🚀 go-pugleaf

RS Wood wrote:

> Question for you DEC fans -
> 
> Back in '83 I was learning to program BASIC on a Commodore PET, saving up
> money to buy a Commodore 64, and getting excited about computers.  One
> thing that really impressed was a visit to a friend's father's office: he
> controlled HVAC services for a major university.  From his office, he
> showed me how he could remotely get readings of building temperatures
> across campus, turn things on/off/up/down using his computerized system,
> and so on. He gave me a print out (80- or 120-column dot matrix fanfold),
> that I kept for a while.
> 
> I'd always wondered what kind of system it was.
> 
> Fast forward to this year, and I'm going through a box of old family
> photos,
> and found a picture from that trip.  And our friend is sitting in front of
> what I now recognize as a DEC VT-100!
> 
> Now I'm wondering about the rest of the system.  The year was 1983: who
> sold computerized HVAC equipment back then - probably wasn't DEC
> themselves, was
> it?  Would this have run over a serial network?  Who made and serviced the
> node controllers that automated these systems, and how expensive would it
> have been?  Was it likely a VAX in the basement or a newer PDP?  And
> lastly,
> this would have predated ethernet, no?  What protocol was it running over?
> 
> All just curiosity, of course, but I'd love to know what else this
> ecosystem must have been composed of.
> 
> Thanks in advance.

It could have been an addressed device serial network.  

Some years ago I aquired through electronic surplus a couple of dozen 
"Accensor" boards, copyright 1976 by Powers Regulator Co,  The boards share 
a common bi-directional serial buss with addressing for 128 modules.  Most 
have a connector for a 10 bit ADC, a few had outputs.  The central 
controller seems like a Motorolla 68xx custom programmed to read addresses 
and reply to the main controller's 'ping'.  Seems to have been part # 
MC14469( Addressable Asynchronus Receiver/Transmitter ) with a custome 
'house' number printed on the chips.

I used several of them slightly rewired to control lights around the house.  
The master controller in my case was a TRS-100.  Anything with a simple 
serial interface and the right program can talk to them.  Was using them up 
until last year when the screen for the TRS-100 went out.  I may still 
revive the network with a more modern controller.

Freddy,
twiddling the bits.
-- 
Please wait, water will shut off.

/|>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>\|
/|  I may be demented                          \|
/|                      but I'm not crazy!     \|
/|<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<\|
*    SPAyM trap:  there is no X in my address   *

On Sun, 21 Jan 2018 21:18:31 +0000, RS Wood <r...@therandymon.com> wrote:
>Question for you DEC fans -
>
>Back in '83 I was learning to program BASIC on a Commodore PET, saving up
>money to buy a Commodore 64, and getting excited about computers.  One thing
>that really impressed was a visit to a friend's father's office: he
>controlled HVAC services for a major university.  From his office, he showed
>me how he could remotely get readings of building temperatures across
>campus, turn things on/off/up/down using his computerized system, and so on. 
>He gave me a print out (80- or 120-column dot matrix fanfold), that I kept
>for a while.
>
>I'd always wondered what kind of system it was.
>
>Fast forward to this year, and I'm going through a box of old family photos,
>and found a picture from that trip.  And our friend is sitting in front of
>what I now recognize as a DEC VT-100!

VT-100 terminals were a fairly popular product that might have been connected to
many kinds of computers,  That alone would not conclusively indicate that a DEC
machine was being used.


>Now I'm wondering about the rest of the system.  The year was 1983: who sold
>computerized HVAC equipment back then - probably wasn't DEC themselves, was
>it?

Certainly not.  It would have been third-party vendor who built their system
around DEC's hardware.


>Would this have run over a serial network?  Who made and serviced the
>node controllers that automated these systems, and how expensive would it
>have been?  Was it likely a VAX in the basement or a newer PDP?  

FYI, the PDP designation died in the '70s when the VAX was introduced; no newer
machines were ever so named.  If that HVAC system was based on a DEC machine --
and again, the VT-100 alone is not sufficient evidence that it was -- then it
was most likely a PDP-11, which was very widely used for industrial control
operations.

On Mon, 22 Jan 2018 09:02:06 +0000, Questor wrote:

> FYI, the PDP designation died in the '70s when the VAX was introduced;
> no newer machines were ever so named.

That would explain why I have two PDP-11 technical books dated 1983/84.

I also have a physical PDP-11/84, so labelled, and that model didn't 
appear until around 1984...

-- 
Using UNIX since v6 (1975)...

Use the BIG mirror service in the UK:
 http://www.mirrorservice.org

On 22 Jan 2018 09:18:57 GMT, Bob Eager <news...@eager.cx> wrote:
>On Mon, 22 Jan 2018 09:02:06 +0000, Questor wrote:
>> FYI, the PDP designation died in the '70s when the VAX was introduced;
>> no newer machines were ever so named.
>
>That would explain why I have two PDP-11 technical books dated 1983/84.
>
>I also have a physical PDP-11/84, so labelled, and that model didn't 
>appear until around 1984...

That's an instance of a new PDP-11, not an instance of a new machine.  The
original poster asked if it was "a VAX ... or a newer PDP."  Since DEC stopped
using the PDP designation, there are no newer PDPs.

Questor <usenet@only.tnx> wrote:
> On Sun, 21 Jan 2018 21:18:31 +0000, RS Wood <r...@therandymon.com> wrote:
>> Question for you DEC fans -
>> 
>> Back in '83 I was learning to program BASIC on a Commodore PET, saving up
>> money to buy a Commodore 64, and getting excited about computers.  One thing
>> that really impressed was a visit to a friend's father's office: he
>> controlled HVAC services for a major university.  From his office, he showed
>> me how he could remotely get readings of building temperatures across
>> campus, turn things on/off/up/down using his computerized system, and so on. 
>> He gave me a print out (80- or 120-column dot matrix fanfold), that I kept
>> for a while.
>> 
>> I'd always wondered what kind of system it was.
>> 
>> Fast forward to this year, and I'm going through a box of old family photos,
>> and found a picture from that trip.  And our friend is sitting in front of
>> what I now recognize as a DEC VT-100!
> 
> VT-100 terminals were a fairly popular product that might have been connected to
> many kinds of computers,  That alone would not conclusively indicate that a DEC
> machine was being used.
> 
> 
>> Now I'm wondering about the rest of the system.  The year was 1983: who sold
>> computerized HVAC equipment back then - probably wasn't DEC themselves, was
>> it?
> 
> Certainly not.  It would have been third-party vendor who built their system
> around DEC's hardware.
> 
> 
>> Would this have run over a serial network?  Who made and serviced the
>> node controllers that automated these systems, and how expensive would it
>> have been?  Was it likely a VAX in the basement or a newer PDP?  
> 
> FYI, the PDP designation died in the '70s when the VAX was introduced; 

What did they call  these boxes then?

> no newer
> machines were ever so named.  If that HVAC system was based on a DEC machine --
> and again, the VT-100 alone is not sufficient evidence that it was -- then it
> was most likely a PDP-11, which was very widely used for industrial control
> operations.
> 
> 



-- 
Pete

usenet@only.tnx (Questor) writes:

> On 22 Jan 2018 09:18:57 GMT, Bob Eager <news...@eager.cx> wrote:
>>On Mon, 22 Jan 2018 09:02:06 +0000, Questor wrote:
>>> FYI, the PDP designation died in the '70s when the VAX was introduced;
>>> no newer machines were ever so named.
>>
>>That would explain why I have two PDP-11 technical books dated 1983/84.
>>
>>I also have a physical PDP-11/84, so labelled, and that model didn't 
>>appear until around 1984...
>
> That's an instance of a new PDP-11, not an instance of a new machine.  The
> original poster asked if it was "a VAX ... or a newer PDP."  Since DEC stopped
> using the PDP designation, there are no newer PDPs.

The PDP 11/84 was introduced in 1988.  If that doesn't meet your
definition of a new machine, I don't understand your definition.

Joe Pfeiffer <pfei...@cs.nmsu.edu> writes:
>usenet@only.tnx (Questor) writes:
>
>> On 22 Jan 2018 09:18:57 GMT, Bob Eager <news...@eager.cx> wrote:
>>>On Mon, 22 Jan 2018 09:02:06 +0000, Questor wrote:
>>>> FYI, the PDP designation died in the '70s when the VAX was introduced;
>>>> no newer machines were ever so named.
>>>
>>>That would explain why I have two PDP-11 technical books dated 1983/84.
>>>
>>>I also have a physical PDP-11/84, so labelled, and that model didn't 
>>>appear until around 1984...
>>
>> That's an instance of a new PDP-11, not an instance of a new machine.  The
>> original poster asked if it was "a VAX ... or a newer PDP."  Since DEC stopped
>> using the PDP designation, there are no newer PDPs.
>
>The PDP 11/84 was introduced in 1988.  If that doesn't meet your
>definition of a new machine, I don't understand your definition.

I suspect he is distinguishing between a new model of
an existing line, versus a new line.

On Sun, 21 Jan 2018 21:18:31 +0000, RS Wood wrote:
>
> Question for you DEC fans -
>
> Back in '83 I was learning to program BASIC on a Commodore PET, saving up
> money to buy a Commodore 64, and getting excited about computers.  One thing
> that really impressed was a visit to a friend's father's office: he
> controlled HVAC services for a major university.  From his office, he showed
> me how he could remotely get readings of building temperatures across
> campus, turn things on/off/up/down using his computerized system, and so on. 
> He gave me a print out (80- or 120-column dot matrix fanfold), that I kept
> for a while.
>
> I'd always wondered what kind of system it was.

X10 <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X10_(industry_standard)> existed since
the late 70s. I read there is also a version for the Commodore 64, Apple ][, 
Mac, MS-DOS...

Last year LGR made a video <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pm33KB2Th9M>
using an IBM PC AT to do that. Just find it intriguing to control your
home old school. :-)

But since you said HVAC services, X10 seems not to cover that.
-- 
Andreas
You know you are a redneck if
you've ever been too drunk to fish.

On Sunday, January 21, 2018 at 4:30:08 PM UTC-5, RS Wood wrote:
> Question for you DEC fans -
> Back in '83 I was learning to program BASIC on a Commodore PET, saving up
> money to buy a Commodore 64, and getting excited about computers.  One thing
> that really impressed was a visit to a friend's father's office: he
> controlled HVAC services for a major university.  From his office, he showed
> me how he could remotely get readings of building temperatures across
> campus, turn things on/off/up/down using his computerized system, and so on. 
> He gave me a print out (80- or 120-column dot matrix fanfold), that I kept
> for a while.
> I'd always wondered what kind of system it was.
> Fast forward to this year, and I'm going through a box of old family photos,
> and found a picture from that trip.  And our friend is sitting in front of
> what I now recognize as a DEC VT-100!
> Now I'm wondering about the rest of the system.  The year was 1983: who sold
> computerized HVAC equipment back then - probably wasn't DEC themselves, was
> it?  Would this have run over a serial network?  Who made and serviced the
> node controllers that automated these systems, and how expensive would it
> have been?  Was it likely a VAX in the basement or a newer PDP?  And lastly,
> this would have predated ethernet, no?  What protocol was it running over?
> All just curiosity, of course, but I'd love to know what else this ecosystem
> must have been composed of.
> Thanks in advance.


It should be noted that such sophisticated control systems existed 
since at least the 1960s, and were not necessarily computer-based.
Our large office building, constructed in 1962, had a sophisticated
wall-sized control panel.

Pipelines and power substations had remote control over data lines
since the 1950s.

scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) writes:

> Joe Pfeiffer <pfei...@cs.nmsu.edu> writes:
>> usenet@only.tnx (Questor) writes:

>>>  On 22 Jan 2018 09:18:57 GMT, Bob Eager <news...@eager.cx> wrote:

>>>> On Mon, 22 Jan 2018 09:02:06 +0000, Questor wrote:

>>>>> FYI, the PDP designation died in the '70s when the VAX was introduced; no
>>>>> newer machines were ever so named.

>>>> That would explain why I have two PDP-11 technical books dated 1983/84.

>>>> I also have a physical PDP-11/84, so labelled, and that model didn't
>>>> appear until around 1984...

>>>  That's an instance of a new PDP-11, not an instance of a new machine.  The
>>>  original poster asked if it was "a VAX ... or a newer PDP."  Since DEC
>>>  stopped using the PDP designation, there are no newer PDPs.

>> The PDP 11/84 was introduced in 1988.  If that doesn't meet your definition
>> of a new machine, I don't understand your definition.

> I suspect he is distinguishing between a new model of an existing line,
> versus a new line.

Yes, that's what he's saying.  He's also objecting, I suspect, to the tendency
to say "PDP" when "PDP-11" is meant, as if that were never applied to any other
architecture.

When I was attending DECUS trade shows hawking the new PDP-10 compatible from
XKL, a very nice lady with whom I was friendly advised me that I should be
talking to the oil folks in Oklahoma, where she made her home, because they had
a PDP in every trailer.  She had spent nearly 30 years in the business...

-- 
Rich Alderson					  ne...@alderson.users.panix.com
      Audendum est, et veritas investiganda; quam etiamsi non assequamur,
	  omnino tamen proprius, quam nunc sumus, ad eam perveniemus.
									--Galen

Rich Alderson <ne...@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:
> Yes, that's what he's saying.  He's also objecting, I suspect, to the
> tendency to say "PDP" when "PDP-11" is meant, as if that were never
> applied to any other architecture.
>
> When I was attending DECUS trade shows hawking the new PDP-10
> compatible from XKL, a very nice lady with whom I was friendly advised
> me that I should be talking to the oil folks in Oklahoma, where she
> made her home, because they had a PDP in every trailer.  She had spent
> nearly 30 years in the business...

when we were doing HA/CMP product ... some posts
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.btml#hacmp

it included doing some amount of availability adn scaleup with Oracle,
old post about Jan1992 scaleup meeting in ellison's conference room.
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/95.html#13

Oracle had earlier been having financial problems and agreed to be
acquired by Nippon Steel. Then they got a 6,000 copy corporate
contract with Shell (and backed out of the Nippon Steel deal)
... including at least one for every Shell location and well drilling
rig. past posts back out of Nippon Steel deal
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2000e.html#49 How did Oracle get started?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2007j.html#88 IBM Unionization
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2010p.html#27 The Scariest Company in Tech
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2014l.html#7 HP splits, again

The next time we did whirlwind ha/cmp marketing tour ... it included
Shell executive hdqtrs (netherlands). We ended that trip with Oracle
World at Cannes. photo at Oracle World
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/lhwcannes.jpg

-- 
virtualization experience starting Jan1968, online at home since Mar1970

On 2018-01-22, hanc...@bbs.cpcn.com <hanc...@bbs.cpcn.com> wrote:
> On Sunday, January 21, 2018 at 4:30:08 PM UTC-5, RS Wood wrote:
>> Question for you DEC fans -
>> Back in '83 I was learning to program BASIC on a Commodore PET, saving up
>> money to buy a Commodore 64, and getting excited about computers.  One thing
>> that really impressed was a visit to a friend's father's office: he
>> controlled HVAC services for a major university.  From his office, he showed
>> me how he could remotely get readings of building temperatures across
>> campus, turn things on/off/up/down using his computerized system, and so on. 
>> He gave me a print out (80- or 120-column dot matrix fanfold), that I kept
>> for a while.
>> I'd always wondered what kind of system it was.
>> Fast forward to this year, and I'm going through a box of old family photos,
>> and found a picture from that trip.  And our friend is sitting in front of
>> what I now recognize as a DEC VT-100!
>> Now I'm wondering about the rest of the system.  The year was 1983: who sold
>> computerized HVAC equipment back then - probably wasn't DEC themselves, was
>> it?  Would this have run over a serial network?  Who made and serviced the
>> node controllers that automated these systems, and how expensive would it
>> have been?  Was it likely a VAX in the basement or a newer PDP?  And lastly,
>> this would have predated ethernet, no?  What protocol was it running over?
>> All just curiosity, of course, but I'd love to know what else this ecosystem
>> must have been composed of.
>> Thanks in advance.
>
>
> It should be noted that such sophisticated control systems existed 
> since at least the 1960s, and were not necessarily computer-based.
> Our large office building, constructed in 1962, had a sophisticated
> wall-sized control panel.
>
> Pipelines and power substations had remote control over data lines
> since the 1950s.
>
>

The Irish army was deployed abroad, for the first time in its
history, in what is sometimes known as the Congo. The Belgians had
pulled out and left the country in chaos. Anyway, the province of
Katanga wanted to seceed, under Belgian influence, so the UN (or US?) 
took over the province, taking over, among other things, the
telephone system, such as it was, but the Katangans continued to
communicate securely. It turned out that they had a way of doing that 
over power lines. About 1961.


-- 
greymaus.ireland.ie
Just_Another_Grumpy_Old_Man

On 23/01/2018 01:50, Rich Alderson wrote:
{snip}

> Yes, that's what he's saying.  He's also objecting, I suspect, to the tendency
> to say "PDP" when "PDP-11" is meant, as if that were never applied to any other
> architecture.
> 

The VAX could have been called the PDP-31 and the Alpha say the PDP-42.

On 1/24/2018 11:10 AM, Andrew Swallow wrote:
> On 23/01/2018 01:50, Rich Alderson wrote:
> {snip}
> 
>> Yes, that's what he's saying.  He's also objecting, I suspect, to the 
>> tendency
>> to say "PDP" when "PDP-11" is meant, as if that were never applied to 
>> any other
>> architecture.
>>
> 
> The VAX could have been called the PDP-31 and the Alpha say the PDP-42.

And we all know that 42...  is the answer to life, the universe, and 
everything!  ;-)

-- 
numerist at aquaporin4 dot com

On 2018-01-24, Charles Richmond <nume...@aquaporin4.com> wrote:

> On 1/24/2018 11:10 AM, Andrew Swallow wrote:
>
>> On 23/01/2018 01:50, Rich Alderson wrote:
>> {snip}
>> 
>>> Yes, that's what he's saying.  He's also objecting, I suspect, to the 
>>> tendency
>>> to say "PDP" when "PDP-11" is meant, as if that were never applied to 
>>> any other
>>> architecture.
>> 
>> The VAX could have been called the PDP-31 and the Alpha say the PDP-42.
>
> And we all know that 42...  is the answer to life, the universe, and 
> everything!  ;-)

You'd have to add support for base 13 so it could properly multiply 6 by 9.

-- 
/~\  cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid (Charlie Gibbs)
\ /  I'm really at ac.dekanfrus if you read it the right way.
 X   Top-posted messages will probably be ignored.  See RFC1855.
/ \  HTML will DEFINITELY be ignored.  Join the ASCII ribbon campaign!

Andrew Swallow <am.sw...@btinternet.com> writes:

> On 23/01/2018 01:50, Rich Alderson wrote:
> {snip}

>> Yes, that's what he's saying.  He's also objecting, I suspect, to the
>> tendency to say "PDP" when "PDP-11" is meant, as if that were never applied
>> to any other architecture.

> The VAX could have been called the PDP-31 and the Alpha say the PDP-42.

Leaving aside the fact that (with the exception of the nonexistent PDP-13)
model numbers were monotonically increasing...

The VAX-11/780 is referred to in Bell, Mudge, and McNamara as the PDP-11/780 in
one chapter.

-- 
Rich Alderson					  ne...@alderson.users.panix.com
      Audendum est, et veritas investiganda; quam etiamsi non assequamur,
	  omnino tamen proprius, quam nunc sumus, ad eam perveniemus.
									--Galen

On Wednesday, January 24, 2018 at 10:10:23 AM UTC-7, Andrew Swallow wrote:
> On 23/01/2018 01:50, Rich Alderson wrote:
> {snip}

> > Yes, that's what he's saying.  He's also objecting, I suspect, to the tendency
> > to say "PDP" when "PDP-11" is meant, as if that were never applied to any other
> > architecture.

> The VAX could have been called the PDP-31 and the Alpha say the PDP-42.

While I would have been happy to see the CPUs of the DECSYSTEM-20 get called the PDP-20, I rather think that *this* would be going too far.

And one model of VAX was called the PDP-11/780... oh, no, the VAX-11/780, 
but indeed it _could_ have been called the former instead.

Since the Alpha was a chip and not a box, it couldn't really be a PDP-
anything, but I suppose boxes containing them could have been called, oh, 
PDP-21/64, PDP-21/164, and so on, but I think that by *that* time, retiring 
the PDP designation would have been graceful rather than abrupt.

John Savard

And it was a great tragedy that the United States failed to support the secessions 
of Katanga, Biafra, and Somaililand, which in each case permitted Africans to 
exist in greater freedom than they would have under the country seceded from.

Except for Botswana, hardly *any* of Africa is similar to the industrialized 
Western world in having a stable government with honest police, free elections, 
a free press, and equality for all the ethnic and religious groups that reside 
therein.

John Savard

Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca> writes:
> And it was a great tragedy that the United States failed to support the secessions 
> of Katanga, Biafra, and Somaililand, which in each case permitted Africans to 
> exist in greater freedom than they would have under the country seceded from.
>
> Except for Botswana, hardly *any* of Africa is similar to the industrialized 
> Western world in having a stable government with honest police, free elections, 
> a free press, and equality for all the ethnic and religious groups that reside 
> therein.

re:
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2018.html#75 DEC and HVAC

Beating the Resource Curse The Case of Botswana
https://isrj.wordpress.com/2010/07/10/reverse-the-curse-botswana-as-a-beacon-of-hope-and-an-economic-model/

from recent thread
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2017e.html#103 [CM] What was your first home computer?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2017e.html#105 [CM] What was your first home computer?

and as mentionined in the thread, Europe and US has had major efforts to
corrupt leaders as part of looting resources ... US dating back (at least)
to banana republic
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_republic

and 

War Is A Racket
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Is_a_Racket
Resource curse
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_curse
Confessions of an Economic Hit Man
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confessions_of_an_Economic_Hit_Man
The New Confessions of an Economic Hit Man
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B017MZ8EBM/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=

"Hit Man" starts in Cambridge ... as does "Harvard Responsible For Rise
of Putin, recent afc thread/post
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2018.html#14 Predicting the future in five years as seen from 1983

Harvard's Man Who Wrecked Russia, Resurfaces in Ukraine
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2015/02/convicted-fraudster-jonathan-hay-harvards-man-who-wrecked-russia-resurfaces-in-ukraine.html

If you are unfamiliar with this fiasco, which was also the true
proximate cause of Larry Summers' ouster from Harvard, you must read an
extraordinary expose, How Harvard Lost Russia, from Institutional
Investor. I am told copies of this article were stuffed in every Harvard
faculty member's inbox the day Summers got a vote of no confidence and
resigned shortly thereafter.

... snip ...

How Harvard lost Russia; The best and brightest of America's premier
university came to Moscow in the 1990s to teach Russians how to be
capitalists. This is the inside story of how their efforts led to
scandal and disgrace.
http://www.institutionalinvestor.com/Article/1020662/How-Harvard-lost-Russia.html

Mostly, they hurt Russia and its hopes of establishing a lasting
framework for a stable Western-style capitalism, as Summers himself
acknowledged when he testified under oath in the U.S. lawsuit in
Cambridge in 2002. "The project was of enormous value," said Summers,
who by then had been installed as the president of Harvard. "Its
cessation was damaging to Russian economic reform and to the
U.S.-Russian relationship."

