of Rick Osterberg Consulting, a
small computer consulting company, since 1990. My only problem is that
available time is often tight. I'm a freshman in college.
-Rick
From: viking@iastate.edu (Dan Sorenson)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: CLI/GUI wars (was Re: Apple IIGS being discontinued...)
Date: 4 Jan 93 09:50:32 GMT
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames IA

In <Geoff.6la6@equinox.gen.nz> Geoff@equinox.gen.nz (Geoff Mccaughan) writes:

>Jeremy Reimer (Jeremy_Reimer@mindlink.bc.ca) wrote:

>>One other point about GUI's--- one of the neatest features I have found in
>>OS/2 is present in the Amiga GUI, most Unix GUIs, NeXT and (I believe) even
>>the Atari ST but surprisingly not the Mac or Windoze.  This is the small
>but
>>incredibly useful feature of a SLIDING SCROLL BAR.  This allows you to see
>at
>>a glance how long a document is and how much of that document is visible in
>>the window.  Why Mac and Windoze don't support it is one of the great
>>mysteries of nature.

>Apple will bring this feature out in their next Mac system release, and then
>spend the next 5 years trying to sue anyone else who uses it.

	They'll have a difficult time of it -- it's been on the Apple IIgs
ProDOS-16 and GS/OS Finder versions since 1986 or thereabouts.  I can only
wonder why it's taken this long to get it to the Mac.

	Remember the IIgs?  It's what started this whole skirmish...

< Dan Sorenson, DoD #1066 z1dan@exnet.iastate.edu viking@iastate.edu >
<  ISU only censors what I read, not what I say.  Don't blame them.  >
<  "Are you *SURE* he's worth a Harley-Davidson?" -- my grandmother  >
< to my girlfriend, about me.  "I'd better not say" -- my girlfriend >
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,sci.math
From: jromanac@tid.es (Javier Romanach)
Subject: Re: Number of numbers (Was Re: PI)
Organization: Telefonica I+D
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL4
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 11:53:28 GMT


Hi,
Sorry to change subjet. I'm looking for an ftp site that would have  a file
with at least the first 200.000 decimals of pi. Does anybody know one?

Thank you,

Javier Romanyach
Internet: jromanac@tid.es
Compuserve: 70630,517@compuserve.com
From: lowen@lorc.eskimo.com (Lamar Owen)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: VCS processor (was Re: Game machine processors)
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 93 08:14:33 -0500
Organization: LORC Enterprises

In <1993Jan7.094705.14127@sol.ctr.columbia.edu> slb22@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (Seth "the Lesser") writes:
>markz@ssc.wa.com (Mark Zenier) writes:

>Now the TMS-9900...THAT was a microprocessor you could be proud of.  I still
>can't understand how TI started with a great architecture like that and made
>such a wretched computer out of it.

There was a very simple reason the TMS9900 and the TI-99/4A were crippled: so
they wouldn't compete with TI's 990 minicomputers.

The 9900 is a strange bird to work with, although the architecture is a wonderful
one.


-- 

Lamar Owen, Systems Consultant          | If there were a tax on syn,
GE Lighting Systems, Hendersonville, NC | we'd all be broke.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
My opinions are not those of GE and do not reflect GE policy in any way.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: dsiebert@icaen.uiowa.edu (Doug Siebert)
Subject: Re: Apple IIGS being discontinued Dec 1992
Organization: Iowa Computer Aided Engineering Network, University of Iowa
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 1993 09:00:01 GMT

Charlie_Gibbs@mindlink.bc.ca (Charlie Gibbs) writes:

>In article <1993Jan6.061801.23114@kth.se> regebro@stacken.kth.se
>(Lennart Regebro) writes:

>>There is no "Eject disk" button on a Mac. You're supposed to drag the disk
>>icon to the trashcan. Which always makes me feel like I'm erasing the
>>whole disk.

>     Amen to that.  I almost lost my lunch the first time I saw
>someone do that.  What a dreadful inconsistency in this wonderful
>user interface: drag files and folders to the trashcan to delete
>them, drag a disk to the trashcan to eject it intact.

I'll agree with you here, that doesn't make sense at all to me either...


>     Fortunately, there are also both a menu selection and a command
>key combination that will do the job; for my own peace of mind I
>always use one of them instead.  The only problem is that the icon
>stays on the desktop, and if you click on it you're dead in the
>water until you re-insert the disk.  Better hope that someone
>hasn't taken it away with him, 'cuz there's no "cancel" button.
>Guess you gotta pull the plug from the wall, since you can't get
>at that "shutdown" menu entry either.  Hope the hard disk isn't
>trashed too badly...

Not true.  Just hit command-period a couple times and it'll quit asking for
that disk.  Another counter-intuitive thing, which is why I hate the Mac's
handling of floppy ejecting so much.  That's probably what most users see,
the problems with people who use the Eject menu item and leave greyed disks
behind, or leave a Mac in a lab wanting some wierd disk inserted.  Before I
got my Mac and I had to go to a lab to use one for something, I always seemed
to find one that was waiting for a disk that was removed -- I was damn happy
when a friend of mine who'd owned one for a couple years let me in on the
secret....but it shouldn't be something you need to be told.  The problem with
the Mac in this respect isn't that it autoejects floppies, I think that's a
good thing.  Its just that the interface surrounding this wasn't well thought
out at all.

-- 
/-----------------------------------------------------------------------------\
| Doug Siebert                             | "I don't have to take this abuse |
| Internet:  dsiebert@isca.uiowa.edu       |  from you - I've got hundreds of |
| NeXTMail:  dsiebert@chop.isca.uiowa.edu  |  people waiting in line to abuse |
|     ICBM:  41d 39m 55s N, 91d 30m 43s W  |  me!"  Bill Murray, Ghostbusters |
\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------/
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers