Red Hat's take:

[John Perry]

Ken Jennings wrote:
> ...  But they only do that when they're too lazy to flip the switches by
> hand on their Altairs.
>

Hey, I did that! Well the bootloader, at least -- on Digital PDP-8,
PDP-11, HP 2100, hp21mx, General Automation SPC-16, ...

And probably others I can't remember offhand.  And the bootloader loaded
the absolute binary assembly language program from the paper tape.

Until later, when NASA went deluxe and bought the 14" 5MB hard drives.
Then I had much longer bootloaders to key in.


--

John Perry
Embedded Electronics
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[PerfectReign]

On Thursday 09 November 2006 19:19, Doug McGarrett wrote:

> At 09:46 PM 11/9/2006 -0500, Ken Jennings wrote:
> >Content-Disposition: inline
> >
> >On Thursday 09 November 2006 21:25, James Knott wrote:
> >> Darryl Gregorash wrote:
> >> > On 09/11/06 06:59, Carlos E. R. wrote:
> >> >> The Thursday 2006-11-09 at 06:55 -0500, James Knott wrote:
> >> >>> Try to buy anyone's Pascal.  It appears to be a dead language these
> >> >>
> >> >> days.
> >> >>
> >> >> There is a gnu version of pascal, and there is also "Free Pascal" (
> >> >> http://www.freepascal.org/). Then, there is also Lazarus
> >> >> (http://www.lazarus.freepascal.org/), that emulates Delphi.
> >> >>
> >> >> When I code something, I do it in Pascal.
> >> >
> >> > I thought real programmers write code at the command line: in DOStalk,
> >> > copy con filename.exe
> >>
> >> No, real programmers write directly to punch cards, using only their pen
> >> knife.  ;-)
> >
> >No, no, no.  Real programmers use a bent paper clip to punch holes in
> > paper tape.  But they only do that when they're too lazy to flip the
> > switches by hand on their Altairs.
>
> I love it!  You guys should go on the Letterman show, or something.
> But I must tell you that I kept a 4" diameter roll of paper tape, punched
> on a model 35, for over 30 years, in my desk, thinking it might come
> in handy someday.  Of course, it never did, and when I retired, I threw
> it out.  OTOH, I once went to a seminar where switch programming was
> demonstrated.  When computing was a baby, you really could do it
> yourself.  I bet most of the pioneers once had a Commodore. Altho the
> richer ones probably had a Radio Shack.  Remember them? The company
> I worked for then had a bunch of secretaries typing in manuals on
> TRS-80's. (I think that was the number.)  I guess that was even before
> CPM, altho not by an awful lot.

This is going way OT, but the TRS-80 was CPM, IIRC.

Here's mine, which is still on my desk...

http://www.perfectreign.com/stuff/trs80_level1_4kb-sm.jpg

...thought it isn't powered up. :)

On topic, I have thought about it and plan to stick with SUSE at least until
someone tells me a really valid reason I should yank it. Yeah, I see the
ethical choice, but there's no pratical reason at the moment.


--
kai
www.perfectreign.com || www.4thedadz.com

a turn signal is a statement, not a request

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[James Knott]

Doug McGarrett wrote:

> At 09:46 PM 11/9/2006 -0500, Ken Jennings wrote:
>> Content-Disposition: inline
>>
>> On Thursday 09 November 2006 21:25, James Knott wrote:
>>> Darryl Gregorash wrote:
>>>> On 09/11/06 06:59, Carlos E. R. wrote:
>>>>> The Thursday 2006-11-09 at 06:55 -0500, James Knott wrote:
>>>>>> Try to buy anyone's Pascal.  It appears to be a dead language these
>>>>> days.
>>>>>
>>>>> There is a gnu version of pascal, and there is also "Free Pascal" (
>>>>> http://www.freepascal.org/). Then, there is also Lazarus
>>>>> (http://www.lazarus.freepascal.org/), that emulates Delphi.
>>>>>
>>>>> When I code something, I do it in Pascal.
>>>> I thought real programmers write code at the command line: in DOStalk,
>>>> copy con filename.exe
>>> No, real programmers write directly to punch cards, using only their pen
>>> knife.  ;-)
>> No, no, no.  Real programmers use a bent paper clip to punch holes in paper
>> tape.  But they only do that when they're too lazy to flip the switches by
>> hand on their Altairs.
>>
> I love it!  You guys should go on the Letterman show, or something.
> But I must tell you that I kept a 4" diameter roll of paper tape, punched
> on a model 35, for over 30 years, in my desk, thinking it might come
> in handy someday.  Of course, it never did, and when I retired, I threw
> it out.  OTOH, I once went to a seminar where switch programming was
> demonstrated.  When computing was a baby, you really could do it
> yourself.  I bet most of the pioneers once had a Commodore. Altho the
> richer ones probably had a Radio Shack.  Remember them? The company
> I worked for then had a bunch of secretaries typing in manuals on
> TRS-80's. (I think that was the number.)  I guess that was even before
> CPM, altho not by an awful lot.

My first computer was an IMSAI 8080, a better quality clone of the
Altair 8800 and often used the front panel switches.

Also, CP/M was around before the Trash-80.  ;-)

I never had a Commie 64 or other Commodore computer.

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[James Knott]

John E. Perry wrote:

> Ken Jennings wrote:
>> ...  But they only do that when they're too lazy to flip the switches by
>> hand on their Altairs.
>>
>
> Hey, I did that! Well the bootloader, at least -- on Digital PDP-8,
> PDP-11, HP 2100, hp21mx, General Automation SPC-16, ...
>
> And probably others I can't remember offhand.  And the bootloader loaded
> the absolute binary assembly language program from the paper tape.
>
> Until later, when NASA went deluxe and bought the 14" 5MB hard drives.
> Then I had much longer bootloaders to key in.
>
>

Ah yes, the PDP-8 RIM loader.  Brings back (core) memories.  ;-)

Incidentally, I still have a core memory plane (4 Kbits IIRC) from a
Collins 8500B.



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