HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Subject: Re: The need for an assembler (was: Favorite CPU)
Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Organization: Columbia University
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 05:30:09 GMT

In article <Btnuz4.BKu@rice.edu> swaim@owlnet.rice.edu (Michael Parks Swaim) writes:
>
>                                                      They're vehement because
>you're vehement. I try not to be vehement because I've been wrong, and
>it's embarrasing.

I think that you'll find that I wasn't the first to cross the "imaginary line"
of vehemence or whatever.  In any case, this is like trying to put all of the
blame for an entire war merely on who fired the first shot or two.  I think
that usenet works like the phrase attributed to Harry S. Truman about those
who can't stand the heat should get out of the kitchen. :-)

cjl
From: lstowell@pyrnova.mis.pyramid.com (Lon Stowell)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Itty Bitty Machines (was: Better dead than IBM)
Date: 2 Sep 92 17:40:31 GMT
Reply-To: lstowell@pyrnova.pyramid.com (Lon Stowell)
Organization: Pyramid Technology Corp., Mountain View, CA
Originator: daemon@sword.eng.pyramid.com

>jones@pyrite.cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879) writes:
>>The first personal computer store in Evanston was the Itty Bitty Machine
>>Company, named, clearly, after that other, somewhat larger company with
>>the same initials.  Does anyone know what became of it?  It got into
>
In article <1992Sep1.235216.19489@geovision.gvc.com> pt@geovision.gvc.com writes:
>You mean besides having their asses sued off?
>
>I think these guys had to change their name when IBM send along more lawyers
>than they had employees.  (Or am I thinking of "Big Blue Computers"?)
>
   I dunno, but I wonder if even IBM's upper management would want
   to confront the inevitable headlines if some reporter got wind of
   a lawsuit alleging that "Itty Bitty Machines" was infringement on
   IBM's corporate name or reputation.



Xref: sparky alt.folklore.computers:12656 alt.3d:873
From: tomc@siesoft.co.uk (Tom Crossland)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.3d
Subject: Re: 3D Graphics Routines
Date: 17 Aug 92 18:58:25 GMT
Reply-To: tomc@siesoft.co.uk
Organization: Siemens Nixdorf Information Systems Ltd.

dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:
: 
:      I am about to start work on a project that will involve the use of
: three dimensional
: graphics (in C).  What I need to know are the basic math equations I
: will need for the rotation
: of a cube (or other objects, or points).
: 
:       If anyone could help out, I'd really appreciate it.

Well  for  a  cube  you  just need to rotate 6 points. OK I'll
try  to  give you a brief run down on what you need to do. The
easiest  way  to  rotate  a point about 3 axis is to rotate it
about  each  in  turn.  The  rotation algorithm is basically a
matrix multiplication:

 Stage I : Rotate x and y about the Z axis:
 
 (x y) * (sinZ  cosZ) = ((xsinZ+ycosZ) (xcosZ-ysinZ))
         (cosZ -sinZ)

  ie. x1=(xsinZ+ycosZ)
      y1=(xcosZ-ysinZ)
      z1=z
      	  
 Stage II : Rotate x1 and z1 about the Y axis:
 
 (x1 z1) * (sinY  cosY) = ((x1sinY+z1cosY) (x1cosY-z1sinY))
       	   (cosY -sinY)
	  
  ie. x2=(x1sinY+zcosY)
      y2=y1
      z2=(x1cosY-z1sinY)
      
 Stage III : Rotate y2 and z2 about the X axis:
  
 (y2 z2) * (sinX  cosX) = ((y2sinX+z2cosX) (y2cosX-z2sinX)
	   (cosX -sinX)
	    
  ie. x3=x2
      y3=y2sinX+z2cosX
      z3=y2cosX-z2sinX
       
If  you  want  to  reduce  the  number of stages involved just
substitute  appropriate  expressions  for x1,x2,y1,y2,z1,z2 in
terms  of  x,y  and  z. This doesn't generally make things any
faster, and it makes it a lot less readble.

Hope this helps some!
--
___ _ __
  ((_))))...
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: dpipes@spica.srg (Dave Pipes x4552)
Subject: Re: Favorite CPU
Organization: just me
Date: Fri, 28 Aug 92 18:53:29 GMT
Followup-To: alt.folklore.computers

In article <4129.168.uupcb@ssr.com> dick.zeitlin%acc1bbs@ssr.com (Dick Zeitlin)  writes:
>PZ> .Didn't one of the Air Force's recent jets have a flight control system tha
>  > .caused the plane to flip over when it crossed the equator into the souther
>  > .hemisphere?
>
>Urban legend.  Aside from all other considerations, nothing in the
>attitude control of the aircraft cares about, or knows about, the
>latitude and/or longitude of the aircraft.

It may be urban legend, but the second part is wrong.  The autopilot would
certainly care about its' current location, and it is attached to the
attitude system.  As I heard the story, the autopilot would be switched on
to induce the error.  The implication was that the coordinate system used
negative values for down and positive for up motion; when the plane was on
the wrong side of the equator, the location values were reversed.  When asked
to maneuver, the plane would begin the altitude change, discover that the 
value was the opposite of what it should see, and assume that the plane had
become inverted.  It then flipped the plane and attempted to continue the
manuver.

That's how the story went, and I can actually picture it being true.
>
>But it makes a good story!  <~>

That it does...
		David Pipes
robear@digex.com
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: jimf@centerline.com (Jim Frost)
Subject: Re: The need for an assembler (was: Favorite CPU)
Organization: CenterLine Software, Inc.
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 1992 17:50:10 GMT

lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
>In article <NEERI.92Sep1135221@iis.ethz.ch> neeri@iis.ethz.ch (Matthias Neeracher) writes:
>>>  Perhaps this is
>>>a down side of the coin about "modern" compilers: they are cheap 
>>>implementations that take shortcuts as compared to "older" compilers.
>>
>>I take it you have tried every single one of the four or five modern compilers
>>to have come to this conclusion?

>I take it that you have ever tried *any* of the older ones to come to your
>conclusion?

You didn't answer his question.  I have tried both old and new
compilers, though, and the old ones just aren't up to snuff.

For a published example of new-versus-old technology, see the _IBM
Journal of Research and Development_, Volume 34, Number 1, January
1990, pp 4-11.  This section describes the 801 project and has quite a
lot of information regarding a PL.8 (80% subset of PL/I) compiler
which resulted from the 801 project.  In particular, p. 8 has a
section entitled "System/370 as a RISC Machine."  An excerpt:

	We discovered that our Model 168, running code generated by
	the PL.8 compiler, consistently ran between 4.6 and 6 MIPS at
	a time when it was considered an accomplishment to drive the
	168 at 2 MIPS.  ... This was largely due to the effort of the
	PL.8 compiler to reuse data already present in the registers
	of the System/370.

There's a lot more content in the article about the kinds of things
that the PL.8 compiler did that previous compilers did not.  In
addition, the _Journal_ article contains a number of references to
other written materials discussing research into optimizing compilers
that should give you a good idea of how compiler technology was
evolving in the late 70's through 1990.

IBM turned the PL.8 from the 801 project into the XLC series compilers
on the RS/6000.  Those compilers are quite good, and they're not even
the best on the market today.

What they *aren't* is pale shadows of past compilers.  IBM saw
200-300% improvements over hand-coded assembly (and better
improvements over existing compilers!) on an architecture that they
thought they knew how to squeeze performance out of.

Not bad for cheap implementations.

jim frost
jimf@centerline.com
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.unix.misc
From: sjsobol@wariat.org (Steven J. Sobol)
Subject: Portabnility, was Re: The need for an assembler
Organization: The Tiny Software Co., via APK Public Access Unix, Cleveland
Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1992 03:48:09 GMT

swaim@owlnet.rice.edu (Michael Parks Swaim) writes:

>  That's because assembly's generally harder than C. In assembly, you can
>use whatever calling conventions you like, as long as you're consistant.
>With C, I (generally) don't have to worry about calling conventions. While
>this degrades performance, it's one less thing for me to have to think
>about. I consider this a good thing. I also don't have to worry about
>addressing elements in an array larger than 64K on my '386. I can also
>write programs that'll run on the Sparcs at school, which would be really
>difficult in assembler.

Seems to me that the big problem doing assembler on a Unix system would 
be portability. Unlike assembler under DOS, or the Macintosh OS, where every
computer uses a member of the same family of CPU's.

-- 
***  **  ** | The Tiny Software Co.  23707 Glenhill  Cleveland OH 44122
 *  *   *   | Steve Sobol * President * sjsobol@tiny.com or tiny!sjsobol 
 *   *  *   | Alternate addresses: sjsobol@wariat.org or ag510@po.cwru.edu
 *    * *   | Disclaimer: I *AM* the Tiny Software Company. 
 *  **   ** | **Welcome to Ohio, the Land of the Orange Construction Barrel**
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: mowoc@acs.ucalgary.ca (Malgorzata Owoc)
Subject: Re: 24-hour clocks (was: Microwave ovens ...)
Date: Tue, 01 Sep 92 06:21:29 GMT
Organization: The University of Calgary, AB, Canada

In the case of railways in Poland a train arrives at latest at 24:00,
but leaves at 0:00.
It was so logical that I was surprised that it is not the same
everywhere else :-)

Margaret
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: elf@ee.ryerson.ca (luis fernandes)
Subject: Re: TeX and C (was: you know when you're hacking too long when...)
Organization: Ryerson Polytechnical Institute, Toronto
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 21:41:54 GMT

In article <1992Aug30.031603.8813@ccu1.aukuni.ac.nz> ecmtwhk@ccu1.aukuni.ac.nz (Thomas Koenig) writes:
[...]
>
>Since you are not the first with that kind of problem, there are several
>solutions available: tgrind (that will do a good job at prettyprinting,
>too) and verbatim.sty. Check them out at your friendly neighbourhood TeX
>ftp site.  There even is a web for C, if you feel you need it.
>
>Unfortunately, I found nothing to prettyprint FORTRAN when it would
>have come in handy last year, but then that's a mismatching of concepts,
>anyway :-)

In addition to doing FORTRAN, vgrind (a TeX-tool) does model,
Pascal, C, ISP, shell-scripts (sh & csh), ldl, Icon, RATFOR,
Modula2, Yacc & Emacs Mock LISP.

(I added C++ functionality; aw shucks, it was nothing...(if
anyone wants the vgrindefs file (with the C++ defs, let me
know)))

zxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzx
Luis Fernandes  <elf@ee.ryerson.ca>
-Friendly Neighbourhood X Wizard's Apprentice
zxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzxzx
From: betsys@cs.umb.edu (Elizabeth Schwartz)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: You know when you're hacking too long when...
Date: 25 Aug 92 19:15:18 GMT
	<1992Aug24.211856.1@vaxb.acs.unt.edu> <l9jbnjINN4au@skat.usc.edu>
Organization: University of Massachusetts at Boston

In article <l9jbnjINN4au@skat.usc.edu> tsmith@skat.usc.edu (Nep Smith) writes:


>>Not too long back, Burger King was advertising their Whopper; you can have it
>>one of 1024 ways.  Now that's 2^10; what I couldn't figure out is what all 10
>>items are.
>>Single/Double, mayo, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onion, tomato, mustard,
>>ketchup...
>>
>>What's the 10th item?  Is it something only a hacker would want?
>The bun? 

Maybe the meat? I've seen vegetarian friends order them without meat.

Kinda sad though...a ketchup-and-onion whopper, hold the meat, hold
the bun?


--
System Administrator                  Internet: betsys@cs.umb.edu
MACS Dept, UMass/Boston               BITNET:ESCHWARTZ%UMBSKY.DNET@NS.UMB.EDU
100 Morrissy Blvd                     Staccato signals
Boston, MA 02125-3393                      of constant information....
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.unix.misc
From: mcovingt@athena.cs.uga.edu (Michael A. Covington)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: What has AI done for me lately?
Date: 27 Aug 92 04:00:25 GMT
Organization: University of Georgia, Athens

In article <173mk6INNmcl@early-bird.think.com> barmar@think.com (Barry Margolin) writes:

>I think the AI "industry" is pretty dead at the moment.  As you suggested,
>there's still quite a bit of interesting research going on, but not much in
>the real world.  However, the technology is sometimes hidden in places you
>may not guess; for instance, Xerox uses real-time AI software inside their
>high-end copiers, to monitor the operation, keep everything synchronized,
>etc.  I've seen expert-system based network management systems.

How about Quintus' helpdesk systems?

There are actually a lot of expert systems in commercial use nowadays.
It's just that it has become less fashionable to call them AI.  Also,
_conventional_ computer programming now encompasses OOP, list processing,
pattern recognition, and lots of things that were considered AI back 
in the days when conventional programming meant Fortran and COBOL.

>One problem the AI industry has, though, is that its boundaries always
>change.  I've heard AI defined as "things we don't yet know how to program
>a computer to do", so once we get things working it ceases to be AI.
>Expert systems can be considered a good example; once they were understood,
>you could see that it was pretty mechanical, and it no longer seemed like
>"reasoning."  More recently, handwriting analysis has moved from AI to
>commodity with the introduction of pen-based computers.

Well said.
-- 
+ Michael Covington - Artificial Intelligence Programs - U of Georgia - USA 
+ Unless otherwise noted, these are private opinions, not official statements.
+ VOTE NO GEORGIA LOTTERY - don't tie education to an unpredictable income.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: ae@sei.cmu.edu (Arthur Evans)
Subject: Re: Graphics systems, also TX-2
Organization: Software Engineering Institute
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 12:54:34 GMT

FredGate@tdkt.kksys.com comments on very early graphics systems.

I played Space War on a PDP-1 at Project MAC (later Laboratory for
Computer Science) in the summer of 1963.  It was clearly a fully
developed piece of software at that time.

The seminal research leading to graphics as we know it was done by Ivan
Sutherland, probably about 1957, while he was an MIT grad student.  He
did the work on the TX-2 at Lincoln Laboratory, a one-of-a-kind machine
with immensely sophisticated (for the time) graphics hardware.  I used
TX-2 in the early '70s, and most of the original hardware and software
were still there -- along with newer stuff.  Now, _there_ was a great
machine.

Art Evans
From: dick.zeitlin%acc1bbs@ssr.com (Dick Zeitlin) 
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: The need for an assem
Date: 2 Sep 92 21:09:00 GMT
Distribution: world
Organization: Advanced Computer Concepts BBS, New Rochelle, NY 914-654-1981
Reply-To: dick.zeitlin%acc1bbs@ssr.com (Dick Zeitlin) 

CL> .Computers can read files much better than people can.  I want my
  > .computer to read my file and figure out what I mean by it.
  > .Clearly, this can be done, but a lame language spec copout
  > .forces me to simplify the compiler design in the interest of the
  > .quick buck made by the compiler vendor.  On this kind of issue,
  > .we were better off 25 years ago :-(.  (And even if I use FORWARD
  > .statements, I still have to put the related bodies before the main
  > .code.  For a "top-down approach" this seems rather demented.

I wonder how many languages you've designed, and how many compilers
you've written.  You seem quick to criticize HLLs because, on the one
hand, they can't read your mind and do what you want (as distinct
from what you write) while, simultaneously, you want them so free-form
as to not inhibit your thought process or stifle that ambiguity.  And,
of course, they should operate as fast as an assembler does.

If a language is designed to reduce the ambiguity of your thought, it's
going to be constraining in some way.  If you have such a strong desire
for free form presentation of concepts to be interpreted by the machine,
why are you advocating a language that allows for no interpretation; no
use of the computer to "read my file and figure out what I mean by it."
Assembler is the antithesis of that concept!

I'd suggest that the appropriate action for you is to design a language
and write a compiler that avoids all the pitfalls that you've been
complaining about.

CL> .Clearly, this can be done, but a lame language spec copout
  > .forces me to simplify the compiler design in the interest of the
  > .quick buck made by the compiler vendor.

So show us what a non-lame language spec would look like.  I have the
feeling that your spec would look very much like assembler!  <~>  FWIW,
few languages are specified by compiler vendors.

  > .That sounds like a military intrusion into an otherwise sensible
  > .design. [...] this how we come to ADA :-).)

I'd suggest that you read the document which describes the design
decisions that were made during the formulation of Ada.  Then you could
point out all the flaws that you feel were made.  I've read it, and am
not so quick to criticize the design decisions.

        D/

 * OLX 2.2 * Real Pilots enjoy NDB approaches to minimums!  Inverted!!
From: mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Origin of locked-in subwindows
Keywords: windows
Date: 27 Aug 92 15:59:45 GMT
Organization: DB and ES Subdivision, TU Vienna

Does anyone know where the idea of windows that are locked into the
frame of another window originated?  This is used quite extensively in
the MS Windows 3.1 Data and Program Managers, with which I've worked a
bit in the last weeks, and is quite a pain.

Is this a Microsoft "invention", or who else came up with the idea?
-- 
Markus Stumptner                                mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at
University of Technology Vienna                 vexpert!mst@relay.eu.net
Paniglg. 16, A-1040 Vienna, Austria             ...mcsun!vexpert!mst
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: artn@bert.eecs.uic.edu (Ellyn Sandor)
Subject: Re: Indentation
Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1992 17:47:50 GMT

TS> Graphics computers have been shipping since 1976 (Apple II).
TS> Why are you all still programming completely in text?

	Actually, there are graphical programming systems, such as
AVS and Khoros.  I have a demo copy of AVS right here with a timebomb
which I am supposed to install and check out.  It looks pretty nice,
really.  Compatible with RS/6000, HP, SGI, and a new other makers.
Rather flexible, but I am told there is a performance penalty.
	Interface builders have also gotten a lot of typing out of
programming for me.  _Forms Library_ for the SGI computers lets you
draw your user interface and rearrange it, and spits out C code for
compiling into your program.  You still have to write all the callback
routines, etc, etc, but the user interface can be built in minutes.
	In fact, it is sort of silly that most people working in
graphical environments (Mac, etc) still have to program the user interface
all in text.  After using Forms, I don't want to ever waste my time
changing code to move buttons, sliders, etc again.
	Where can I find a good interface builder for X windows?  I
would love to write X windows code with buttons and stuff, but X seems
so damn dense, I can't get past "Hello, world."  A GUI builder would be
a week project for a good X person. (I tried MAKEing Dirt, but did
something wrong; is it worth the trouble to figure it out?)

		sbm
-- 
--
Stephan Meyers | artn@uicbert.eecs.uic.edu
(Art)^n Laboratories, inventors of the Stealth Negative PHSCologram
(312) 567-3762
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.computers:13130 alt.religion.computers:567 rec.humor:27045
From: ivie@cc.usu.edu (CP/M lives!)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.religion.computers,rec.humor
Subject: Re: Assembly joke
Date: 26 Aug 92 11:21:05 MDT
Organization: Utah State University

In article <1992Aug25.172534.6401@ceilidh.beartrack.com>, dnichols@ceilidh.beartrack.com (Don Nichols (DoN.)) writes:
> In article <l9jfl8INN2ic@exodus.Eng.Sun.COM> landauer@morocco.Eng.Sun.COM (Doug Landauer) writes:
>>>     Assemblies of God!
>>I would be surprised if fewer than 100,000 programmers have thought of
>>jokes along these lines, but few of us (e.g., you and me) have poor
>>enough taste to post them.  The one that had me concerned was on a
>>church labeled the "Second Assembly of God".  I was assuming that it
>>must have been an exceptionally large program, and wondered how many
>>assembly errors were found when they tried the "First Assembly of
>>God".  Then I was struck down by lightning.  Thank God I'm an atheist!
> 
> 	On first noticing a sign for "Assembly of God", my first though was
> "I didn't know that the deity came in source form."

Of course, one of the assemblies of God would have to be performed on the
Sun of God.

Couldn't resist any longer...

Roger Ivie
ivie@cc.usu.edu
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.religion.computers
From: john@mullet.gu.uwa.edu.au (John West)
Subject: Re: Good source code to read?
Organization: University Computer Club --- Perth, Western Australia
Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1992 06:57:43 GMT

fjh@mundil.cs.mu.OZ.AU (Fergus James HENDERSON) writes:

>That depends on how you write it.
>A simple pi program WILL halt eventually, with the message "Out of memory".
>A more resiliant pi program will pause occaisionally with messages like
>"insert next floppy disk", or "insert previous floppy disk".
>So long as you don't mind switching the floppies when requested,
>and even going down the street for a new box of disks occaisionally,
>then such a program will neither halt nor loop.

Until you have converted all of the particles in the universe into floppies,
and find you still need 'just one more'.

John West
-- 
For the humour impaired: Insert a :-) after every third word
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers