Re: [libreoffice-users] Re: LibreOffice is listed as an educational software for math

On 05/24/2012 12:14 PM, Joep L. Blom wrote:
> On 24-05-12 16:06, Tony Sumner wrote:
> > On May 24, 2012, Jay Lozier wrote:
> >
> > > This trip down memory lane makes one feeil old. Anyone remember
> > > teletypes with punched tape?
> >
> > Of course. My favourite paper tape story. At AEE, Winfrith, we did
> > serious computing on the IBM704 at Risley in Lancashire. We would type
> > the program onto paper tape and run it though a teletype to send it by
> > phone to Risley. At their end they would punch it out and to check that
> > it was ok they would send it back. At the Winfrith end we then had the
> > original tape and a copy and we would hold these up to the light to
> > check for errors. If there were none we'd phone Risley and say yes ok
> > go ahead.  This was a communication protocol, yes? Later we installed a
> > punched card system so we could put the program on cards and fly them
> > to Risley by plane.
> >
> > Tony
> I assume you never worked with the folded papertape used with the DEC 
> PDP-8! coded in ASCII. Years before we used an  Electrologica X-1 with 
> papertape coded in EBSDIC!You could edit the tapes with a manual punch 
> and nontransparent sellotape. We thought punched cards were 
> old-fashioned!.
> Joep
DEC PDP 11 and similar was most of my main-frame and mini-main-frame 
work back in the 80's and early 90's.  I used  IBM main-frames in the 
late 70's bunch cards and dumb terminals in then in late 90's with 
terminals dumb and smart.  In the mid 70's I used a teletype style 
printer/terminal connected via phone to a computer 50+ miles way, for my 
first coding experience, then went to punch cards before I ever got to 
use a dumb terminal CRT display and text editor to type in and edit 
program code for COBOL, FORTRAN, BASIC, RPG-II/III, Assembly, and a few 
other languages.   Now people use PCs with "smart" color coded editors 
to help them code, edit, and debug their programs.

I wrote an RPG-III coding editor so it would be easier to line up the 
cryptic codes in their proper columns.  It was well received at that 
place that used RPG-II/III.  It took half the time to type in the 
programs in the dumb terminals.

I started my computer work experience when most computers I had 
"terminal" access to, or had to load tapes for, were bigger than all my 
apartment rooms combined, and then some.  I worked a terminal with one 
that used more floor space than a basketball court.  I remember when a 
college put up a Bulletin Board System [via phone modems] that had a 
brand new 10 MEG of drive space and the people could not think of why it 
needed so much space to store files.  10 MEG was too large to imagine 
using.  Those were the days when floppies were floppy.

---

Well we really went off thread topic with this one.

As I stated in the original post, it was interesting that LO was listed 
under free Math software.

Now it seems we are talking about the "grand old days" of computers 
before they could fit on a desk.

I still know many people who do not have the money to buy a computer or 
if they have one be able to get online with broadband.  In the '50 it 
was thought there was no need for more than 50 to 100 computers in the 
whole USA.  Now there are millions of them in the USA, with people like 
me having several desktops/laptops running side by side when needed.  
Then add their smart phones, tablet phones, and the wifi reader/tablet 
non-phones that people [and kids] thing are a requirement it their 
lives.  Well, this generation does not appreciate what their fathers and 
grandfathers had to deal with when they were working with computers in 
those early years when the smallest computer was the size of a stove or 
refrigerator.



--
For unsubscribe instructions e-mail to: users+help@global.libreoffice.org
Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/
Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette
List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/global/users/
All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted