HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: daniel@mertwig.uucp (Daniel Drucker)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: bellcore documents?
Date: Thu, 31 Dec 92 21:13:33 EST
Reply-To: daniel%mertwig@uunet.uu.net  (Daniel Drucker)
Organization: Abnormalities of Reality


I was just reading _The Hacker Crackdown_ (Bruce Sterling), and it
mentions an 800 number where you can purchase Bell technical
documents. Does anyone know the number?

I think he should have explained a little more on page 53 when he
describes how the term 'hacker' has changed...

--
Daniel Drucker        N2SXX       Coconut seashells whispering to me
daniel%mertwig@uunet.uu.net         "Forever, forever, my Coda..."
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: bugs@netsys.com (Mark Hittinger)
Subject: Re: Digigal Rainbow 100?
Keywords: digital, DEC, Rainbow 100
Organization: Netsys Inc.
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 05:10:50 GMT

alderson@elaine46.Stanford.EDU (Rich Alderson) writes:


>Does anyone remember what the distinction between the 100 and the 100+ was?


I think it was the memory layout / limits.  I think the 100+ could go to 896k
whereas the 100a and 100b could only go up to 700 something.  I think the 100+
also had a heftier power supply too.  

Note for anybody still using the Rainbow - I wrote the copy-protected floppy
copier for the rainbow.  I may still have some copies laying around that
work.  email me if interested.  The Rainbow was a strange box but it was
surprisingly not handicapped at the hardware level like the pro was.

I turn my rainbow on sometimes but I think the hard disk controller is
blown.  I suppose I'll have to get a new one someday so that my antique
will actually work.
From: daz@hal.gnu.ai.mit.edu (David A. Z.)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Bellcore
Date: 11 Jan 1993 18:47:59 GMT
Organization: /etc/organization
NNTP-Posting-Host: hal.gnu.ai.mit.edu

In Message <aXBowB1w165w@mertwig.uucp> daniel%mertwig@uunet.uu.net (Daniel 
Drucker) writes:

> I was just reading _The Hacker Crackdown_ (Bruce Sterling), and it
> mentions an 800 number where you can purchase Bell technical
> documents. Does anyone know the number?

	Technical Advisories (TA's) [generally free I believe] are
documents that describe Bellcore's preliminary view of proposed generic 
requirements.  To obtain TAs, write to:

	Bellcore
	Document Registrar
	445 South Street, Room 2J125
	P.O. Box 1910
	Morristown, NJ 07960-1910

To obtain other Bellcore documents, contact:

	Bellcore
	Customer Service
	60 New England Avenue, Room 1B252
	Piscataway, NJ 08854-4196
	1 (800) 521-CORE
	(201)699-5800 (for foreign calls)

	- daz

Note: Above text, aside from signature, may or may not be copyrighted by
Bellcore, either in part or in full, etc...
From: dp@world.std.com (Jeff DelPapa)
Subject: Re: Retrocomputing Backwards
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 16:00:17 GMT

In article <1993Jan11.154106.21109@ozrout.uucp> stirling@ozrout.uucp (Stirling Westrup) writes:
>Ever since I saw Harlen Ellison's famous episode of the original Star Trek
>series whos name I am unsure of (City at the Edge of Forever?) I've
>wondered how feasible building a mnemonic memory circuit "Out of stone
>knives and bearskins" would be.  'course, we don't know anything about trek
>technology, so lets pose the same question with modern technology.
>
>If a competant engineer was transported back to 1950 with a 486 chip (or a
>68040), could he build a working computer with it?  Would he be able to
>devise compatible memory, a power supply, and other stuff that it would need?
>How much harder would the job be in 1940?  How much easier in 1960?
>
>-- 

There was a similar science fiction story, about what folks of the
40's would make of a later generation ALCM.  The oscilliscopes of the
day would not be able to see the clocks, the chemistry of the day
would not be able to detect the impurities in the silicon of the
chips, the ramjet would likely puzzle them.  They probably would be
able to figure out the warhead.

