🚀 go-pugleaf

>>You had a DISC?  New Mexico Tech's first machine had no disc
>>storage at all!  It was a 360/40 running TOS, Tape Operating
>>System, and it had no operator console (operator messages
>>came out on the line printer).

I'm fortunate enough to have always used systems with a disk.
Even the old LGP21 with discrete transistors and NO CORE used a
fixed head disk (just like a drum, only flatter).
It was a serial machine: the display for accumulator/PC/instr reg
was an oscilloscope.
The registers were continuously read/written
to the outermost tracks of the disk.
The read head was the register length BEHIND the write head,
thus constantly recirculating the memory.
It was a pleasure taking that thing apart after using it a week and
realizing how it was thoroughly obsolete, preventing anybody else
from wasting time on it.  I gained an appreciation of why SOAP was
a good ting for its time.

I've read about how to shuffle cards/paper tape for multiple
passes, and I'm glad I didn't have to endure that.

tn...@bfmny0.BFM.COM (Tom Neff) posted
>This was in the days when people got useful WORK done with computers, of
>course.  We have evolved far beyond that today.
[stuff deleted]
>When submitting a job was worth a
>day of your time and real dollars out of your budget, you made damn sure
>you had a valid job and a valid reason to submit it.
>
>Nowadays we have all been "liberated" by miraculously advanced computers
>on our very own desks and in our very own labs -- computers so flexible,
>powerful and responsive they can literally do anything our imaginations
>can conceive.  As a result, we sit around all day tinkering with editor
>macros and advertising used kayaks for sale.

I learned programming as part of the high school math classes.
We used a batch machine and approached programming like
a lab experiment: plan what we wanted to do/prove,
plan HOW to do it, implement a plan, try it and anticipate
the results, iterate until the results are achieved,
and then STOP.

The computer was a tool used as part of the process.
It was not a justification unto itself.
As such, I've never seen computers as toys nor enjoyed computer games.

I am intensely curious and read the manuals and experiment
with the odder functions even if there's no direct need.
I never said I was entirely focused in my efforts.
I do it to learn and satisfy my cusiousity, not for amusement.

For example: the processor for a RWR I worked on allowed the result
of an arithmetic operation to be put directly into execution
register.  Having used the IBM 360's "execute" instruction before, I
thought this a useful way to extend the instruction set.
I wrote a test program that added the contents to the address field
of an instruction to a register, in effect making an indexed instruction.
Yes, there were indexed indtructions but only 2 index registers.
Rather than shuffle index registers, I could use a general purpose
register for indexing too.
This was frowned upon as "self modifying code".
A valid objection to such practices is that the result goes
register to register, never going to the bus.
The front panel only monitored the bus, so there was no way to
see the instruction generated.

Jeffrey Jonas
jeffj@synsys.uucp