[cctalk] Re: Bomar 901b My wife found in my stuff. Is this as scarce at it seems?s,?

On Tue, 16 Apr 2024, Van Snyder via cctalk wrote: The HP-35 was marketed with a name of "Electronic Slide Rule" https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/calculators/1/64/264 Similar title, 52 years ago, not 59 years ago. It came out in 1972. I saw one in late 1972. In 1972, however, you could get a Silent 700, and connect to a timesharing machine over telephone. Although the HP-35 was the first "pocket calculator" from HP, it was not the first handheld calculator. In 1970 or 1971, Wang had a tiny desktop calculator that had a card reader! The card reader was an external peripheral, that clam-shell closed on individual port-a-punch cards (perforated normal sized cards using every other column) In fact, by 1972, there was even a handheld calculator made in France; one of my bosses in 1972 had that. It was kept in my desk drawer, and they called me "Head of computing services" in bidding on at least one contract. A completely undeserved title, just because I did a little programming in FORTRAN and APL, and was the keeper of the calculator.