test-drb December 2001

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

243 participants
1096 discussions

ANNOUNCE--Altair32 version 2.1 released!

by rcini＠msn.com

Hello, all: Just a quick announcement. Today was the official release of version 2.1 of the Altair32 Emulator. Yeah! It's been about four months since the 2.0 release and a lot has happened since then. Floppy disk images for CP/M, Altair DOS and Disk BASIC are fully functional and the Altair32 now has an integrated debugger, courtesy of Jim Battle's Sol-20 emulation project. These two items alone took over half of the time between releases and integrating the debugger required a major overhaul of the 8080 emulation code. On the negative side, a small regression error has crept in and 4k BASIC will no longer run. This is not so bad because if you could run 8k BASIC there's no reason to run 4k BASIC. The next phase of the project will hopefully include some or all of the following: Continued code cleanup; minor fixes to IMSAI conditional Further testing of the debugger (it's been only lightly tested with the Altair32) A set of Windows-based tools to manipulate diskette images (to enable people to download programs from http://www.retroarchive.org and get them onto diskettes) Support for BBS software Support for different floppy controllers/disk formats and maybe a pseudo-floppy hard drive. That's it for now. As always, you can check out the project at: http://highgate.comm.sfu.ca/~rcini/classiccmp/Altair32.htm Rich Rich Cini Collector of classic computers Build Master for the Altair32 Emulation Project Web site: http://highgate.comm.sfu.ca/~rcini/classiccmp/ /************************************************************/

22 years, 9 months

[PDP8-Lovers] how to clean a PDP8/A, dishwasher?

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Dec 15, 12:28, Matthew Sell wrote: > Typically, the time spent "in the water" isn't long enough to damage. Even > items made of steel and iron won't rust if the water is removed after the > cycle is complete. If they sit overnight, well, that's a different story. > > The only production problem I saw with untreated water was with an > electronic test instrument that had a lot of high-impedance signal > interconnects throughout. Many signal lines ran for long distances next to > each other. While the design of this piece of test equipment was > questionable, it was our duty to get it to work. > > The two biggest problems were contaminants from the water supply used in > the washing process (city water - switched to using a commercial filtration > system), and humidity (had to paint a sealant on all of the boards). That's a well-known problem. Some of the residues from a domestic water supply -- especially in hard water areas -- are mildly hygroscopic, and as a result, the boards would acquire very small amounts of moisture on the surface, especially when exposed to a humid atmosphere. In combination with the salts in the residue, this makes for leakage across the board, which could easily upset very high impedance circuits. I heard of someone who had the opposite problem. He designed a CMOS circuit which worked fine when forst contructed, but stopped when given anti-environment protection or was potted. He'd inadvertantly relied on the normal leakage across a PCB to hold the unused inputs of a CMOS gate at a particular level. Remove the leakage current and the gate stops working properly. Solution: add the pullup resistor that should have been there in the first place. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York

22 years, 9 months

[PDP8-Lovers] how to clean a PDP8/A, dishwasher?

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Dec 15, 1:32, Matthew Sell wrote: > Here's the secrets to doing this right: > > 1) Do not use any detergents. NONE. Why not? Commercially, detergents are used to remove flux. I use laboratory detergent to clean PCBs I've made or modified. I don't use washing-up liquid, though, and I don't use the harsher detergents sometimes found in dishwasher detergent. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York

22 years, 9 months

"Geeks" and licensing

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

On December 15, Jim Davis wrote: > IMHO: All software development should be performed as such: > > 1) Requirements - what should it do, and not do. Spin this till > everybody > signs off. > 2) Prelim design - Ok, a rough outline of the design, data structures > and control/data flow defined here. > 3) Detailed design - Define all the modules and their function, break it > down. > 4) Test plan - integrate testing into detailed design, make it unit > testable. > a unit is somthing that has input and output and side effects, like a > function. > 5) Finally, coding - build modules in parallel with test code. > 6) Unit testing - verify that modules comply with detailed design. > 7) Integration testing - hook it all together, make sure it works, apply > test plan developed in step 4 for fully integrated aplication. > > Do 1-3 until marketing decides what they want,4-7 until you find no > errors. > > For safety critical, you should /have to perform statement and decision > coverage in > step 6 and 7 and the detailed design should have a one-to-one > corespondence > with the detailed design document. Hmm, that procedure "reads" nice, but it sounds like more meetings than actual work. But then I've been a software developer for about twelve years, and nobody that I've worked with can figure out how I can blow off all the meetings and not get fired...it's because I end up writing all the code that the rest of the developers are talking about in their meetings, WHILE they're in their meetings, and by the time they're doing screwing around, the code is running. Procedures are nice, but they can be taken too far. Goal-orientation is better. (While I'll freely admit that this approach simply doesn't work for multi-million line applications, I should state that I generally work on applications of less than one million lines, but generally more than 100,000. I further state that my methods should probably NOT be used in life-critical applications...more than two eyes need to look at that stuff, no matter what.) -Dave -- Dave McGuire St. Petersburg, FL "Less talk. More synthohol." --Lt. Worf

22 years, 9 months

Should engineers be licensed (Was "Geeks")

by CLeyson＠aol.com

On Sat 15 Dec 2001, Jeffrey S. Sharp wrote: > There's a big difference between writing code to solve problems and being > a software engineer. Designing, coding, and compiling is only 40% of the > battle. Hopefully you're also spending some time planning and testing. The company I work for seem to have forgotten the planning and testing part of the software design process. We had a lot of embedded software written by outside contractors for a 486 running QNX real time OS. Over the years the software has evolved into the hardware equivalent of a rats nest and it's been left to our customers to find the bugs - most being "show stoppers". I sometimes wonder just how many customers we've lost because of this. Also, dont get me wrong, the same should be applied to hardware design. We recently interviewed an electronics engineering graduate who didn't know the difference between NPN and PNP transistors !! What do they teach kids these days ?? Should engineers be licensed ? - It's not a bad idea. Chris Leyson

22 years, 9 months

Couple of items available - more info . . .

by cfandt＠netsync.net

>X-Authentication-Warning: ns2.ezwind.net: majordom set sender to >owner-classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org using -f >X-Sender: cfandt(a)206.231.8.2 >X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.1 >Date: Thu, 13 Dec 2001 21:54:36 -0500 >To: <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org> >From: Christian Fandt <cfandt(a)netsync.net> >Subject: Couple of items available . . . >Sender: owner-classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org >Reply-To: classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org > >I've got four Iomega Bournoulli Boxes, model A210H, if anybody wants them. >I can maybe think of a few bits to swap for them but that doesn't matter. I >just need the room (as several list members who've visited us can attest) >and want them to go to a new home. > >I can ship but just reimburse me for the shipping cost and maybe purchase >of a proper shipping carton or two as needed. Seem to weigh 15 to 20 lbs. >each. Zip code 14701. > >Also, any interest in several IBM 3287 printers? Dot matrix 132 column page >printers which use SNA network interface. I have had a few questions asking (basically) what those Bournoulli Boxes are. Please forgive me as I thought they were somewhat well known - but that's probably because we used them all over the plant where I once worked and I kinda got used to them. Plus, it's been a relatively long time since they fell out use and younger folks of course wouldn't know much of them. At any rate, they are a removeable media mass storage device which uses what are essentially disk cartridges. Vintage '82-'85, I think. The media inside its case, IIRC, is similar to an 8" floppy disk except encased in a rigid plastic case. The cart is something like 8" wide, about 12" long and about 5/8" or so thick. These model A210H units have two 10 megabyte drives within a single enclosure. It measures approximately 5 inches high, about 12 inches wide and about 13-14 inches front-to-back. The PC XT, AT and compatible host machines had installed within themselves a proprietary ISA card with a cable from it to the Bournoulli Box. I know I've got at least two of these cards tucked away somewhere but I need to dig and hunt for them. They're packed away in one of the boxes from our move to this house several years ago. I've got a software driver disk or two around too. Same thing: where the h*** are they at the moment? But I can find them with diligent hunting. We live on a 66' x 210' lot and they can be eventually found :-) Iomega's Bournoulli Boxes were great for use as backup of the contemporary 20-to-80 mb hard disks of that era. That is what these units had been used for at my ex-employer along with their use as local data storage for daily Customer Service and Field Service records. I rescued them when we cleaned out an off site warehouse back in the mid 90's. I've also got maybe a dozen or more of the cartridges, too, which I just found. Yours for the taking too. Same conditions as previously stated (pay shipping, help towards a shipping box if actually needed, etc., yadda-yadda-yadda). Come and get 'em. Thanks. -Chris -- -- NNNN Christian Fandt, Electronic/Electrical Historian Jamestown, NY USA cfandt(a)netsync.net Member of Antique Wireless Association URL: http://www.antiquewireless.org/

22 years, 9 months

[PDP8-Lovers] how to clean a PDP8/A, dishwasher?

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Dec 15, 15:47, Chad Fernandez wrote: > So it's almost like cloth, but made of wire? Yup, though the ferrite core rings mean the spacing between strands is larger than in cloth woven from thread. And it's knitted. I was told the other day that there are still two old ladies in the Midlands who can repair some types of core by re-knitting it. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York

22 years, 9 months

if you hadn't already known this about the PDP-8

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

On December 13, Doc wrote: > > Remember Linux too needs lots of memory. With >16 meg on a video card > > your OS needs about 16x that. It is the video display that is the > > killer. > > BZZZT!! Wrong. > > Linux *likes* lots of memory. I can show you X running on a 386SX with > 12M and a 1M video card. Not just a demo; that's my friend's firewall. A firewall with a video card? Gotta love them PCs. ;) But yes, I agree...Linux can be made to work well on machines with small quantities of memory. It's actually pretty good at it. -Dave -- Dave McGuire St. Petersburg, FL

22 years, 9 months

Is there no end

by SUPRDAVE＠aol.com

In a message dated 12/15/2001 7:18:46 PM Eastern Standard Time, jhellige(a)earthlink.net writes: << >That is just right. Airc, IBM would'nt buy Intel's processor for the IBM >PC unless Intel had multiple sources. This was to ensure supply to IBM if >Intel's plants were overridden by bugs, damages by an infusion of dust (or >aluminum powder.....;-)). AMD at least (and I think Seimens and NEC as >well) was contracted to produce the 8088 cpu. AMD was given all info >needed to clone the chips. > >This relationship continued through the 80286 and 80386 processors, but >became very strained as AMD was making 386's cheaper and imho better than >the intel products by modifying the Intel designs. Intel and AMD ended up >in court over the 80486 chip ; intel claiming that the contract between it >and AMD did not include information or production of this CPU. AMD was >eventually forced to produce a 'clean room' 80486 design but because of >the delays caused by the litigation they had plenty of time to do it. AMD's faster coprocessors also caused quite a problem if I remember correctly. Harris also pushed the 286 faster than any of the other sources. I remember PC Magazine running an article comparing various 286 machines with a headline that mimicked the Corvair's 'Unsafe at any speed' headline. >> I've always liked AMD stuff. My first PC I got myself was an AMD 386 dx40. I couldnt decide whether to get a 486-25 and didnt quite understand the sx/dx issue. Ran OS/2 great on 8 meg. Later, I found that the AMD 486 dx2/80 was cheaper than Intel's 66 so I got that and never any problems with it. -- Kwanzaa is NOT a real holiday.

22 years, 9 months

Burroughs - any information?

by mhstein＠usa.net

Where were you a few years ago when I was looking for a home for my Burroughs software & manuals (didn't run across this list at the time though). After 10 years or so programming these babies (L/TC/B80&90) I'd accumulated pretty well every piece of firmware, utility & app software there was, but then (as now) there wasn't much interest in what most people (unfairly, in my biased opinion) derided as "just" an accounting machine (you haven't lived 'till you've played Lunar Lander with a golfball printer...) Unlike the mainframes, these machines were generally sold outright & therefore scrapped outside of Burroughs, so there were lots of them around. Finally sold the hard disk carts to a rebuilder, recycled the floppies & tossed the mylar tapes & manuals. HOWEVER, I do still have an electrical parts catalogue from 1972, a little early for the B80, but might have some of those chips from the TC listed; if you're interested, send me a couple of part numbers off list & I'll see if they're listed and it's worth while scanning it for ya. If size vs computing power were a criterion, there wouldn't be very many old mainframes in Sridhar's collection... And yes, rugged indeed; extremely reliable, aside >from the occasional head crash. Alas, many of them were disembowelled & ended up as desks or workbenches. As mentioned elsewhere, I also still have a digital cassette drive & tapes with who knows what on them (for the L/TC's), as well as a TD700 flat- screen display unit & controller for the B80, if anybody's interested. mike ----------------Original Message----------------- Date: Fri, 14 Dec 2001 17:44:21 +0100 From: "Sipke de Wal" <sipke(a)wxs.nl> Subject: Re: Burroughs - any information? I did obtain about 5 TC5500 consoles and a B80 back in the '80. They were rather large for their computing power and no software was obtainable so I scrapped them. I still have a couple of kilo's TTL-chips from them, with their own Burroughs legacy partnumbers. Very rugged design though! Maybe you could get some old "B" hardeware but software was out of the question. Sipke de Wal

22 years, 9 months

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test-drb December 2001