... snip ...

this says in 1655, bengal was one of the richest places on earth and by
1755 it was one of the poorest. also churchill in 1943 was using
shipping capacity to stockpile/hoard for after the war ... resulting in
3m-6m indian starvation deaths. points out that award for chirchills
ww2/history description was for (fiction) literature
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003VTZXC2/

The World Crisis, Vol. 1, Churchill explains the mess in middle east
started before WW1 with move from 13.5in to 15in guns (which requires
moving from coal to oil) loc2012-14:

>From the beginning there appeared a ship carrying ten 15-inch guns, and
therefore at least 600 feet long with room inside her for engines which
would drive her 21 knots and capacity to carry armour which on the
armoured belt, the turrets and the conning tower would reach the
thickness unprecedented in the British Service of 13 inches.

loc2087-89:

To build any large additional number of oil-burning ships meant basing
our naval supremacy upon oil. But oil was not found in appreciable
quantities in our islands. If we required it, we must carry it by sea in
peace or war from distant countries.  loc2151-56: This led to enormous
expense and to tremendous opposition on the Naval Estimates. Yet it was
absolutely impossible to turn back. We could only fight our way forward,
and finally we found our way to the Anglo-Persian Oil agreement and
contract, which for an initial investment of two millions of public
money (subsequently increased to five millions) has not only secured to
the Navy a very substantial proportion of its oil supply, but has led to
the acquisition by the Government of a controlling share in oil
properties and interests which are at present valued at scores of
millions sterling, and also to very considerable economies, which are
still continuing, in the purchase price of Admiralty oil.

... snip ...

Iran elected leader was going to review the Anglo-Persion contracts
... and then (CIA Confirms Role in) 1953 Iran Coup
http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB435/
including
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kermit_Roosevelt,_Jr.
in
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat
and to help keep the shah in power, US (including Norman Schwarzkopf
senior) trains
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAVAK

-- 
virtualization experience starting Jan1968, online at home since Mar1970

On Wed, 24 Jan 2018 17:10:22 +0000, Andrew Swallow wrote:

> On 23/01/2018 01:50, Rich Alderson wrote:
> {snip}
> 
>> Yes, that's what he's saying.  He's also objecting, I suspect, to the
>> tendency to say "PDP" when "PDP-11" is meant, as if that were never
>> applied to any other architecture.
>> 
>> 
> The VAX could have been called the PDP-31 and the Alpha say the PDP-42.

Early on, presumably to reassure users about upgrade paths, the VAX was 
marketed as the VAX-11. I don't think that had a one-to-one 
correspondence to the availability of hardware PDP-11 emulation, either.

-- 
Using UNIX since v6 (1975)...

Use the BIG mirror service in the UK:
 http://www.mirrorservice.org

In article <mdd1sif...@panix5.panix.com>,
Rich Alderson  <ne...@alderson.users.panix.com> wrote:
>Andrew Swallow <am.sw...@btinternet.com> writes:
>
>> On 23/01/2018 01:50, Rich Alderson wrote:
>> {snip}
>
>>> Yes, that's what he's saying.  He's also objecting, I suspect, to the
>>> tendency to say "PDP" when "PDP-11" is meant, as if that were never applied
>>> to any other architecture.
>
>> The VAX could have been called the PDP-31 and the Alpha say the PDP-42.
>
>Leaving aside the fact that (with the exception of the nonexistent PDP-13)
>model numbers were monotonically increasing...
>
>The VAX-11/780 is referred to in Bell, Mudge, and McNamara as the PDP-11/780 in
>one chapter.
>
>-- 
>Rich Alderson					  ne...@alderson.users.panix.com
>      Audendum est, et veritas investiganda; quam etiamsi non assequamur,
>	  omnino tamen proprius, quam nunc sumus, ad eam perveniemus.
>									--Galen

IIRC, there were references to the VAX8600 as a VAX 11/790 in some places.
Of course the delay on Venus was pretty long.

Anyone know if the rumors were true that the 8650 was the 8600 running at the
original spec'd speed?

Bill 

Bill

On 2018-01-24, Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca> wrote:

> And it was a great tragedy that the United States failed to support the
> secessions of Katanga, Biafra, and Somaililand, which in each case permitted
> Africans to exist in greater freedom than they would have under the country
> seceded from.
>
> Except for Botswana, hardly *any* of Africa is similar to the industrialized 
> Western world in having a stable government

"I'm a very stable genius."

> with honest police,

"Comey, you're fired."

> free elections, 

Thank you, Mr. Putin.

> a free press,

"You are fake news!"

> and equality for all the ethnic and religious groups that reside 
> therein.

...whatever shithole country they may come from.

-- 
/~\  cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid (Charlie Gibbs)
\ /  I'm really at ac.dekanfrus if you read it the right way.
 X   Top-posted messages will probably be ignored.  See RFC1855.
/ \  HTML will DEFINITELY be ignored.  Join the ASCII ribbon campaign!

On 2018-01-25, Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> wrote:
> On 2018-01-24, Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca> wrote:
>
>> And it was a great tragedy that the United States failed to support the
>> secessions of Katanga, Biafra, and Somaililand, which in each case permitted
>> Africans to exist in greater freedom than they would have under the country
>> seceded from.
>>
>> Except for Botswana, hardly *any* of Africa is similar to the industrialized 
>> Western world in having a stable government

Sadly, for obscure reasons, I know Botswana people, and one of the
reasons its so stable is that its basically owned by De Beers.
Kenya is a good country to visit. 

The original British Somailand is now a seperate region and is doing
all right. Luckily for them, they have few natural resources, so do
not attract predators

>
> "I'm a very stable genius."
>
>> with honest police,
>
> "Comey, you're fired."
>
>> free elections, 
>
> Thank you, Mr. Putin.
>
>> a free press,
>
> "You are fake news!"
>
>> and equality for all the ethnic and religious groups that reside 
>> therein.
>
> ...whatever shithole country they may come from.
>


-- 
greymaus.ireland.ie
Just_Another_Grumpy_Old_Man

Quadibloc wrote:
> And it was a great tragedy that the United States failed to support the
secessions
> of Katanga, Biafra, and Somaililand, which in each case permitted Africans
to
> exist in greater freedom than they would have under the country seceded
from.
>
> Except for Botswana, hardly *any* of Africa is similar to the industrialized
> Western world in having a stable government with honest police, free
elections,
> a free press, and equality for all the ethnic and religious groups that
reside
> therein.

The UN had a hand in promoting the corruption.

/BAH

Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca> wrote:
> And it was a great tragedy that the United States failed to support the secessions 
> of Katanga, Biafra, and Somaililand, which in each case permitted Africans to 
> exist in greater freedom than they would have under the country seceded from.
> 

Katanga and Biafra, at least, would seem to have been imptovements.

> Except for Botswana, hardly *any* of Africa is similar to the industrialized 
> Western world in having a stable government with honest police, free elections, 
> a free press, and equality for all the ethnic and religious groups that reside 
> therein.

Liberia managed to have an election and a peaceful transfer of power. Small
steps, I guess.

-- 
Pete

Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca> writes:

> On Wednesday, January 24, 2018 at 10:10:23 AM UTC-7, Andrew Swallow wrote:

>> On 23/01/2018 01:50, Rich Alderson wrote:

>>> Yes, that's what he's saying.  He's also objecting, I suspect, to the
>>> tendency to say "PDP" when "PDP-11" is meant, as if that were never applied
>>> to any other architecture.

>> The VAX could have been called the PDP-31 and the Alpha say the PDP-42.

> While I would have been happy to see the CPUs of the DECSYSTEM-20 get called
> the PDP-20, I rather think that *this* would be going too far.

Of course, the PDP-10 designation for DEC's mainframe line was dropped in 1971
with the introduction of the DECsystem-10 and the KI-10 CPU.  The KL-10 CPU
used in the DECSYSTEM-20 was also used in later DECsystem-10 boxes (and was
introduced to the world in that form before the -20 was ready to ship).

-- 
Rich Alderson					  ne...@alderson.users.panix.com
      Audendum est, et veritas investiganda; quam etiamsi non assequamur,
	  omnino tamen proprius, quam nunc sumus, ad eam perveniemus.
									--Galen