<dp>
From: tom@smart.bo.open.de (Thomas Neumann)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Vax Trek
Date: 5 Jan 1993 21:15:51 GMT
Organization: News at smart
NNTP-Posting-Host: smart.bo.open.de
X-Newsreader: Emacs 18.59.1, GNUS 3.14.1

Hi,

I'm looking for a series of articles called "Vax Trek" that was floating
around the net about 4 years ago. If anybody has a complete collection
of them please drop me a note. DON'T SEND IT DIRECTLY, CONTACT ME FIRST
since I want to avoid receiving it n^2 times :-)

bye -- Thomas
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.computers:18543 sci.math:17632
From: magnus@thep.lu.se (Magnus Olsson)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,sci.math
Subject: Re: Pseudorandomness and computable numbers (was Re: Number of numbers (Was Re: PI))
Date: 4 Jan 93 09:14:31 GMT
Organization: Theoretical Physics, Lund University, Sweden

In article <hebrais.10x4@mirkwood.CAM.ORG> hebrais@mirkwood.CAM.ORG (Philippe Hebrais) writes:
>[ magnus@thep.lu.se (Magnus Olsson) writes in article <1993Jan2.094503.1844@pollux.lu.se>: ]
>>This is the usual definition, with one modification: Since an algorithm
>>by the usual definition of algorithm must terminate, one should really
>>define a computable number as
>>
>># A number x is computable if and only if for each positive integer N
>># there exists an algorithm that outputs the N first decimals of x.
>
>Isn't this trivially true?  (for each N, use the print program for
>the N first digits).  I think you ment:
>
># A number x is computable if and only if there is a program that
># on input N, outputs the Nth digit of the decimal expansion of x.

Yes, I guess that's what I meant (though you've replaced "algorithm"
with "program" and "the N first decimals" with the "Nth digit", which
doesn't change anything). I made the usual mistake of getting "for
all" and "there exists" in the wrong order. 

>>>My questions to any math guru out there are the following :
>>> 1. Is PI a computable number ?

Just for clarity: it wasn't I who wrote that, but samuel@front.se.

>>One rigorous definition is
>>
>># A number is a PRDE number if and only if it is not computable
>
>That might be the definition of "random" real numbers, but not
>"pseudo-random" (that's the whole point of pseuso-random, it's
>computable but looks random).

Well, in that case one could argue that any _known_ number can't be
random, be it computable or not. But then the question follows how one
can "know" a non-computable number at all. 

              Magnus Olsson                | \e+      /_
    Department of Theoretical Physics      |  \  Z   / q
        University of Lund, Sweden         |   >----<           
 magnus@thep.lu.se, thepmo@seldc52.bitnet  |  /      \===== g
PGP key available via finger or on request | /e-      \q
From: Jason_Mulligan@camelot.apana.org.au (Jason Mulligan)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Test
Distribution: world
Date: 30 Dec 92 14:01:06 EST
Organization: The TOWER BBS



 -- AEd V1.36f/EvaA

-- Via DLG Pro v0.992
From: bevan@cs.man.ac.uk (Stephen J Bevan)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: VCS processor (was Re: Game machine processors)
Date: 6 Jan 93 13:22:37 GMT
Organization: Department of Computer Science, University of Manchester
In-reply-to: ercm20@festival.ed.ac.uk's message of 5 Jan 93 13:26:15 GMT

In article <29891@castle.ed.ac.uk> ercm20@festival.ed.ac.uk (Sam Wilson) writes:
   The Ace wasn't actually a Spectrum: the innards were more like the ZX-81
   (monchrome screen, at least and 1K? 2K? of RAM) but it had the
   Spectrum-style 'dead flesh' keyboard.  What was much more impressive was
   a ROM (you soldered it in instead of the Sinclair BASIC ROM) produced by
   a one-man outfit called Skywave Software which gave you a real-time,
   multitasking FORTH for the ZX-81 (Timex TS-1000 in the US?).  It had
   independent virtual screens, no less - can't remember if they were
   overlapped or tiled

I think they were tiled.

   - I suspect they just overwrote each other if you
   got the dimensions wrong, but what the heck.  The guy, whose name I've
   forgotten (are you out there anywhere?)

David Husband.

bevan
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: dnichols@d-and-d.com (DoN. Nichols)
Subject: Re: "Stringy Floppy"
Organization: D and D Data, Vienna VA
Date: Sun, 10 Jan 1993 00:11:28 GMT

In article <1993Jan9.201706.27670@EE.Stanford.EDU> siegman@EE.Stanford.EDU (Anthony E. Siegman) writes:
>   Among the collection of bizarre early computer artifacts is the
>"Stringy Floppy" (that was its product name) that was once marketed in
>the Northern California area.  
>
>   The Stringy Floppy was a little box that connected to a TRS-80
>Model I Level II (although the bus extender cables for connecting

	[ ... ]

>>various peripherals to the TRS-80 were almost impossible to find) and
>contained a small tape recorder which accepted the small endless loop
>tape cassettes used in mini-dictaphones (I guess I'm not really sure
>it was an endless loop; maybe you had to rewind).

>   I had one; does anyone else recall this?

	I never actually saw one (I'm on the East Coast), but I remember the
device being written up in Interface Age, or Byte, and I believe that it was
usable with more than just the TRS-80.  I seem to remember that it was
available for the SWTP 6800, and other machines of the time.  (However, I
wasn't going to order one till I could see a source of tapes locally.  They
weren't described as being answering-machine tapes, or I might have
considered the availability to be higher.)

-- 
 Email:   <dnichols@d-and-d.com>  |  ...!uunet!ceilidh!dnichols 
		 <dnichols@ceilidh.beartrack.com>
 Donald Nichols (DoN.)  |   Voice (Days): (703) 704-2280 (Eves): (703) 938-4564
	--- Black Holes are where God is dividing by zero ---
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,sci.math
From: hrubin@pop.stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
Subject: Re: Normal numbers (was Re: Number of numbers (Was Re: PI))
Organization: Purdue University Statistics Department
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1993 17:52:16 GMT

In article <1993Jan4.134805.25742@infodev.cam.ac.uk> sl25@cus.cam.ac.uk (Steve Linton) writes:
>In article <1993Jan4.134418.25602@infodev.cam.ac.uk>, gjm11@cus.cam.ac.uk (G.J. McCaughan) writes:
>|> In article <1993Jan4.131015.4890@pollux.lu.se> magnus@thep.lu.se (Magnus Olsson) writes:

>|> >However, now that I've come to think of it, I'm not 100% sure that
>|> >even that condition is sufficient for pseudo-randomness. Does anybody
>|> >have a counterexample - a number where the decimal expansion
>|> >follows some simple rule, but all N-digit sequences have the same
>|> >probability of appearing?

>|> Yes. 0.12345678910111213141516171819202122...100101102103104105106...
>|> (write down all the positive integers in order and stick 'em together).

>I don't think this works.  Apart from the nees for a careful definition of
>probability (what limit are you taking), I think sequences containing zeroes are
>probably unfairly excluded, as each number begins with a non-zero.

This does work, as the criteria are asymptotic.  When one is dealing with
longer and longer digit strings, such as million-digit, billion-digit, etc.,
that each one starts with a non-zero becomes irrelevant.

-- 
Herman Rubin, Dept. of Statistics, Purdue Univ., West Lafayette IN47907-1399
Phone: (317)494-6054
hrubin@snap.stat.purdue.edu (Internet, bitnet)  
{purdue,pur-ee}!snap.stat!hrubin(UUCP)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,sci.math
From: pratt@Sunburn.Stanford.EDU (Vaughan R. Pratt)
Subject: Re: Number of numbers (Was Re: PI)
Organization: Computer Science Department,  Stanford University.
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 05:24:02 GMT

In article <1993Jan5.020509.18268@infodev.cam.ac.uk> gjm11@cus.cam.ac.uk (G.J. McCaughan) writes:
>In article <1993Jan4.232723.3685@smsc.sony.com> markc@smsc.sony.com (Mark Corscadden) writes:
>>Suppose you define a real number to be "primitive recursive" if there is
>>a primitive recursive function which computes the Nth decimal digit as
>>a function of N.  Same for a "total recursive" real number.
>
>>Does anyone know whether PI is primitive recursive by the definition above?
>
>Sorry; pi is primitive recursive. [...]

How do you reconcile this with:

>Incidentally, one point no one's mentioned with regard to the definition
>of computable numbers: suppose you have an algorithm for approximating a
>number x, which gives you upper and lower bounds for x which are arbitrarily
>close together. I would then say that x is computable; but this would not
>necessarily enable you to get the decimal digits of x. Suppose, for instance,
>that the bounds the program gives for x are of the form 1/2+h, 1/2-h; then
>you can't tell whether it should start .500000 or .499999, so with the defns
>given already the program wouldn't make x computable...
>Actually, this doesn't matter because for any irrational number you can get
>arbitrarily many decimals if you can get arbitrarily good approximations,
>and all rational numbers are computable anyway.

The argument in the last sentence isn't enough to show that pi is
primitive recursive as defined above.  If for every primitive recursive
f there exists n such that digits n through n+f(n) of pi are either all
9's or all 0's, then your precision argument isn't enough as it stands.
-- 
Vaughan Pratt				There's safety in certain numbers.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: markz@ssc.com (Mark Zenier)
Subject: Re: VCS processor (was Re: Game machine processors)
Organization: SSC, Inc.,  Seattle, WA
Date: Mon, 04 Jan 1993 20:00:37 GMT
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]

Peter da Silva (peter@NeoSoft.com) wrote:
: In article <8505@charon.cwi.nl> dik@cwi.nl (Dik T. Winter) writes:
: >  > In <1993Jan2.180042.1@kean.ucs.mun.ca> jbridson@kean.ucs.mun.ca writes:
: >  > >I forget the name of the VCS's CPU, but I do remember it was 6-bit,
: >  > >with 12-bit address.
: 
: I don't know of any 6-bit micros, but sounds like it *could* be a PDP-8
: clone chip (waits for cjl to put his oar in). That and the 4004 or TMS-1000
: are the only non-8-, non-16- bit chips I can think of.

There were several early oddities around in the mid 70's.  One was
a sort of PDP-11 clone from General Instruments that was a 10 bit/16 bit
processor.  The data memories needed to be 16 bits, but they only
used 10 bits for instructions, so you could use the 10 bit wide
ROMS they made for it.  I remember the number as {something}-1600.

Mark Zenier  markz@ssc.wa.com  

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: Jeremy_Reimer@mindlink.bc.ca (Jeremy Reimer)
Subject: Re: CLI/GUI wars (was Re: Apple IIGS being discontinued...)
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 1993 10:54:03 GMT

> Matthias Neeracher writes:
>
> Msg-ID: <NEERI.93Jan6141523@iis.ethz.ch>
> Posted: Wed, 6 Jan 1993 13:15:23
>
> Org.  : Integrated Systems Laboratory, ETH, Zurich
>
> In article <19270@mindlink.bc.ca>, Charlie_Gibbs@mindlink.bc.ca (Charlie
> Gibbs) writes:
>
> > In article <NEERI.93Jan5174107@iis.ethz.ch> neeri@iis.ethz.ch
> > (Matthias Neeracher) writes:
> [...]
> >>The Apple II [gs] team realized that the lIsa and Macintosh teams had
> simply
> >>traded ease of learning for ease of use in shrinking the scroll boxes, so
> >>they went back to proportional scroll boxes.
>
> >      This trade-off is consistent with the apparent target audience
> > for the Mac: people who know little about computers and who are
> > unlikely to become that familiar with them (i.e. "the rest of us").
> > Ease of learning is important if you're dealing with people who will
> > never use a machine enough to really learn it, and who must therefore
> > relearn a lot of it every time.  I much prefer the worms, though.
> > They're more intuitive; a large worm can't move very far in the
> > scroll box, just you can't slide a document very far when nearly
> > all of it is on the screen.  In fact, I find it disconcerting when
> > a large movement of a scroll box moves the text on the screen very
> > little.
>
> I am somewhat familiar with computers :-), but I have no complaints
> about Apple's scroll bars, as I rarely ever use them anyway (Mostly, I
> just use keyboard equivalents). *If* I use them, I am more likely to use
> the
> arrows and the paging (gray) areas than the scroll box, and in these two
> cases,
> the above observation does not apply.


Perhaps you might use the scroll bars more if they were
scaling/sliding/proportional/whatever.  In the days when I used Windoze, I
never used scroll bars either because you never knew how they would behave,
whether they would move the document a little or a lot.  I found them an
annoyance and always used keyboard equivalents.

When I upgraded to OS/2, I found I started using scroll bars a lot more.  It
seems like such a little, trivial thing but it isn't.  Of course, it's nice
to have them done properly in 3D as well (IE "pushed down" when clicked and
held)


--
Jeremy_Reimer@ |"It turned out, as N-Man discovered later, that the black
mindlink.bc.ca | boat hadn't been after him at all.  It was full of riotous,
---------------| unemployed former James Bond villains enraged at the fall
aka THE JAGUAR!| of Communism in the Soviet Union."
---------------|
Stealth Sig#69 |  --From "N-Man #3: N-Man on Holiday"

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: dbrooks@osf.org (David Brooks)
Subject: Re: Operating System Destiny
Organization: Open Software Foundation
Distribution: usa
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 13:51:16 GMT

Actually, Dave Cutler's original claim to fame was RSX.  But he didn't
want to name his new OS after that, and have people joking about what a
hog it is...
-- 
David Brooks					dbrooks@osf.org
Open Software Foundation			uunet!osf.org!dbrooks
Shine out, fair sun, with all your heat!  Black winter freezes to his seat...
The boneless fish close quaking lies...the stars in icicles arise!
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: slb22@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (Seth "the Lesser")
Subject: Re: VCS processor (was Re: Game machine processors)
Organization: Generic American College Kids (G.A.C.K.)
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 1993 09:47:05 GMT
Reply-To: slb22@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (Seth "the Lesser")
X-Posted-From: cunixb.cc.columbia.edu
NNTP-Posting-Host: sol.ctr.columbia.edu

markz@ssc.wa.com (Mark Zenier) writes:
>
>There were several early oddities around in the mid 70's.  One was
>a sort of PDP-11 clone from General Instruments that was a 10 bit/16 bit
>processor.  The data memories needed to be 16 bits, but they only
>used 10 bits for instructions, so you could use the 10 bit wide
>ROMS they made for it.  I remember the number as {something}-1600.

That would be the CP-1600.  I believe the Intellivision may have used it (I
only had an Atari VCS, so I wouldn't know).  I have a book from Osborne that
includes architecture, instruction set, and timing data sheets for a whole
buncha weird stuff, including the CP-1600 (and the TMS-9900, and the AMI
2900-series bit-slices, as well as the 8086 and the 68000).  It's actually a
decent processor.  Among other odd features, it had five pins dedicated to a
single instruction, which outputted a four-bit immediate on four dedicated
pins, presumably intended to drive an external mux, and branched conditional
on a dedicated input pin.  *Made* for video games.  Never intended for
anything else.  The serial chips suck.

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.

Seth L. Blumberg          \ Warning: This posting has been determined to cause
slb22@columbia.edu (play)   \ cancer in laboratory animals.  Please make sure
sethb@ctr.columbia.edu (work) \ that no white mice are allowed to read it.  
    > No one I know shares my opinions, least of all Columbia University. <
From: wb8foz@skybridge.SCL.CWRU.Edu (David Lesher)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Digigal Rainbow 100?
Date: 11 Jan 1993 00:05:53 GMT
Organization: NRK Clinic for habitual NetNews abusers - Beltway Annex
Reply-To: wb8foz@skybridge.scl.cwru.edu (David Lesher)
NNTP-Posting-Host: skybridge.scl.cwru.edu
Keywords: digital, DEC, Rainbow 100

There's a newsgroup to check out for Rainbow stuff...
comp.sys.dec.micro, I believe.....

--
A host is a host from coast to coast..wb8foz@skybridge.scl.cwru.edu
& no one will talk to a host that's close..........................
Unless the host (that isn't close).........................pob 1433
is busy, hung or dead....................................20915-1433
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.arch,comp.sys.intel
From: leo@rulhp1.leidenuniv.nl (L. Mekenkamp)
Subject: Re: NeXTstep not running on Cyrix 486DLC (was Re: Apple IIGS...)
Organization:  Dept. of Mathematics and Computer Science ; Univ. of Leiden ; the Netherlands
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 93 15:28:43 GMT


aj923@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (P. J. Remner) writes:
>In a previous article, rmk@rmkhome.UUCP (Rick Kelly) says:
>>
>>Just remember that this is the first commercial OS package that is meant
>>to only run on a 486.  It won't run on a 386, as a 386 doesn't have bswap.
>>

>No wonder.  The 486DLC is just a 386 with a 1k cache and a coprocessor.
>
>I don't know how many people were suckered into buying the 486DLC, thinking
>that they were getting 486 performance at ultra-low cost.

WRONG on 2 points . 1: The 486DLC IS a 486 with 386 interface. 
The 486DLC does have intructions
that the 386 lacks. 2: The 486DLC does not have a copro on chip.

If you don't know what you are talking about, then please do not talk at all.

And about those people you call suckers: a friend of mine sold approx 100 486DLC
based PC. All, and I repeat *ALL* of the customers ar VERY satisfied with
their machines, which btw have also a Cyrix copro plugged in.

I agree that the 486DLC isn't a i486DX, but it gives people w/less money
a GOOD alternative.

Leo Mekenkamp
Leiden University, The Netherlands
Mekenkamp@RulWinWST.Leidenuniv.NL
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Hardware form of cargo cult programming
From: pgut1@cs.aukuni.ac.nz (Peter Gutmann)
Date: Sun, 10 Jan 1993 11:03:11 GMT
Organization: Computer Science Dept. University of Auckland

I was reading through a collection of old quotes I keep lying around and came
across the following reference to a hardware form of cargo cult programming:
 
    "I'm not sure what the 2.2k resistor actually does, but where this sort
     of circuitry is used, the manufacturers seem to like using such a series
     resistor, so I thought I'd use one too"
     
                - 'The Serviceman', Electronics Australia, September 1990, p.46
                  (The Serviceman is a regular column featuring war stories
                   from an electronics serviceman.  This is possibly written
                   by more than one person, since I remember a Serviceman
                   column going back to the mid '60's).
 
I wouldn't be surprised if cargo cult electronic engineering were a lot more
common than the programming equivalent - it's quite common to see curcuit
components which seem to have no use whatsoever, but use them "just in case" -
I've been guilty of this myself as often as not.  Possibly this is due to the
fact that in a program the use of unnecessary code is easier to determine than
in other situations.
 
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 'em's bound to work)
               -- Surgeon-General's Warning:  Intel inside! --