June 2016 - vcf-midatlantic

Workshop breakfast tomorrow
by Evan Koblentz 12 Jun '16

12 Jun '16

For anybody who didn't stay here tonight or who is arriving tomorrow: we will meet for breakfast at the Princess Maria Dinner (on Rt. 35 in Wall Township) at 9:00am. Probably back at the museum around 10:30ish.

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"floppy drive pot luck" at the June workshop?
by Steven Michelsen 10 Jun '16

10 Jun '16

I am planning to come to the June workshop this weekend, in the hopes that someone can help me diagnose my smokin' hot (literally) Eagle PC. I found a seller on ebay who is local to me, that just sold a lot of 5.25" floppy drives for $7 each. He has 13 more of them that he was planning to put up for auction. He says that they were all pulled from PCs on their way to recycling, and they have not been tested. They are all half-height drives. He is willing to sell me the pile for $6 each. I will pick up the other 13 drives if enough folks who will be at the event this weekend are willing to put up $6 each for one or more of them. I will keep a few myself; there will be about 10 up for grabs. Who's in? The seller has given me a day to gauge your interest in this stuff. If this email violates some sort of "no commerce" mandate, I apologize. I am not looking to make anything on all this; just looking to share what seems like a good deal. Steve

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Re: [vcf-midatlantic] "floppy drive pot luck" at the June workshop
by Steven Michelsen 10 Jun '16

10 Jun '16

OK I just bought the lot. Whatever is left over I can always keep or put up on ebay. I hope to be there tomorrow 1pm or so. Steve -----Original Message----- From: vcf-midatlantic [mailto:vcf-midatlantic-bounces@lists.vintagecomputerfederation.org] On Behalf Of Dean Notarnicola via vcf-midatlantic Sent: Friday, June 10, 2016 3:38 PM To: vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic(a)lists.vintagecomputerfederation.org> Cc: Dean Notarnicola <dnotarnicola(a)gmail.com> Subject: Re: [vcf-midatlantic] "floppy drive pot luck" at the June workshop? I'll take at least one; more if they are 360K On Friday, June 10, 2016, william degnan via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic(a)lists.vintagecomputerfederation.org> wrote: > Steve, > That's very on-topic, thanks for the suggestion. Hopefully someone > will want them b > > On Fri, Jun 10, 2016 at 3:18 PM, Steven Michelsen via vcf-midatlantic > < vcf-midatlantic(a)lists.vintagecomputerfederation.org <javascript:;>> wrote: > > > I am planning to come to the June workshop this weekend, in the > > hopes > that > > someone can help me diagnose my smokin' hot (literally) Eagle PC. > > > > > > > > I found a seller on ebay who is local to me, that just sold a lot of > 5.25" > > floppy drives for $7 each. He has 13 more of them that he was > > planning > to > > put up for auction. He says that they were all pulled from PCs on their > > way to recycling, and they have not been tested. They are all > half-height > > drives. He is willing to sell me the pile for $6 each. > > > > > > > > I will pick up the other 13 drives if enough folks who will be at > > the > event > > this weekend are willing to put up $6 each for one or more of them. I > > will > > keep a few myself; there will be about 10 up for grabs. Who's in? The > > seller has given me a day to gauge your interest in this stuff. > > > > > > > > If this email violates some sort of "no commerce" mandate, I apologize. > I > > am not looking to make anything on all this; just looking to share > > what seems like a good deal. > > > > > > > > Steve > > > > > > > -- > @ BillDeg: > Web: vintagecomputer.net > Twitter: @billdeg <https://twitter.com/billdeg> > Youtube: @billdeg <https://www.youtube.com/user/billdeg> > Unauthorized Bio <http://www.vintagecomputer.net/readme.cfm> >

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bunch-o-replies
by Jeffrey Jonas 10 Jun '16

10 Jun '16

I get the digest version so I'm replying to everything I just read: From: VAXman(a)tmesis.org > Also, the GUI -- guarantee user ignorance That's a good one *ker-quote* *** Neil Cherry: > I really see no merit to teaching some programming lingo > but I do see merit in developing a logical/programming mindset > to get from point A (input) the point B (output). I misread that as "from port A input to port B output". But I'll make my point anyway: even BASIC had PEEK and POKE for hardware specific twiddling. Most Apple ][ folks had the Beagle Brothers posters and cheat-sheets for hardware specific tweaks and configurations. Now it's all an "app" or utility. No understanding required. *** Bill Sudbrink: > We get job candidates with CS degrees from reputable universities > who don't know what a register is I'm still wrestling with how to explain "what is a register" without using the word "register". Saying it's "special memory" doesn't convey how it's so different from RAM or ROM. *** Dean Notarnicola > ... I knew plenty of Cobol programmers back in the day > who knew practically zero about how or why the underlying systems worked. My dad worked on mainframes since the 50s. Cobol was his bread-and-butter but he also had to know peripheral specifics to make them sing and dance. He still remembers details of the Analex printer required to make it work at full tilt because printing labels was one of his assignments. Things people proudly claim as "hacks" were just common requirements of the job "back then". My dad knew machine code and assemblers. He has reference cards for Autocoder and other ancient tongues because before source code debuggers, all you got was a core dump and the error exception. IBM mainframes gave an ABEND code, register dump and a core dump. The programmer manually figured out what instruction gave the error, crawling around the data segment as required to figure the full context. Huge tables were often covered in fanfold to trace all the pieces. *** chrisjpf33(a)gmail.com > And that is why we have garbage software today! Thus Java: write once, debug everywhere. I've seen embedded crapware, such as a Dlink home router that emitted the most horrendous HTML it was my displeasure to view. Despite claiming "Linux compatible", some administrative menus were IE only, as if the firmware was created by someone using M$ building blocks. *** re: not learning what's under the hood I'm kinda guilty-as-charged. I had an assignment on IBM system 3 where I took a black-box lego-building-block approach since time was limited. I learned RPG, OCL (the system's primitive JCL) and the system utilities. Everything required for program development and machine administration, but never got deeper into the machine architecture. McGuire's ribbed me for that since it's a wonderful machine. I don't think the client would've appreciated my frobbing the CE panel :-) I made up for that by learning the Z80 and IBM 1130. *** Evan: > I'd be interested in seeing how the percentage of college freshman > choosing the EE major changes over time for the past few decades. And what constitutes an EE major now vs. 'then'? I'm not up to date on ABET accreditation but degree requirements are a moving target. I had just missed learning tubes and using a slide rule. The motor/generator lab was abandoned only a few years earlier because nobody taught it. The curriculum emphasized math, solid state physics and silicon devices. Interdisciplinary engineering is now not only tolerated but encouraged. Simulation tools such as MATLAB are considered essential foundations. Today's EE degree is quite different from that of only a few years ago. As Christopher Blackmon already replied: > The college I went to (NC State Univ) > offers a CPE (Computer Engineering) degree that (at least was) > a simple hybrid of CSC & EE re: Storage is basically free now. Not when you're using a system-on-chip such as the Arduino. The popular AT-Tiny takes everything several steps smaller. *** re: Tony Bogan > 99% of the people never have and never will > know how to fix a car, or even a bike. I'm forced to agree, kinda. A 3 speed bike was my primary vehicle for many years, with daily use for a paper route. I changed snapped cables, flats, snapped chains but never had to dig into the shifter. It's reminiscent of the Monty Python "Bicycle Repairman" skit where a town of all superheroes have no such basic skills. Just consider how many folks cannot even change a car tire, depending entirely on roadside service. When it's available quickly, okay, it's nice. But there are times and places you're out of range. And then what? -- jeff jonas

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auctions update
by Evan Koblentz 10 Jun '16

10 Jun '16

As of this morning, the Apple II is above $3,000 and the Sol-20 is above $2,000. Anybody want to guess how high they'll sell?

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It's alive!
by Evan Koblentz 09 Jun '16

09 Jun '16

List has come back to life.

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List test. Please disregard.
by MailmanLists Listgnome 09 Jun '16

09 Jun '16

08:04 AEST 2016-06-10 List test. Please disregard.

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Still not working ...????
by Evan Koblentz 09 Jun '16

09 Jun '16

Sad to say that all day has gone by and I haven't heard back from the list company. :(

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efficiency, put another way
by Herb Johnson 09 Jun '16

09 Jun '16

In the context of the previous discussion - which was about gleaning any values from, or interests today in, vintage computing - my strategy is to say that personal computing and minicomputing of the 1970's and into the 1980's was a *resource poor* environment. "Efficiency" in using scarce resources is a necessity, to get something done. As gains were made in memory, processor complexity, speed and storage capacity, these resources were fairly quickly maxed out - and then improved again, and again. Some of this stuff was crude, some of it was well crafted in the McGuire sense. But at some point - certainly over a decade ago, probably more - computing for most purposes, for most people, provided more than enough resources. Processor speed topped off (any faster and they'd cook). Memory was cheap. Storage was cheap. Even the Internet became cheap and common. There's powerful languages and environments for various domains. What became expensive? *People.* Programmer time, engineering time, production time. Craft is not cheap. Even time itself has become an expense. I call the 21st century a "resource rich* period of "computing" - it's odd to talk about computing now, it's like telling fish about water, it's just part of living. My point - It's hard to conserve when there's an (apparent) abundance. Resource-poor and people-cheap, to resource-rich but people-expensive. Bringing it back to vintage computing..... So one value of preserving vintage computing, is to remind us by example and fact, about the issues of "efficiency", from a time when we had no choice but to be efficient. the tools and methods from then, can be applied in principle now. Why bother? - for the reasons that Jonathan noted, there are times and situations where convenient in-efficiency bites us in the ass. Or as Dave McGuire noted, as a matter of quality. Current resources can be overtaxed when mis-used. Old-school methods and quick fixes don't work well when scaled too large. Smart tools used by the less-informed produce un-scalable results. And so on. Resource-poor to resource-rich; and now to maxed-out or inefficient. That's the argument. So we in vintage computing may be able to offer some perspective in how to solve problems of excessive, at least inefficient, use of resources. Or not....smarter software may be smarter than the programmers, and avoid the worst of these problems. Compared to the 1970's, we have computers now to program computers, they do it better than the worst engineers and programmers. This is annoying to us, who take pride in being smarter and more efficient. Also: old stuff is clunky, boring to many. Those are the counter-arguments. Herb Johnson -- Herbert R. Johnson, New Jersey USA http://www.retrotechnology.com OR .net

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Auction update
by Evan Koblentz 08 Jun '16

08 Jun '16

Bidding on the Apple II is beyond $3,000: http://www.ebay.com/itm/191890608380 Sol-20 is around $1,200: http://www.ebay.com/itm/191890605553

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