On 11/3/2026 22:21, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
On 2026-11-04, Rich <rich@example.invalid> wrote:
c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:
On 11/3/26 20:55, Woozy Song wrote:
Usenet has a lot of people who have been using it since the 1990s, so
presumably over 50 years old. I am a bit older, I remember 9-track
tapes, punch cards and acoustic coupler modems.
<waves hand> Me too!
Umm ... they were EIGHT-track tapes :-)
Idiot. Woozy's not referring to "8-track audio tapes".
Uh, I think he was pulling our legs - note the smiley.
He's referring to 9-track digital computer tapes used on
old IBM mainframes. They were 9-tracks:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9-track_tape
Eight data bits plus one parity bit per byte makes for a "9-track"
tape.
If you're really old you'll remember 7-track tapes (6 data bits
plus one parity bit, popular before 8-bit bytes came along).
I don't think I ever actually used one of them, but I did read
about them. I think some units even had a hardware converter
option that let you attach them to a machine that did 8-bit
bytes; for every three 8-bit bytes you sent them they'd write
four 6-bit bytes to the tape. Good for converting your old
tapes...
1964: Junior High School. Getting simple computer architecture books
(written for a general "Popular Mechanics" audience) and Fortran
beginning textbooks from the library. Writing FORTRAN IV programs in a
comp book. No access to any computers, but reading about GE (BASIC) time-sharing systems in newspapers.
1969: Enrolling in University Math department with the goal of learning computer science (and dropping out after 6 months). While there, played
with GIER minicomputer, "2st generation comp[uter" (first transistor generation), 1024 words of 42 bits each, plus 4KW of "extended storage" (buffer memory with fast block transfer in and out). Fixed head drum
with 960 tracks of 40 words each; programmed in Algol-60, paper tape
in/out with 2000 char/sec optical paper tape reader, 150 cps punch.
1970: Leaving studies at Uni, taking job at physics dept of uni, with
another GIER, plus IBM 1130 with 1MB disk cartridge drive (2311) and 2
tape drives, 1 7-track 800 bpi, one 9-track 1600 bpi, 600 cpm card
reader / 200 (?) cpm punch (1442), 150 (?) lpm printer. The 1130
eventually became a HASP RJE terminal. Access to NEUCC data center with
IBM 7494 (36 bit tape oriented IBSYS/IBJOB OS) and IBM 360/65 (OS-360/MVT/HASP/WITS) with tapes, disks and 2260 CRJE terminal on-site.
1972: Job transitions to startup of RECKU data center with UNIVAC-1106 (EXEC-8) with mix of Fastrand huge drum, 7-track tape, 9-track tape,
UNIVAC 9300 for card/printer I/O spool. Gradually building out a row of
80 MB removable disk storage units.
The UNIVAC was 36 bits, mostly using 6-bit FIELDATA for text, but
gradually growing into 9-bit bytes and printing 7-bit ASCII text.
The 7-track tapes were a natural fit for 36-bit words, but the 9-track
was faster and at 1600 bpi held more data. When moounting the 9-track
tape, one could select whether to use "packed binary" mode (5 8-bit
bytes in 2 36-bit words) or "byte mode" (4 8-bit bytes in the 4 9-bit
quarter words of a 36-bit word).
Just before I left the university in 1972, someone had brought in a
bare-bones PDP-11/20 mini with a TTY which they also used for papertape
I/O. But that did not catch my interest.
In 1974, we got a couple PDP-11/10, which we used to develop a terminal concentrator that allowed "glass TTYs" to emulate a multi-dropped
cluster of Univac's expensive keyboard/printer terminals or Uniscope
display terminals over a synchronous comms line. I hung around enough to understand the building blocks and the instruction set.
In 1975, I moved to a small private engineering company which used PDP-8
and PDP-11 barebones systems to build various industrial systems. The
larger PDP-11 systems ran RSX-11M, and used the 2MB cartridge disk
drives. I also wrote a customer data acquisition device driver for a
Nord-10 minicomputer running SINTRAN.
Around 1977, my coworker talked me into a side project to write terminal emulator code to run on a Z80 multi-microprocessor system that plugged
into a UNIBUS on a PDP-11 or a VAX too emulate UNIVAC or IBM display terminals.
Around 1978, our little company became the Danish distributor for Wang
Labs word processing systems. As part of the deal, we got a Wang VS-10
which was sort of like a 370/125 with a stupid terminal system, that
could be programmed in RPG or COBOL, but the terminals were Z80
processors attached with twinax cables like IBM3270, and could run the
word processing system, using the VS-10 as a boot device and central
disk storage.
In 1980, I moved to California to work for ACC and got introduced to a PDP-11/70 running Univ v6, later BSD, VMS, 4.2BSD and Ultrix. My group
mostly developed "smart communication boards" for Unibus, some Z80
based, some MC68000 based. Later with did rack-sized communication
systems on a VersaBus chassis. All of this connected first to ARPAnet,
then we landed on the MILnet side in the ARPAnet split (26.x.y.z). Most
of our customers were in 21.a.b.c (some of you know what that was, the
rest of you are not supposed to ask). Our first network connection was
a VDH link as 1200 bps; later we got an IMP in our computer room. Our
East coast office was connected via a 2400 bps X.25 trunk.
Beginning in 1989, I worked on "remote telnet clusters" with 10 async
TTY ports on one side, an ethernet port on the other side and an MC68000
in the middle.
From 1995 to 1997, I tried to build a small-business modular edge
router on a PCI (ATX) x86 motherboard with "smart peripherals". When
that collapsed, I finally found the people I still work with. We do
industrial radio modems at low speed and high reliability.
--
Lars Poulsen - an old geek in Santa Barbara, California
--- PyGate Linux v1.5.19
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)