HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: weisberg@ee.rochester.edu (Jeff Weisberg)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.college
Subject: Re: Looking good with mouses
Keywords: Unknown
Date: 21 Aug 92 13:44:34 GMT
Organization: Univ of Rochester, College of Engineering and Applied Science

In article <1992Aug21.095114.3605@darwin.ntu.edu.au> nunn@nutmeg.cs.ntu.edu.au (JsNO  BAR---NUNN) writes:
/* 
/*   There's a lot of things that a computing professional does to "look cool".
/* You have only to Look at UNIX users to see this. For example:
/* 
/*    - if you use a vi editor on UNIX; to show your really cool, you use the
/*       'i'. 'j', 'k' ans 'm' keys, NOT the numeric pad.

um, or the h, j, k, and l keys maybe?, but of course to be really 
impressive, you ought to be using "ed", "ex", or "cat >file" instead.

/*    -  You pronounce "!" as "Bang",
/*    -  And you never type "ls" (aka "dir" for MeSsyDOS) between transiting,
/* copying or doing something between two leaf nodes of a file systems, because it
/* shows that you keep having to be reminded of where things are.

I'd have to disagree with this. I'm so absent-minded I'll sometimes
do an 'ls' as every-other command, even tho' the output from the 
previous one is still on the screen.


/*   What I want to know is; is there any cool movement (or as such) that
/* professionals do seperate the novices from the pro's when using mouses?.

use the control, shift, alt, and meta keys with the mouse buttons, to get
other results. or just don't use it.

/* 

-jeff
Organization: Freshman, IM - H&SS Track, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.college
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 1992 13:30:00 -0400 
From: Crystal Linn Trexel <ct2f+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re:  Signals on the door

How 'bout this one:  We have these memo boards up on our door -
actually, almost everyone does.  Last year, my rommate and I had an
inside joke about ducks, so we drew a duck on the message board - no one
could figure it out unless we told them.

Crystal Trexel
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: soley@trooa.enet.dec.com (Norman Soley)
Subject: Your co-worker may be an alien
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 17:23:47 GMT


Sometime in the last decade one of the supermarket tabloids published a 
list of 10 ways you could spot aliens among your co-workers. The list was 
written so as to suggest that computer geek types were actually aliens.
I remember it was posted on the door of the CSC room at Waterloo, among 
other places. Anyone else remember this or better yet have a copy?
--
    Norman Soley, Specialist, Professional Software Services, ITC District
    Digital Equipment of Canada                   soley@trooa.enet.dec.com
    Opinions expressed are mine alone  and do not reflect those of Digital 
    Equipment Corporation or my cat Marge.
From: allan@cs.UAlberta.CA (Allan Sullivan)
Subject: Re: Nonfiction Computer History Book List Wanted
Organization: University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 18:34:49 GMT

ivie@cc.usu.edu (CP/M lives!) writes:

>In article <16needINNku5@wupost.wustl.edu>, bryan@wupost.wustl.edu (bryan o'connor) writes:
>> I'm looking for good NONFICTION books about computer history.
>> (ENIAC to present)

I've found that many textbooks have sections on Computer history.
For example, the textbook from a course I took in advanced architectures
("Computer Systems Architecture", by Jean-Loup Baer, CSP) has
chapters on the evolution of large systems and Mini-computers.

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: neeri@iis.ethz.ch (Matthias Neeracher)
Subject: Re: The need for an assembler (was: Favorite CPU)
Organization: Integrated Systems Laboratory, ETH, Zurich
	<1992Aug16.074623.2955@news.columbia.edu> <id.6WFS.0NK@ferranti.com>
	<1992Aug18.052636.23004@news.columbia.edu>
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 17:22:31 GMT

In article <1992Aug18.052636.23004@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
>In article <id.6WFS.0NK@ferranti.com> peter@ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) writes:
>>I'm not distancing myself from the horde, I'm part of it. The horde isn't as
>>ignorant as you'd like to make out.
>
>I think others may have differing opinions about the statistics behind that.
>I offered an open challenge for someone to quantify how many bugs they might
>attribute to various language-based implementations of any code released by
>any author on any basis, to rate the use of the various languages as that
>pertains to reliability of product.  I don't see anyone challenging my
>opinion that C would come in dead last.

That's because it was so obviously just a polemical remark with no factual base
that nobody saw a need to challenge it. But if you insist: I *do* challenge
that opinion.

The problem I saw with your challenge was that you failed to come up with a
measure that would establish the quality of a language and its programmers
without being polluted by the bunch of crappy programs that comes with the
*popularity* of a language. What I mean with this is that more bad programs
tend to be written in popular, easily accessible languages like C, BASIC, and
HyperCard than in languages like Portal, Standard ML, or Ada, which are not
likely to be accessible to amateur programers.

>I would think that writing buggy
>code in C qualifies at least in part as not knowing what goes on under
>the hood so to speak.

In my experience with correcting other peoples' bugs, I found that most of the
bugs came from not looking at the road so to speak :-)

>Presumably all of these "experts" you claim exist 
>(aren't they "experts" since they aren't as ignorant as I make out?) had
>full access to all of the associated wonderful development tools to 
>eliminate all known problems, etc., so if so, then why the failing grade?

Who gave the failing grade ?

>I have friends who are of the opinion that C is more like a demented
>macro assembler being misused with the "wrong" macroes,

So have I, but these friends generally tend to program in Oberon :-)

Matthias

-----
Matthias Neeracher                                      neeri@iis.ethz.ch
  "And I won this ribbon in a Degradation Contest at the Teheran
   meeting of Junkies Anonymous" -- William Burroughs, _The Naked Lunch_
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: geoffrey@tafe.sa.edu.au (Geoffrey D. Bennett)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: What You See Is All You Get
Keywords: WYSIAYG
Date: 23 Aug 92 07:12:22 GMT

Does anybody know what the above phrase means?  And I don't mean
What You See Is What You Get.  Or is it just a corruption of
WYSIWYG?

--
 ___
/  __
\___|eoffrey D. Bennett!-)           geoffrey@tafe.sa.edu.au
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.computers:12576 comp.human-factors:1789 comp.misc:3239 comp.programming:2334
From: guido@cwi.nl (Guido van Rossum)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.human-factors,comp.misc,comp.programming
Subject: Re: Indentation
Date: 15 Aug 92 11:12:01 GMT
Followup-To: alt.folklore.computers

norman@a.cs.okstate.edu (Norman Graham) writes:

>From article <1992Aug14.175408.3096@bnrmtl.bnr.ca>, by pat@bnrmtl.bnr.ca (Patrick Smith):
>> In article <1992Aug14.170444.1576@tandem.com>, tvv@tandem.com (Tom Van Vleck) writes:
>> |BTI computer systems had an implementation language called DRAGON, in
>> |which the indentation WAS the loop/if scope indicator.
>> 
>> An interesting idea.
>> Does anyone know how well this worked in practice?
> 
>In systems I've used, it works well. I believe this mechanism 
>(called 'layout' or 'off-side rule') originated in Peter Landin's
>work on Iswim in the mid-60's. The layout mechanism has been 
>adopted by most of the purely functional programming languages
>designed in the past 10 years (eg. Miranda and Haskell).  The use
>of layout seems to be generally regarded as a good thing by those
>in the functional programming community.

Some other languages using this: occam, ABC, Python.  None of these
originate in the functional programming community, although one could
say their designers liked elegance.  In the latter two cases, you can
judge for yourself how well it works: source for both languages
(portable to UNIX, PCs and Macs) can be ftp'ed from ftp.cwi.nl.  Both
are interpreted, interactive languages; ABC is ideal for teaching
first concepts of programming, Python operates in the same area as
Perl, Icon or Tcl.

--Guido van Rossum, CWI, Amsterdam <guido@cwi.nl>
"Kemal Ataturk had an entire menagerie called Abdul."

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.unix.misc
From: jbotz@mtholyoke.edu (Jurgen Botz)
Subject: Re: The need for an assembler (was: Favorite CPU)
Organization: Mount Holyoke College
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 1992 17:11:42 GMT

In article <1992Aug19.205606.4808@ecl.psu.edu> bjj@ecl.psu.edu (Bryan J. Jensen) writes:
>In article <1992Aug18.153447.3104@auto-trol.com>, davgot@auto-trol.com (David Gottner) writes:
>> Basically it's the old "C shouldn't be used because C code is buggier than
>> other code"
>> 
>> This attitude IMHO is entirly incorrect.  It is easy to write hard to
>> maintain, buggy, cryptic code in **any** language.  C, Ada, assembler,
>> Pascal, you name the language.
>
>Politically Correct applies to languages too I guess.  The democrats
>would be proud of you.  You are claiming that no aspect of a language
>affects code reliability.  So the ADA people were just wasting their time.

I can't resist this... yeah, the ADA people were just wasting their time.

No, _I_ wouldn't say that "no aspect of a language affects code reliability,"
but David's statement holds anyway... it's easy to write buggy code in any
language.  I would add: it's hard to write good code in any language, but
it is also true that some languages help you a little more with that than
others.  Certainly it's easier to write solid code in a HLL than in assembly.

But to get back to ADA... you don't get high code reliability by throwing
everything plus the kitchen sink into one bag.
--
Jurgen Botz                  |   Internet: JBotz@mtholyoke.edu
Academic Systems Consultant  |     Bitnet: JBotz@mhc.bitnet
Mount Holyoke College        |      Voice: (US) 413-538-2375 (daytime)
South Hadley, MA, USA        | Snail Mail: J. Botz, 01075-0629
From: barmar@think.com (Barry Margolin)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: What has AI done for me lately?
Date: 21 Aug 1992 21:19:02 GMT
Organization: Thinking Machines Corporation, Cambridge MA, USA
NNTP-Posting-Host: telecaster.think.com

In article <BtC9EI.KL6@dexter.mi.org> jsr@dexter.mi.org (Jay S. Rouman) writes:
>I know that pure research should not have a bottom line, but the
>artificial intelligence projects at MIT and Stanford loom so large in
>computer folklore that it's hard to avoid wondering what the practical
>impact has been.  Certainly Symbolics is a spinoff of that effort, but
>beyond building LISP-based machines, I'm not sure how closely even
>their technology is tied to AI.  

They were selling neural net software for a while, but I haven't heard
about that for years.  Much of their business these days is in scheduling
applications, and that requires lots of heuristic tweaking.

>				  There are some expert systems in use,
>particularly in the medical field, but do lots of doctors really use
>them on a daily basis?  The PBS series "The Machine that Changed the
>World" left one with the impression that AI was in deep trouble and if
>the field didn't pull a rabbit out of the hat Real Soon Now it was
>going to dry up and vanish.  

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.

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.
-- 
Barry Margolin
System Manager, Thinking Machines Corp.

barmar@think.com          {uunet,harvard}!think!barmar
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: mesm@netcom.com (Mary E. S. Morris)
Subject: Re: You know you've been hacking too long...
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 12:48:02 GMT
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest) 

kjell@elixir.e.kth.se (Kjell Rilbe) writes:
: In article <IISAKKIL.92Aug14192502@vipunen.hut.fi> iisakkil@vipunen.hut.fi (Mika Iisakkila) writes:
: 
: No, no, no, no, no, no!
: The fireworks hadn't started yet. We were *waiting* for the fireworks.
: And the walkman did not appear to stay in place! We could all see both
: the LED and the walkman move around, only the LED wasn't moving the same way
: the walkman was.....
: 
: Please, TRY THIS YOURSELVES! I can understand that it seems unbeleivable,
: but if you just switch off all lights, and try this, you will see what I'm
: talking about! (I hope. If not, I'm going crazy. Along with three of my
: friends.....)
: 
: /Kjell Rilbe

I know what you are saying. If you look at the red led-like display
of minesweeper (a game for MS Windows) it too seems to float. I cannot 
say that I have ever seen anything other than a red-led-like thing 
float like that. My guess would be that this color of red is close 
to the end of the spectrum that humans can see. And for some of us
we can't see all of its spectrum directly, we see the rest as an
aftereffect (similar to hot air rising causing waves) and this 
aftereffect distorts what we know is there so we compensate by
seeing it "float"

Mary

Mary E. S. Morris    |  The future exists first in imagination, then
mesm@netcom.COM      |  in will, then in reality. -- Galivan Burwell
=====================================================================
Netcom - Online Communication Services San Jose, CA
Organization: Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 1992 17:41:42 -0400 
From: Pat_Barron@transarc.com
Subject: Re: Copy of Ritchie's "Why Pascal Is Not My Favorite..."?

alanlb@bethesda.cs.vt.edu (Alan L. Batongbacal) writes:
> Does somebody out there have a copy of this?

Actually, it was written by Brian Kernighan, not Dennis Ritchie.

It is Bell Labs CSTR #100, and is available via anonymous FTP to
research.att.com, as /netlib/research/cstr/100.Z.

--Pat.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: jgd@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (John G Dobnick)
Subject: Re: Favorite CPU
Originator: jgd@csd4.csd.uwm.edu
Reply-To: jgd@csd4.csd.uwm.edu
Organization: University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 22:10:14 GMT

From article <610@cpsolv.CPS.COM>, by rhg@cpsolv.CPS.COM (Richard H. Gumpertz):
> In article <1992Aug07.212531.14134@allegro.com> sieler@allegro.com (Stan Sieler) writes:
> }One last thing...has there *ever* been another multi-processor machine that,
> }*while running*, could be "split" into two entirely independent machines,
> }and then rejoined?  We routinely did this with our dual CPU B7700 in the
> 
> This was done routinely with Multics.  We took processors in and out all the
> time for running hardware PM and for testing new versions of the system.

Unisys 2200/1100 series machines (formerly called Sperry, formerly
called Univac).  Symmetric multi-processor systems.  Partitionable
"on the fly" -- CPUs/IO Units/memory boxes can be added/removed
from the running system, without interrupting normal operations.  

-- 
John G Dobnick                          ATTnet: (414) 229-5727
Computing Services Division             INTERNET: jgd@uwm.edu
University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee     UUCP: uunet!uwm!jgd

"Knowing how things work is the basis for appreciation,
and is thus a source of civilized delight."  -- William Safire
From: rbthomas@frogpond.rutgers.edu (Rick Thomas)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Why do we have _both_ "EDITOR" and "VISUAL" shell variables
Date: 12 Aug 92 16:34:58 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Engineering Supercomputer Lab
Cc: rbthomas bill@celestial.com


In <Jul.30.01.23.10.1992.8026@dartagnan.rutgers.edu> lear@dartagnan.rutgers.edu (eliot lear) writes...
>In article <Jul.17.19.59.01.1992.2117@psi.rutgers.edu> scooper@psi.rutgers.edu (Simon P. Cooper) writes:
>> (1) Check VISUAL env; if not set continue, otherwise use as editor
>> (2) Check EDITOR env; if not set use "vi", otherwise use as editor
>Yes, this is something I never understood about BSD.  Perhaps there
>is some historical value in having both VISUAL and EDITOR.  

Yes, something historical...  (A faraway look came into the old man's
rheumy eyes, as he settles down in his place by the fire...)

Long, long ago (he continued) in a galaxy far far away, when kernels
were small, and code was tight, people used hard-copy terminals for
most of their programming work.  Yes, Virginia, there were such people
once.  They had names like "Ken" and "Dennis".  Short, simple names,
unlike today.  Names of power.  Who ever heard of a programmer named
"Elliot"? I ask you! (he said, digging his younger companion in the
ribs with a friendly elbow.)  Some of those hard-copy terminals only
printed in UPPER-CASE.  They were called "KSR-33", and they made a
great deal of noise.  But you have been protected all your life, child,
by the great OSHA, and wouldn't understand such things.

(His younger companion smiled.  He enjoyed the old man's stories, but
he knew better than to actually believe them! "Small kernels", indeed!
Everybody knew that was an oxymoron.)

In any case, (said the old man, combing his beard with his fingers)
there came a great change on the land, when people started using new
"video-terminals".  But the change did not happen all-at-once.  No
indeed.  Even as today, people had investments in existing technology,
and were reluctant to throw away a working piece of equipment.  So it
came to pass that there was a period of years when both hard copy and
visual terminals were in common use, and people frequently had to
switch back and forth between them.

And so, as a legacy of that time, to remind us that it was not always
as it is today, we have "EDITOR" for use with hard-copy terminals, and
"VISUAL" for use with video terminals.

Enjoy!

Rick
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.unix.misc
From: peter@ferranti.com (Peter da Silva)
Subject: Re: The need for an assembler (was: Favorite CPU)
Organization: Xenix Support, FICC
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 1992 18:49:59 GMT

In article <1992Aug18.052636.23004@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
> b)	I think academia would resent your slur,

Probably. I'll stand by it.

> c)	I've done that about 8-9 times including the part about running the
> first time (that it was done, assembly-error free, and perused a reasonable
> amount of time to get rid of obvious problems.) 

What, an operating system? Ah well, you're obviously a super-programmer and
can deal with the detail needed to do substantial amounts of code in assembly.

> I don't see a connection
> between academia and lack of real-time, or is that an oblique reference to
> money versus theoretical, because I've done both.

I don't know of any significant real-time project or product in the academic
world. Even in the commercial world, real-time is pretty esoteric.

> I think others may have differing opinions about the statistics behind that.
> I offered an open challenge for someone to quantify how many bugs they might
> attribute to various language-based implementations of any code released by
> any author on any basis, to rate the use of the various languages as that
> pertains to reliability of product.  I don't see anyone challenging my
> opinion that C would come in dead last.

In terms of the ease of generating bugs per unit line, I'd put C, assembly,
and PL/M at about the same level. They all force you to operate too close
to the grindstone for my liking. The advantage C has over assembly is that
it takes quite a few less lines to do a given task.

> I would think that writing buggy
> code in C qualifies at least in part as not knowing what goes on under
> the hood so to speak.  Presumably all of these "experts" you claim exist 
> (aren't they "experts" since they aren't as ignorant as I make out?)

No, just competant.

> had
> full access to all of the associated wonderful development tools to 
> eliminate all known problems, etc., so if so, then why the failing grade?

What wonderful development tools? I use vi, make, lint, and cc.

> I have friends who are of the opinion that C is more like a demented
> macro assembler being misused with the "wrong" macroes, but I won't let
> my personal friends bias the count here.

Well, it's pretty close to assembly... but I find the macros it uses just
fine.
-- 
Peter da Silva                                               `-_-'
$ EDIT/TECO LOVE                                              'U` 
%TECO-W-OLDJOKE Not war?                        Have you hugged your wolf today?
Ferranti Intl. Ctls. Corp.      Sugar Land, TX  77487-5012       +1 713 274 5180
Organisation: European Space Technology Centre (E.S.T.E.C)
Date: Thursday, 20 Aug 1992 08:56:28 CET
From: Roy Jaques <RJAQUES@ESTEC.BITNET>
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: DataPoint (Was: Non Unix-OS's)
 <1992Aug18.211927.4075@news.uiowa.edu> <1992Aug19.103723.58252@cc.usu.edu>

Datapoint have had a few near misses in financial terms and at one point the UK
 company was more profitable than the US parent. Databus has its good points an
d has apparently been implemented on other operating systems. Arcnet however co
uld be described as a success compared with their other offerings,, there is a
RFC about running TCP/IP protocols over Arcnet but I havent actually read it -
maybe I should just to remind me what I got away from

Roy Jaques
(rjaques@estcs1.dnet.estec.esa.nl)
From: newton@iagu.itd.adelaide.edu.au (Mark Newton)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Nonfiction Computer History Book List Wanted
Date: 19 Aug 92 03:00:51 GMT
Organization: University of Adelaide, South Australia

In article <1992Aug17.102317.58203@cc.usu.edu> ivie@cc.usu.edu (CP/M lives!) writes:
>In article <16needINNku5@wupost.wustl.edu>, bryan@wupost.wustl.edu (bryan o'connor) writes:
>> I'm looking for good NONFICTION books about computer history.
>> (ENIAC to present)
>
>"Fire in the Valley" is good (and not on your list), but, again, it's about
>the people.

One of the references that we've been handed for an Operating Systems
course that I'm taking is called "Electronic Computers: A Historical
Survey" by Saul Rosen, published in "Computing Surveys", volume 1, number 1
in March 1969.

It's especially interesting because as a historical document, it was
itself written in what we consider to be the prehistory of computing.

It starts by talking about university projects, including ENIAC, EDVAC
and EDSAC, and progresses through to "modern" technology like Multics. :-)

   - mark


-- 
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Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.arch