Linux is KING - Couldn't be hacked - Mac, Vista went down in flames

[Richard England]

Les wrote:
> On Tue, 2008-04-01 at 20:36 -0700, Richard England wrote:
>   
>> BRUCE STANLEY wrote:
>>     
>>> */Tim <ignored_mailbox at yahoo.com.au>/* wrote:
>>>
>>>     Tim:
>>>     >> have the CPU op-code cheat sheet in the coat pocket... ;-)
>>>
>>>     Les:
>>>     > I memorized it and threw it away. Does that mean I fail the test?
>>>
>>>     If you code in pen and ink before even going near the computer, that
>>>     counts.
>>>
>>>     Back when I were a lad, we didn't use no debugger. We'd print the
>>>     code,
>>>     and attack the printout with pencils out to mark all the bugs and
>>>     corrections, then type the changes back in.
>>>
>>>     Tim, waiting for one of the old codgers to tell us a tale of how they
>>>     had to make the valves and warm them up before starting... ;-)
>>>
>>> =========
>>>
>>> Type them in?  I remember punching them in on  Hollerith cards.
>>>
>>> Dropped a pile of them once. 
>>>
>>> That motivated me to have the punch card machine to put sequence numbers
>>> on the cards so that they could be resorted again.
>>> punch card machine
>>>       
>> Try dropping two trays , each about 2.5 feet long.  They did that to me 
>> in the data center when I was in grad school.  Luckily I had just 
>> printed they contents out and resequenced them.  The manager of the data 
>> center had a cow when I told the staff to put the deck back together, 
>> but my advisor (bless him) stood behind me and insisted that if they had 
>> taken due care it wouldn't have happened.
>>
>> Ah cards, loved 'em (not).  And drum cards. Boy there was an arcane art!
>>
>> ~~R
>>
>>     
> Did you have the diagonal line drawn on the top to help?
>
> If they were Fortran, or COBOL, you could always sort on the line
> number.  I don't remember the other languages having line numbers.
>
> Regards,
> Les H
>
>   
Yes, they were lined with a double line. But what made it easier for the 
date center to reassemble was that this was the first "run" after I had 
repunched the whole deck and put brand new sequence numbers on the cards.

BTW, columns 73-80 of the punch cards were ignored in Fortran so after 
we had a good "production" quality program, we would have it punched by 
the system card punch and have the cards sequentially number in those 
columns.  

We were running research simulations so the program stayed constant and 
only the data portion of the deck was changing, only about 30-40 cards, 
if I recall.

Simulating rolling tires to reduce friction due to flexing of the tire 
construct.  Now there was a research project.... :-)


~~R