HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: peter@taronga.com (Peter da Silva)
Subject: Re: The need for an assembler (was: Favorite CPU)
Organization: Taronga Park BBS
Date: Mon, 7 Sep 1992 05:05:15 GMT

In article <1992Sep3.082922.3281@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
>When the hll zealots go away, the flames will go away.  My position has
>been made abundantly clear on the rest.

You *say* you're just advocating the appropriate use of assembly, yet you
continually argue it's reasonable to write entire applications in assembly.

It's not, and hasn't been for at least 10 years. Writing an application in
assembly is (1) pointless machismo, and (2) the biggest reason DOS has been
unable to significantly improve in the past 10 years.
-- 
                                                                `-_-'
                         Have you hugged your wolf today?        'U`

Peter da Silva, Taronga Park BBS, Houston, TX  +1 713 568 0480/1032
From: koen@blade.stack.urc.tue.nl (Koen Holtman)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Who invented the digital computer
Date: 8 Sep 92 09:32:47 GMT
Organization: MCGV Stack, Eindhoven University of Technology, the Netherlands.

sunthej@alleg.edu (Jake Blues) writes:
>	Hello all.  I remember reading that there was some dispute as to  
>who invented the digital computer, and that a court case was ongoing that  
>could have wide-reaching consequences to the industry.  Does anyone have  
>any more info on that?  Has the court case been resolved?  Who won?

Both von Neumann and Eckhard & Mauchly independently tried to patent
the digital computer. Eventually, both applications were refused
because they were turned in more than a year after the first published
evidence of the invention. 

Apparently, look and feel was unknown in those days.

Reference:
    Portraits in silicon / by Robert Slater. - London : MIT Press, 1987. - 
    XIV, 374 p. - ISBN 0-262-19262-4

(Btw this is a great book for trivia: 
 Q: Which computing scientist was among the first to install a
    windshield sprayer on his car?
 A: von Neumann
)

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Koen Holtman                  TUE computing science     "Dat zieje wel"
koen@blade.stack.urc.tue.nl    (Ax:*p)==(*p&p!=&x)         --Multatuli
From: IQTI400@INDYCMS.IUPUI.EDU (macphil)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: IF-less programming
Date: 4 Sep 92 22:30:12 GMT
Organization: IUPUI

In article <Bu14o2.Hvz@world.std.com>
dpbsmith@world.std.com (Daniel P. B. Smith) writes:
 
[modest proposal deleted]
 
>to draw my special charts ... and my IF-less programming CASE tools are
>on the way.  :-)
 
I'm still watiging to see real CASE software anywhere.  I've seen lots
of CASA software, but no CASE.
 
CASA = Computer Assisted Systems Analysis.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.peripherals,comp.unix.xenix.misc
Subject: cmsg cancel <1992Sep06.020138.27586@cavebbs.welly.gen.nz>
From: lesley@cavebbs.welly.gen.nz (Lesley Walker)
Date: Sun, 06 Sep 92 03:20:28 GMT
Organization: The Cave MegaBBS, Public Access Usenet, Wellington, NZ

<1992Sep06.020138.27586@cavebbs.welly.gen.nz> was cancelled from within trn.
-- 
  -=- The Leather Goddess (aka Lesley Walker) -=- Wellington, New Zealand -=-
        lesley@cavebbs.welly.gen.nz                      Vote for MMP!
   DoD#258 -=- Yamaha XV1000 -=- Yamaha XS650 -=- Ford Cortina -=- Altos 586
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: eru@tnso04.tele.nokia.fi (Erkki Ruohtula)
Subject: Re: automatic CP/M to MS-DOS migration?
Organization: /user1/u2/eru/.organization
Date: Wed, 9 Sep 1992 12:53:59 GMT

dhembrow@eoe.co.uk (David Hembrow) writes:
>ivie@cc.usu.edu (CP/M lives!) writes:
>: About the time that MS-DOS first came out, I remember rumors of software
>: that developers could get from either Intel or Microsoft (don't remember
>: which) that would take 8080 assembly source and make 8086 assembly source
>: from it, with warnings on things that wouldn't translate. The direct
>: correspondence between CP/M and DOS system calls made it easy to translate
>: CP/M software to DOS.
>: 
>: Roger Ivie
>: ivie@cc.usu.edu
>
>I've got two different programs like this at home. Never actually used
>them, but they do work as described above.
>
>The problem with translating Z80 is that it has extra registers, IX, IY
>and alternate set which don't correlate with anything on the 8086.
>The converter program which I've got generates a load of macros to handle
>these with multiple instructions.
>
>I get the impression that it would do quite well on simple code using
>8080 instructions but anyone who did anything more complex would be bitten
>by the extra code generated.
>
>The macros for LDIR etc. are comparitively straightforward, using REP MOVSB
>as you might expect.

I believe most of the commercial CP/M software was written
in the 8080 subset, because of all the 8080 and 8085
machines, so the extra Z80 registers were usually no
problem.  (For example Nokia Data (where I once worked) sold
the 8085-based MikroMikko 1 up until -84 (or maybe -85, but
it was some years before my time there)). Important things
like the Microsoft languages, WordStar, dBase etc.  used the
subset, and thus reasonably efficient automatic translation
was not hard.

The early Intel articles and documentation on the 8086
family naturally emphasized this compatibility aspect,
showing things like 8086 register diagrams with the intended
8080 subset shaded.
--
Erkki Ruohtula     / Nokia Telecommunications Oy
eru@tele.nokia.fi / P.O. Box 33 SF-02601 Espoo, Finland
(My private opinions, of course.)

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.unix.misc
From: mjn@pseudo.uucp (Murray Nesbitt)
Subject: Re: The need for an assembler (was: Favorite CPU)
Organization: Private system in Toronto, ON
Date: Sat, 5 Sep 1992 09:09:51 GMT
	<1992Aug31.162630.23913@news.columbia.edu> <id.7MVS.5EK@ferranti.com>
	<1992Sep3.091928.22081@news.columbia.edu>


lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:

>In article <id.7MVS.5EK@ferranti.com> peter@ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) writes:
>>In article <1992Aug31.162630.23913@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
>>> This is patently wrong.  I write for the 8086/8088 model as do most people.

Are you serious?

>>> It runs on 8088, 8086, 80186, 80188, 80286, 80386SX, 80386DX, 80486SX,
>>> 80486DX, 80486DX2, and about 20 non-Intel clones from AMD, NEC, ULSI, TI,
>>> and a few other cpu clone maker's cpu's.
>>
>>I can guarantee you it won't run on *any* of my 80286 or 80386 or 80486 systems.
>>
>>But Ckermit will.
>
>Totally incorrect; just setup the descriptor tables and change the directives
>and a tiny amount of code and it does run in less time than it takes to
>recompile C-Kermit.  BTW, you are apparently ignorant of the dual .EXE files
>that implement the hack of dynamically making the changes so programs like
>this run under either real or protect mode.

You are "apparently ignorant" of the fact that many people choose to
run something a little more powerful than MSDOS on top of their
powerful hardware.  I think this was Peter's point.

Like Peter, I can guarantee that your program will *not* run on my
80386-based system.  But Ckermit will (and does).

Please note that I don't particularly support either side of this
argument (although I *do* get a kick out of the machismo of the
pro-assembler side).  But it's pretty hard to argue with the fact that
Ckermit (and gcc, GNU emacs, C-News, zoo, et al.), which run on such a
wide variety of architectures, are primarily written in a certain,
relatively portable, high-level language.  Let's just say I'm glad
they were not written in "8086/8088 model" assembler.

-- 
Murray
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: mdw@theory.TC.Cornell.EDU (Matt Welsh)
Subject: Part numbers
Organization: Cornell Theory Center
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 1992 19:08:59 GMT

I've always loved the idea of part numbers, all of those endless
arbitrary digits given to every type of part imaginable. Once upon
a time, a friend of mine and I were going through the "Hacker Test"
(I'm sure you've all seen it)... one of the questions is "Do you
know what IBM part number 7320154 is?" I don't know if the author
of the test had any idea what the part was himself, but we decided
to call up IBM and find out anyway. 

So we called the 1-800 number (long lost in the annals of memory) and 
told the operator who answered that we were systems admins (which we were) 
who ran across this part number in some documentation (which we did, 
if you count the Hacker's Test as documentation) and needed to know what it
was. "Nope, we only have the part number. No idea what it is."

So she transferred us to the "Parts Numbering Division". To us this
was hilarious: we envisioned an entire cluster of offices and rooms,
completely devoted to the numbering of parts. "Hmmm... guys... let's
see, we have this here chip socket-head cleaner pin, what should we
number it?" "I know! 3893829! We haven't used that number yet!"
"Perfect. Beautiful. When I hear '3893829' I just *think* socket-head
cleaner pin!"

Anyway. After the phone rang for a few seconds, some guy picked up: 
"Parts numbering division." We didn't want to waste too much of his
time because we could hear the hum of activity of parts being numbered in 
the room behind him. We explained to him our 'problem', and he finally
agreed to look up the number to us. We heard him type away at the keyboard
for a second or two, and then laugh. 

"7320154? Did I hear you right?"

"Sure," we replied.

"Well, it says here that it's a 'spacer'." He laughed again.

"Hmmm.... what's that, then?"

"I don't know... some kind of spacer or something. It says here it's been
obsolete since 1973!" 

We all had a good laugh over that, and finally left the nice man alone to
get back to numbering parts. In any case, that's just a rough sketch of
what actually happened... jem@sunsite.unc.edu can fill in the details
for you. 

The point of all this is: part numbers are your friends. Just out
of curiosity, kudos to the first person who can tell me the name of the
part and the function for IBM part number 6247480. Now, don't go bothering
the nice folks at the IBM P/N division; we've bugged them enough already...


cheers,

mdw


-- 
Matt Welsh    mdw@tc.cornell.edu        +1 607 253 2737
Random Hacker, Cornell Engineering and Theory Center 
  "I'll eat anything that's BRIGHT BLUE!!"
From: ae@sei.cmu.edu (Arthur Evans)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: WANTED: Computer Trivia
Date: 4 Sep 92 22:19:33 GMT
Organization: Software Engineering Institute

danny@ponder.csci.unt.edu (Danny Faught) asks:
    How should one pronounce "Knuth"?

			kuh-NUUTH

Art Evans

**THE** Art of Computer Programming
From: bmw@isgtec.com (Bruce M. Walker)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Is there a PDP-11 (or 8, or...) Emulator?
Date: 11 Sep 92 17:57:10 GMT
Organization: ISG Technologies Inc., Mississauga Ontario

In article <SX0JS26@taronga.com> peter@taronga.com (Peter da Silva) writes:
> In article <1992Sep4.051450.22555@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
> >I know of several PDP-8 emulators for PC's and MACs in various stages of
> >functionality. [...]
>
> If it's for the PC, that means it'll run in a PC emulation box on most
> machines within a few years, so the "non-real" versions in high level
> languages will be faster.

My PDP8 simulator (called "simul8"), is coded entirely in C, and
compiles on many machines: Sparc, SGI, HP and PC.  It runs on the Sun
Sparcstation IPX at roughly twice the speed of the real PDP8/e; that
is, it averages about 1.5uS per instruction (running a "reasonable"
instruction mix), while a real PDP8/e should do about 3uS per.

Simul8 handles a couple of pieces of i/o: TTY and "papertape" (a disk
file), and successfully runs 8K BASIC (oh boy!).  However, performance
on a PC is slow (1/10th the real PDP8 speed on my 386SX) and I need to
be able to handle device interrupts and some more i/o before I can run
FOCAL, CHEKMO2 (chess) and the editor, etc.

[BTW, It will be donated to the community when it's done.]

--
"The path of my life is strewn with cowpats from the devils' own herd."
                                          -- Edmund Blackadder II
bmw@isgtec.com   [ ...!uunet.ca!isgtec!bmw ]  Bruce Walker
From: payner@netcom.com (Rich Payne)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Flash illiteracy; was: Re: Deutsches Museum (was: Zuse Computers
Date: 12 Sep 92 16:20:18 GMT
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest)

In article <1992Sep9.175011.10156@u.washington.edu> pollock@milton.u.washington.edu (Joe Pollock) writes:
>In article <1992Sep7.114029.58687@cc.usu.edu> ivie@cc.usu.edu (CP/M lives!) writes:
>>In article <1992Sep1.045612.10928@ultb.isc.rit.edu>, bmb1021@ultb.isc.rit.edu (B.M. Buck ) writes:
>>> 
>>> Actually, I think that that would make a very striking picture (done
>>> differently, of course...).  Anyone up to superimposing a picture of a
>>> brightly-lit full-moon over the shadow portion of a solar eclipse?
>>
>>I'm not sure, but, assuming that you found a large enough flash, you would
>>probably make a whole bunch of astronomers very angry.
>>
>>Roger Ivie
>>ivie@cc.usu.edu
>>
>The flash is the easy part. Take one cold-war surplus thermonuclear
>device....  The real trick is the reflector :-)
>
>And if you did this in the back yard, your neighbors (those within
>50 miles or so) would also probably be less than wildly enthusiastic
>about it.
>

In fact, it may actually be illegal to detonate thermonuclear explosives
in some communities. 


Rich
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: adam@owlnet.rice.edu (Adam Justin Thornton)
Subject: Re: Branching in HLL vs. Assembler (was Re: The need for an assemble
Organization: Milo's Meadow
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1992 22:10:28 GMT

Applesoft 250 character lines.  You got two of them.  Beagle Brothers used to
have two-liner competitions.

My favorite was "Chugga", which turned on first one drive and then the other,
getting ever faster.

On a Duodisk it sounded like a puffer train.  On two Disk IIs it sounded like
sex.  It was marvelous.

Adam
-- 
"Man is conceived in sin and born in corruption and he passeth from the
 stink of the didie to the stench of the shroud.  There is _always_
 something." -- Robert Penn Warren | Vote Cthulhu in '92! | adam@rice.edu
If Rice shared my opinions I wouldn't have this disclaimer | 64,928
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.dcom.modems
From: rdippold@qualcom.qualcomm.com (Ron Dippold)
Subject: Re: Disconnect Phantom
Keywords: Knock it off!!
Organization: Qualcomm, Inc., San Diego, CA
Date: Sun, 6 Sep 1992 06:37:41 GMT

gsroka@leland.Stanford.EDU (Gregory Sroka) writes:
>In article <1992Sep4.091759.4300@nntp.hut.fi> tsand@vipunen.hut.fi (Tapio Sand) writes:
>>                                                           tsand@vipunen.hut.fi
>>TEX disconnects, dial again for another session.
>>D;+vC)?iH%"
>>NO CARRIER
>^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>Keep this crap out of your posts!!

>For those not dialing in on modems - it makes my modem think the session
>has ended. When I reconnect - I find that the session is still active.
>Has this caused anyone else any problems, like disconnecting without properly
>logging out and closing the session? 
>Flames, jokes, sarcasm, etc. are the expected hazards of participating
>in the newsgroups, but keep your posts off of our hardware!!!!!!

Good lord - it looks like we have actually found a terminal program
that's stupid enough to think "NO CARRIER" really means the connection
has ended.  It's been talked about here, but nobody thought anyone was
still using one.
-- 
Give me chastity and continence, but not just now.  -- St. Augustine
From: rfd@po.CWRU.Edu (Richard F. Drushel)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: "The Ballad of John Henry, the Thinkin' Man"
Date: 16 Sep 1992 01:42:11 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH (USA)
Reply-To: rfd@po.CWRU.Edu (Richard F. Drushel)
NNTP-Posting-Host: slc12.ins.cwru.edu


In a previous article, rfd@po.CWRU.Edu (Richard F. Drushel) says:

>	Here is something you folks should enjoy.  If any of you are
>really desperate for the actual record info, I could dig around in my
>attic and find the record.  The transcript is good, but the recording
>is naturally better :)

	[song deleted]

	Well, I did find the record.  So here is the complete citation,
for any of you audiophiles who frequent the second-hand record shops:

	The Brothers Four:  In Person
	Recorded live at the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis and
Vanderbilt University
	Produced by Irving Townsend
	Columbia Records Monaural--CL 1828 (1962)
	"The Thinking Man, John Henry"--Melody Trails, Inc. (BMI)  4:50
-- 
Rich Drushel ** rfd@po.CWRU.edu *** Biology Ph.D. Student ** Cleveland FreeNet
Co-Sysop, Coleco ADAM Forum --- Assistant Sysop, Science Fiction & Fantasy SIG
"Solda pung apfashat ro des-marno, / Marn ladir o armag noth yeni arno. / Hell
miryat it, / Jambo iat it, / Os lasse wei ticip kati baldo." / Old Ennish poem
From: dik@cwi.nl (Dik T. Winter)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Is there a PDP-11 (or 8, or...) Emulator?
Date: 8 Sep 92 14:00:48 GMT
Organization: CWI, Amsterdam

