HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Deutsches Museum (was: Zuse Computers
From: don@zl2tnm.gen.nz (Don Stokes)
Date: 23 Aug 92 05:27:33 GMT
Distribution: world
Organization: The Wolery

jsr@dexter.mi.org (Jay S. Rouman) writes:
> This sure doesn't have much to do with computers, but I can't help mentioning
> my favorite--watching people on the observation deck of the CN Tower taking
> flash pictures of metro Toronto at night.  Those little flash tubes really
> light up the city!

I hate to inject reality into a folklore group, but....

Quite a number of cheapo auto-everything cameras also automatically fire
the flash if they think it's too dark.  Mind you, people trying to use them
are probably going to be disappointed unless they have a fast film loaded...

Of course, if someone points a fancy SLR set to a normal exposure into the
night, they deserve everything they get....

--
Don Stokes, ZL2TNM (DS555)                        don@zl2tnm.gen.nz (home)
Network Manager, Computing Services Centre            don@vuw.ac.nz (work)
Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand              +64-4-495-5052
From: exuhag@exu.ericsson.se (James Hague)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: The need for an assembler (was: Favori
Date: 16 Aug 92 19:54:57 GMT
Reply-To: exuhag@exu.ericsson.se
Organization: Ericsson Network Systems, Richardson, TX

Charles Lasner writes:
>
>b)	I said *most* users of hll.  If you put yourself in the category of
>the people whose names you used, then you are proving my point:  There are
>possibly as few as 5 people who actually have a clue as to what a compiler
>is doing for them in any detailed way; for the rest, who are apparently a
>huge ignorant horde that *you* want to distance yourself from, they likely
>know little to none about what's going on under the hood.

Perhaps we could end this dicussion if you'd just admit that you program
in assembler because you *like* it.  Unless there is a good reason
to do so, most people will not make their own furniture or bake their own
bread.  You certainly aren't going to get a job at McDonald's if you insist
on making the hamburger buns from scratch--though no one will argue that your
way would produce a better product.  There are people who *will* make their
own furniture and will spend months carving wooden duck decoys and won't
even touch pre-packaged conveniences like Cool Whip or boxed cake mixes.
These people insist on doing things the hard way and are breaking every
rule of modern living.  So what?

--
James Hague   
exuhag@exu.ericsson.se
From: eriks@lin.foa.se (Erik Svensson FOA2)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Computers killing people? (WAS Re: 9 track data storage???)
Date: 13 Aug 92 13:18:48 GMT
Organization: FOA, Linkoping, Sweden

lbd@cbnews.cb.att.com (linda.b.dunlap) writes:

>In article <159e2pINN6ic@rodan.UU.NET> avg@rodan.UU.NET (Vadim Antonov) writes:
>>
>>And don't forget 100k (?) Iraquis. All that modern military stuff
>>is computer-guided.
>>
>>--vadim

>I remember hearing a rumor that printers sent to Iraq were programmed to
>upload (something) into radar installations to give erroneous data.

>First, is it possible?  Second, anyone else heard such a thing?

There's been a lot of talk about it. It isn't true, though. If it can be done?
Don't know.
--
Erik Svensson			Research Officer
Guided Weapons Division		National Defense Research Establishment (FOA)
Stockholm			Sweden

net.address: 	eriks@fenix.lin.foa.se

"I've got LOT's of common sense. I just choose to ignore it." -- Calvin
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.unix.misc
From: hollombe@polymath.tti.com (The Polymath)
Subject: Re: The need for an assembler (was: Favorite CPU)
Organization: The Cat Factory
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 01:22:42 GMT

In article <id.FN9S.OC8@ferranti.com> peter@ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) writes:

}... Anyone who knows only one programming language, or who identifies
}themselves as being a "language X" programmer, is a pretty sore kind of
}programmer indeed.

And they've probably only worked for one (boring) employer.

The reality is, unless you work 100% for yourself, most programmers don't
get a choice about what language to program in.  My first job was in a job
shop.  The language we used was whatever the customer specified --
everything from assembler to dBase.  Nor was any time budgeted for
learning new languages.  You were expected to pick it up on the fly,
usually in a matter of days.

I've lost count of the languages I've worked with at one time or another
(they include misc. assemblers for 8, 16 and 32 bit architectures).
Except for my home system, I never had a choice about any of them.

You can debate all you want about assembler vs. other.  In the end, if you
like to eat at all regularly, you'll do what you're paid to do.

The Polymath (aka: Jerry Hollombe, M.A., CDP, aka: hollombe@polymath.tti.com)
Head Robot Wrangler at Citicorp                   Turn the rascals out!
3100 Ocean Park Blvd.   (310) 450-9111, x2483     No incumbents in '92!
Santa Monica, CA  90405
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: zrepachol@cc.curtin.edu.au (Paul Repacholi)
Subject: Re: Mad drums
Organization: Curtin University of Technology
Date: Sun, 23 Aug 1992 11:54:15 GMT

In article <1992Aug19.203437.15767@greco-prog.fr>, david@dragon (David SHERMAN) writes:
> 
> In a physically-related but otherwise unconnected vein, this sort
> of problem is common enough in bio labs with high-speed centrifuges.
> I remember a Beckman ultracentrifuge that did this because the samples 
> weren't balanced.  By the time it had finished, the rotor, or rather 
> pieces of the rotor, had buried themselves in the centimeters-thick 
> steel wall of the chamber.  You could see bits poking through.

You don't need it out of balance. Many rotors ( boats to the bio people ) have
a finite fatigue life. After n runs at full speed you down grade it to 80% ect.
Running the wrong boat at 500000rpm can be spectacular. The 3 days or so to
remove the crap from the vacume system is a discouragment though. The sight of
a camper van sized machione jumping 2-3 feet into the air is not quickly forgot-
ten, meither is the noise!

> 
> We were told, though it may not be true, that the chassis was designed 
> to blow outward if necessary...the excuse was that these machines were
> often mounted in long rows along the wall of a lab, and the risk of
> hitting one operator was lower than setting off a chain reaction.
> 
> What self-respecting computer operator would work under conditions
> like this?
> 
> ObFolklore:
>     Anyone remember the HP 9815 programmable calculator?
>     Pretty much the same size as a pizza-box sparcstation.
>     Surprisingly useful beast (especially if nothing else was 
>     available!); we used them do statistical analysis and to drive 
>     a pre-HPGL plotter.  I think they were still in wide use running 
>     diagnostic equipment in blood-screening labs well into the 1980's.
> 

Got one in the garden shed. Anyone have the manuals for them?

~Paul

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.3d
From: dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley)
Subject: 3D Graphics Routines
Reply-To: dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley)
Organization: CEBAF
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 12:59:21 GMT


     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.

Thanks!

John Dudley


Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.unix.misc
From: peter@ferranti.com (peter da silva)
Subject: Re: Favorite CPU
Organization: Xenix Support, FICC
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 22:16:49 GMT

In article <1992Aug14.054435.20122@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
> In article <id.1N9S.MV7@ferranti.com> peter@ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) writes:
> >In article <1992Aug8.175306.4732@ecl.psu.edu> bjj@ecl.psu.edu (Bryan J. Jensen) writes:
> >> Most C programmers lack the ability or initiative to add optimizations
> >> to their C compiler.  More important, how is the C programmer to know
> >> that his executable is wretchedly optimized?

> >It runs too slowly.

> Considering the number of buggy C programs out there, how do you expect the
> C programer to know if his program runs too slowly when apparently much of
> the time he doesn't know if it even *does* run?

If he can't tell, then he's saved a lot of time he might have wasted on
pointless micro-optimizations. Oh, I already mentioned that, didn't I?

Well, then he's saved time that he can profitably spend analyzing the bugs
and removing or repairing them.

As for buggy C programs, have you noticed all the buggy assembly programs
out there?
-- 
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
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: anthony@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Anthony J Stieber)
Subject: Re: Bogosort
Organization: Computing Services Division, University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 1992 04:46:37 GMT

In article <WARREN.92Aug16104905@Xenon.stanford.edu> warren@cs.stanford.edu (Mark A. Warren) writes:

>Strassens algorithm is describe in full detail in
>_Introduction_to_Algorithms_ by Cormen, Leiserson, and Rivest, pub
>McGraw Hill, ISBN 0-07-13143-0. This is one of the best books on
>algorithms in print, if you don't have a copy, you should get one.

Is this the same Rivest of RSA?  If so, how many (if any) of the
algorithms in the book are patented?  If it was the same Rivest, I
wouldn't avoid the book on principle of not wanting to encourage
software patents.  Software patents could destroy all but corporate
software development.
--
<-:(= Anthony Stieber	anthony@csd4.csd.uwm.edu   uwm!uwmcsd4!anthony
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.unix.misc
From: kjell@elixir.e.kth.se (Kjell Rilbe)
Subject: Re: You know you've been hacking too long...
Organization: Dept. of EE, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 14:34:52 GMT

In article <BswnIE.Dpt@world.std.com> bmarcum@world.std.com (Bill Marcum) writes:
[Referenced articles deleted]
>Speaking of screen color, I've noticed somthing interesting on a computer
>where I work.  The screen display has alternating lines of red and light-blue
>text on a dark-blue background.  I wear very thick glasses, and as I move my
>head, the red letters seem to move around while the light blue letters stand
>still.

This has got nothing to do with computer folklore, but I just have to tell
you all about this. The other night me and some friends were out to watch
the fireworks they have here at "Stockholm Water Festival" every other night.
One of us had a walkman. It was dark, and the walkman had this little red
LED to indicate power is on. When he moved the walkman, this little LED
seemed to kind of float around, like it was not attached at all to the
walkman!!!!!
It was nothing wrong with our eyes, we all saw it, and one of us did NOT
wear glasses. Really freaky!!!

/Kjell Rilbe

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: neeri@iis.ethz.ch (Matthias Neeracher)
Subject: Re: The need for an assembler (was: Favori
Organization: Integrated Systems Laboratory, ETH, Zurich
	<1992Aug14.074141.21987@news.columbia.edu>
	<NEERI.92Aug18180729@iis.ethz.ch>
	<1992Aug19.183629.6213@news.columbia.edu>
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 1992 10:10:35 GMT

In article <1992Aug19.183629.6213@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
>In article <NEERI.92Aug18180729@iis.ethz.ch> neeri@iis.ethz.ch (Matthias Neeracher) writes:
>>In article <1992Aug14.074141.21987@news.columbia.edu> lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner) writes:
>>>*good* assembly programmers do not optimize their code, they write it
>>>correctly the first time.
>>
>>Correctly or optimal ? [...]
>[...]
>My point is that after a reasonable effort to understand an architecture, the
>typical *good* assembly programmer knows how to write the best possible code
>for a majority of common program details.  Overall algorithms might yield to
>better ones, but I am referring to essentially the best hand method to code
>a particular well-focused procedure.  Such code becomes essentially "second
>nature" to a good assembly programmer, and thus the code is "correct" the
>first time.  At least in the sense that the majority of it isn't a candidate
>for rewriting for any reason related to technique per se.

Ah, ok, if you formulate it like this, I can completely agree with you.

>>>DEC is saying that
>>>the Alpha chip is going to take them well into the next century.  I guess that
>>>means we shouldn't learn it either to any extent because DEC might retract
>>>that statement any time now, right?
>>
>>No, that means that DEC has made a prediction for a timespan which is almost
>>as long as their current existence. It seems to me that DEC is trying to
>>announce the end of progress in architectural design, which to me just seems
>>*slightly* premature.
>
>I don't agree; DEC isn't an end-all, be-all company now, assuming anyone
>ever thought it was :-).
>
>In any case, I think they are serious to their notion that Alpha will be
>around for quite awhile, and thus assembler on it should be looked into.

Yes, I also think they are serious about that, and I think it might be worth
looking into the assembler. I just doubt their lifespan prediction. Would
anybody else be willing to predict how long Alpha is going to play an important
role at DEC? My personal estimate would be about 15 years.

Matthias

-----
Matthias Neeracher                                      neeri@iis.ethz.ch
   "You think people really worship the devil?"
   "Sure. It's the perfect religion--you fuck up, you go to heaven"
                                     -- Andrew Vachss, _Sacrifice_
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Subject: Re: Early Programable calculators.
Reply-To: lasner@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Charles Lasner)
Organization: Columbia University
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1992 09:23:12 GMT

In article <1992Aug13.200622.8105@twg.com> nolan@twg.com writes:
>
>
>OK, folks, let's hear it for the Olivetti P101 desktop engine. I believe that
>it predates the HP and the Casio, but I trust that you all will correct me if
>I'm in error

The Olivetti Programma 101 was my first machine.  I actually succeeded in
getting a useful program to be 120 steps long by splitting all of the
registers.

I'd say it came out around 1965 or so; I was using it in 1967 and it certainly
wasn't new then.  I understand that they came out with a model with an
A-D convertor attached.

cjl
From: cblandy@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Chris Blandy)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Computers killing people?  (WAS Re: 9 track data storage???)
Summary: Printer Virus...
Date: 14 Aug 92 23:02:04 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin

In article <1992Aug12.163016.11684@cbnews.cb.att.com> lbd@cbnews.cb.att.com (linda.b.dunlap) writes:
>
>I remember hearing a rumor that printers sent to Iraq were programmed to
>upload (something) into radar installations to give erroneous data.
>
>First, is it possible?  Second, anyone else heard such a thing?

Yeah, I read about the so-called printer virus.  It was supposedly a batch
of code written at the NSA and plugged into the ROMs in printers sold to
other countries.  No official press release, but it was discounted as
hogwash by most...
From: jones@pyrite.cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879)
Subject: Re: Indentation
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1992 20:28:00 GMT
Organization: University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA

From article <1992Aug14.201914.24443@news.uiowa.edu>,
by jones@pyrite.cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879):

> if	not(termset)
> ..	at	707
> ..	write	1) Press NEXT if your PPT is correctly

Dumb news system!  It doubled all my dots in column 1.  TUTOR on PLATO used
only a single dot, as it was when I posted the original of this thing!

				Doug Jones
				jones@cs.uiowa.edu
From: andersa@Riga.DoCS.UU.SE (Anders Andersson)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Peet Peeves!
Date: 18 Aug 92 12:10:33 GMT
Organization: Uppsala University, Sweden

In article <1992Aug12.031639.11024@uwm.edu>, anthony@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Anthony J Stieber) writes:
> When "terminal" and "computer" are confused .  As in, "Hey, this
> terminal doesn't run MS-Windows right."

As if it were only a matter of terminology...  But I *have* seen
people having trouble compiling their programs, and reaching out
to power-cycle their VT100.  What's worse, it may actually work
once in a while, thus improving their confidence in the method.
Watch the grassroot rumour mill in action:  "Things they never
teach you at Comp Sci school..."

I don't really want to put the blame on them; after all, this is
an educational institution where we are supposed to teach people
these things, but I'm afraid my explanations are wasted as long
as I don't have a good understanding of what's going on in their
minds.  In any case, I'm not the teacher here, though I did get
the opportunity to actually show the mainframe to each year's
freshmen, in the hope of preventing some of the more unnecessary
misconceptions.  Now that we have converted to (physically tiny)
networked servers and diskless workstations, I feel a significant
part of the impression of a Real Computer in the basement is lost...
--
Anders Andersson, Dept. of Computer Systems, Uppsala University
Paper Mail: Box 520, S-751 20 UPPSALA, Sweden
Phone: +46 18 183170   EMail: andersa@DoCS.UU.SE
From: kimm@faatcrl.UUCP (kimm)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: 24 hour clock (was Re: hacking too long?)
Date: 13 Aug 92 13:19:02 GMT
Distribution: alt.folklore.computers
Organization: FAA Technical Center, Atlantic City NJ

jdavis@bordeaux.kpno.noao.edu (Jim Davis) writes:

>In article <19926.337.11759@execnet> you write:
>>  What I actually find frightening is that people who I _know_ don't
>>  have any involvement with computers, or ham radio, or anything like
>>  that actually _understand_ when I tell them that it's 23:08.
>>
>>  Although many of them have travelled in Europe, where I understand
>>  that 24 hour clocks are something of a standard...

>Don't forget the military, military dependents, etc.  If you've ever lived
>on a military base, you know all about the 24 hr clock.

My college (US) used the 24 hr clock for class schedules.
-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kimberly A. May  Internet: kimm@faatcrl.UUCP    UUCP: .....rutgers!faatcrl!kimm
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.human-factors,comp.misc,comp.programming
From: jones@pyrite.cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879)
Subject: Re: Indentation
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1992 20:19:14 GMT
Organization: University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA

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.

The TUTOR language on the U of Illinois PLATO (and I assume, on NOVANET
too) has mandatory indentation of the bodies of loop and conditional
statements.  Here is an example from an old listing of mine dated 1/28/80:

if	not(termset)
.	at	707
.	write	1) Press NEXT if your PPT is correctly
.		   connected to an IBM mag-card station.
.
.		   Press BACK if not.
.		   Press HELP for an explanation.
.	loop	true
.	.	pause	keys=next,back,help,term
.	outloop	key /= term
.	endloop
.	jump	key=back,title,x
.	jump	key=help,hardwar,x
.	at	709
.	erase	50,6
.	calc	termset<-true
endif

(Note that two glyphs in the original can't be reproduced by single ASCII
characters, so I've used two character sequences, the <- should be a left
arrow, and the /= should be a not-equals sign.)

Anyway, the thing to note about indenting is that indenting of the body of
a structured statement was always done with the sequence "dot tab", so that
a column of dots always connected the line that opened the block with the
line that closed the block.  Furthermore, in the case of loop/endloop
blocks, the outloop statement (an exit from the body of a loop) was always
indented at the level of the loop being exited, not at the level of the
statements in the body.  Thus, when an exit was embedded in a nested loop,
the loop being exited was indicated by the indenting level of the outloop
statement.

[[ Historical sidelight:  PLATO was implemented on a CDC 6600 mainframe,
and it used an extended version of the CDC 6 bit character set, complete
with multiple shift codes and alternate character sets.  A PPT was a PLATO
programmable terminal, containing an embedded Intel 8080 microprocessor.
IBM communicating mag-card hardware used an awful character set called
IBM Word Processing EBCDIC, complete with multiple logical typeballs and
shift codes, even when no selectric print mechanisms were involved.  This
code fragment was part of the package for printing PLATO files on an IBM
Word Processing System 6 Ink Jet Printer. ]]
						Doug Jones
						jones@cs.uiowa.edu
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.computers:12763 comp.unix.misc:3290
From: exuhag@exu.ericsson.se (James Hague)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: The need for an assembler (was: Favori
Date: 14 Aug 92 13:57:43 GMT
Reply-To: exuhag@exu.ericsson.se
Organization: Ericsson Network Systems, Richardson, TX

Charles Lasner writes:
>
>This gets to the heart of the matter: hll programmers depend on the compiler
>to do "magic" of various hues and colors for them; for most of them, they
>haven't a clue as to what's going on, and the best they can do is to "tinker"
>with what little options are available to them, namely the command-line
>switches to operating the compiler.

But isn't the goal to write a program for solving the problem at hand in
a clear and algorithmically "optimal" way?  In 95% or more cases I really
don't care what the compiler does.  That's why I wrote the program in
a HLL to begin with.

I have two irrational :-) gripes with HLLs though:

(1) Many programmers use the "no thought, quick coding" capabilities of HLLs
    far too much.  Normally you don't have to worry about minute speed
    improvements and such, but it seems that many people are also not
    worrying about other little things like algorithms and overall program
    organization.

(2) Popular HLLs are too complex.  Using a C compiler from any major vendor
    requires tremendous devotion.  The Bible would be a quicker read than
    the manuals for any currently hot compiler.  Not to mention all of the
    quirks and bugs that you have to know about and work around.  You almost
    have to know what's going on under the hood.  I won't even go into all
    the standards changes and continually changing vendor dependent features.
    Assembly is actually a win in terms of simplicity.

[BTW, I think C++ and ANSI C show that if you slowly bloat up a language over
a period of years then there isn't as much animosity toward it as there would
have been if you introduced the full language up front (Ada, PL/1). :-]

--
James Hague   
exuhag@exu.ericsson.se
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.unix.misc