In article <1992Sep8.095530.16240@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
 > In article <SX0JS26@taronga.com> peter@taronga.com (Peter da Silva) writes:
 > >In article <1992Sep4.051450.22555@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
 > >>I know of several PDP-8 emulators for PC's and MACs in various stages of
		       ^^^^^
 > >Putting the instruction set decoder in assembly makes some sense, if you don't
 > >know how to write fast code in C. It's hard to do an interpreter in C that's
 > >at all fast (not impossible, by any means, just hard). But the rest of the
 > >code is unlikley to get a significant speedup.
 > 
 > The peripheral code is in C already, and likely will stay that way, since it's
 > not speed-important.  The instruction decode is done by table lookup; there is
 > no faster way.
 > 
Eh?
	switch(codeword) {
	case 0:
	    ...
	case 4095:
	    ...
	}
-- 
dik t. winter, cwi, kruislaan 413, 1098 sj  amsterdam, nederland
home: bovenover 215, 1025 jn  amsterdam, nederland
dik@cwi.nl
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu (Eric Rescorla)
Subject: Re: Branching in HLL vs. Assembler (was Re: The need for an assemble
Organization: Rescorla for himself.
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1992 14:57:29 GMT

In article <NHaHqB7w164w@lorc.UUCP> lowen@lorc.UUCP (Lamar Owen) writes:
>The REAL winners of the ObBASIC contest were even more convoluted, with whole
>games being written in one, two, or three lines.  You could REALLY screw with 
>people's minds in *those* days.  And, note that the TRS-80 BASIC supportted
>the ELSE clause, but with the caveat that it had to be on the same line as
>the IF!  Thus, all the : statement separators.
As I remember, the way things worked was that a failed if descended
to the next line for execution(barring elses) while a successful if
just stayed on the current line, so writing:
10 IF FOO THEN BAR
20 ...

saved you writing
10 IF !FOO(or whatever the syntax was in old basic) then 20
15 (good example of numbering, eh?) BAR
20 ....

But, as you say, BAR had to be one line, hence all the :s.
-Ekr

-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Eric Rescorla, DoD#431 (Nighthawk S)              rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu
Former chemist now CM400 mechanic                 ekr@eitech.com(preferred)
                       I will hack Unix for food.
From: stefang@isy.liu.se (Stefan Gustavson)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Renumbering BASIC programs (was Re: Branching in HLL vs. Assembler)
Date: 8 Sep 92 09:47:17 GMT
Organization: Dept of EE, University of Linkoping

don@zl2tnm.gen.nz (Don Stokes) writes:

>jeremy@sw.oz.au (Jeremy Fitzhardinge) writes:
>> Ob brain twitch:  how can
>> 1000 LET N=1000+A*1000
>> be made to use less memory on a ZX Spectrum?

>1000 LET N=VAL("1000*A*1000")

>(Numeric constants were stored in _both_ binary and text formats in memory,
>so putting it in a string saves five or six bytes per constant, at the
>expense of execution time...)

>Do I win?

No, you don't:

1000 LET N=VAL("(A+1)*1000")
is one byte shorter. :-)

How come that old BASIC interpreters made so bad use of memory
when 16K was still expensive? I don't get it.

   /Stefan (stefang@isy.liu.se)
From: IQTI400@INDYCMS.IUPUI.EDU (macphil)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Coke machine at CMU
Date: 10 Sep 92 00:58:41 GMT
Organization: IUPUI

In article <1992Sep9.165234.13531@grian.cps.altadena.ca.us>
>
>I don't know about the CMU area, but here in LA the old bottles are
>still available.  About 10 years ago they got real hard to find for
>about 9 months, but were never _totally_ discontinued. If the local
>situation htere has changed, and the old style bottles are now
>available, and if the old machine was put into storage and could
>be resurrected gold old CMU could boast....  again?
 
 
This is called regional marketing.  You'll find any number of products
which many people were familiar /c @ one time in their upbringing
to suddenly disappear only to hear others claim they either never saw
the products to begin /c or that it never stopped...
 
 
Organization: Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA