test-drb

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

101090 discussions

by jim＠g1jbg.co.uk

Hi all, whilst reading my 11/45 processor manual the other night, I came across the statement that, if Unibus A and B are separated, Unibus B can be used for inter-processor links, so long as one of the connected devices is a Unibus controller. Does anyone have any experience of this configuration, and if so, what operating system was used. Finally, is there any reason why I couldn't link the Unibus in my 11/44 to Unibus B in my 11/45, assuming I had some software that could take advantage of it. Jim.

17 years, 8 months

First Northern Germany DECnet Party

by hoelscher-kirchbrak＠freenet.de

First Northern Germany DECnet Party, who wants to join? Who wants to install, configure, network, cluster or program ALPHAs, MIPSen, VAXen and PDPs just for fun together with 10 to 20 other DEC enthusiasts for a day or two? We want to join everything running on DEC hardware or talking DECnet, including simulators (e.g. simh). Beginners are welcome! Everyone brings along his computers and together we will build something really nice! Maybe there will even be some VAXstations to lend for the event. If there are enough persons willing to participate I will arrange a large room and other things needed ... Beside the activities mentioned above there are further things planned: - Barbecue - Hardware/Software/Manuals Swap - Talk, Discussions, Helping each other, ... A possible date would be the weekend 18./19.10.08. The location will be in the "Weserbergland" a little south of the town of Hameln. Details will follow when I know more! Please let me know if you would like to come! Ulli The VAXorcist P.S. I really do not know how many persons might be interested, but as a precaution I want you to know that I will limit the number of participants to a maximum of 20.

17 years, 8 months

OT: PC keyboards

by jules.richardson99＠gmail.com

Hey all, I'm soliciting ideas for a (full-size) PC keyboard to go with my laptop (which one of the dogs saw fit to trample) - which unfortunately means it has to be USB (spit!) I don't want to spend an utter fortune (it's just a keyboard, after all), but nor do I want some sort of "dead flesh" monstrosity (which seems to be *everything* I've tried in real stores so far). I used to find the old PC XT keyboards a little too 'clicky', but on the other hand everything I've tried since seems a bit too spongy. Maybe someone does a USB to PC-AT or PS/2 converter unit, which would allow me to connect an older keyboard? Ideally I really don't want 'Windows' keys or other stupid extra keys (email / web etc., or all the other crud modern manufacturers seem to like including) - I'll take them if I have to (and if I can them pull them out and fill in the holes, even better :) Any recommendations from the list? (off-list if needed; I don't want to jam the list with modern PC chat!) cheers Jules

17 years, 8 months

Book offer

by rtellason＠verizon.net

I have sitting here in front of me a book, "Assembler for COBOL Programmers", by one Hank Murphy. "MVS" and "VM" also appear on the cover. Copyright date is 1991. ISBN and other whatnot or more details available on request. I have *no* interest in this at all. Cover my postage and maybe a little extra would be nice, and you can take it off my hands. Feel free to forward this post to other places where there might be some interest... -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin

17 years, 8 months

Wanted: vacuum tube logic circuits

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> I found some on Bitsavers. There are MANY others (Bendix G15, and WISC for example). I have been trying to dig out these sorts of things from the CHM archives as I can find them, since there is much less information available on the actual implementation details available on how first generation computers were actually built. They were often very careful to minimize the number of active devices, since tubes are big and consume lots of power. This also helps explain why so many machines performed arithmetic serially.

17 years, 8 months

Stellar GS-1000 Graphics Computer

by tom＠arlglobal.com

Hello, I came across a post you made from 2005 about a Stellar GS-1000 that you were giving away. I've been collecting vintage machines that I've encountered over the years and I'm curious if you disposed of it or by some rare chance you still have it. Thanks! -Tom

17 years, 8 months

Wanted: vacuum tube logic circuits

by wbblair3＠yahoo.com

> I found some on Bitsavers. > > "Illiac design techniques" (under univOfIllinoisUrbana/illiac/ILLIAC) > describes the basic logic elements, which are then just hooked > together as building blocks (And, Or, Not, and flip-flop). Those are very useful. Thanks. > Under ibm/sage there's a documents list -- only one of the documents > is actually there but a lot more are listed, including circuit > diagrams.? Maybe those are available... The two I?d _really_ love to see even if they didn?t have info I could actually use are: 31P2-2FSQ7-142 Maintenance Techniques and Procedures of Central Computer for AN/FSQ-7, Combat Direction Central 31P2-2FSQ7-212 Schematics for Central Computer of AN/FSQ-7, Combat Direction Central Unfortunately, they aren?t on Bitsavers. I wonder if these were classified TOs.

17 years, 8 months

Wanted: vacuum tube logic circuits

by wbblair3＠yahoo.com

> I'm not about to dig mine out and paw through it, but I think the > "bible" of tube design, the "Radiotron Designer's Handbook" might be > a bit too early to provide guidance on logic circuits.? Anyone know > offhand? Unfortunately, according to the TOC available at the link below, it doesn?t have anything specific about tube logic circuits, but it certainly does look like a goldmine of electron tube technical data: http://www.pmillett.com/Books/intro_RDH4.pdf

17 years, 8 months

Wanted: vacuum tube logic circuits

by wbblair3＠yahoo.com

> There are MANY others (Bendix G15, and WISC for example). Thanks. I found some complete circuits for the G15 there, but I haven?t found the circuits for many of the logic gate symbols used in most of the Bendix diagrams. The WISC thesis contains no diagrams whatsoever which is interesting considering its content. I guess the author didn?t like to draw. ;-)

17 years, 8 months

Wanted: vacuum tube logic circuits

by wbblair3＠yahoo.com

> DIY digital projects using vacuum tubes were extremely rare, mostly > due to cost. I think you?ve probably hit the main problem there. Tube receivers, transmitters, audio amps, etc., actually did something useful to justify their expense whereas affordable logic circuits would have only been technical novelties with no practical use.

17 years, 8 months

More ETH Lilith goodies available

by julianskidmore＠yahoo.com

bfranchuk wrote: > I want to cry out ... Real hardware I want It. > Can new bit slice version of the hardware be built? The real problem is building an authentic Lilith with today's hardware. For example, I can't yet track down a supplier of a 2901 - AMD don't make them, Signetics don't, Cypress semiconductor don't seem to. Does anyone still make them? So, then you're left with 3 choices: * Build a Lilith out of TTL. * Build a Lilith using an FPGA. * Build it using a Microcontroller. The TTL solution is crazy - even ETH didn't have to do that. The FPGA solution isn't bad, you could probably do it with a smallish FPGA to handle the micromachine and some Flash chips for the Microprogram (2x8-bitx128K would have sufficient bandwidth). But it won't feel very authentic looking at a single chip with 200+ pins. So you might as well do a firmware emulation using a humble MCU. An Arm-based one would be fast enough and could drive a display in real-time. > Also did any of the 'Wirth' languages have plans > for 32 bit data and adresses? Yes. The Ceres-1, 2 and 3 workstations were 32-bit. Personally I find 16-bit more interesting, more of a challenge. And it's surprising how hard it would be to create a 16-bit self-hosted computer today. 16-bit compilers seem to be MIA or too big to be run on a 16-bit CPU. Even Bill-Buzbee's Magic-1 doesn't self-host. That's one of the other interesting features of Lilith, its Modula-2 compiler is powerful enough to develop entire systems and it *can* self-host. In theory you could expand a Lilith to cope with, say, 16Mb of code, just by extending its base registers (F, G, L, H etc) to 256b boundaries (that wouldn't help much with data access though, since Lilith shares a single 64KW address space amongst all processes and programs). -cheers from Julz @P

17 years, 8 months

UI (Was: OT: Microsoft crazy academic deal

by tonym＠compusource.net

>-----Original Message----- >From: Fred Cisin cisin at xenosoft.com >Sent 8/20/2008 9:48:12 PM >To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts cctalk at classiccmp.org >Subject: UI (Was: OT: Microsoft crazy academic deal> > >On Wed, 20 Aug 2008, David Griffith wrote: > Around that time just to prove that "Bob" was a piece of junk, someone > created "Bubba". As I recall, it seemed to work better than the Microsoft > product. I think this is it: > http://www.crummy.com/warren/files/picks/bubba.zip > >Thank you for the topic drift! > >Is that the same one as: >http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-13624-0.html?forumID=102&threadID=269221&m… > > I dunno - calling Bob a UI is kinda' insulting to UI's - that was just a POS. Does anyone actually KNOW of anyone who bought it? Tony

17 years, 8 months

Wanted: vacuum tube logic circuits

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

William Blair asks: > I have in the past found plenty of relay-based logic circuits on-line > but am having a really tough time finding any binary tube circuits with component values. The HP AC-4 counter modules (each can do a decade and they are occasionally re-wired to do other count sequences) came in several different speed grades, with different component values to accomodate the speed requirements. Different speeds had different DC biases and speedup capacitors and in some cases slightly different logic configs. (Yes, I believe that "speedup capacitor" is indeed the technical term). They use 5963's or 6211's which are computer/industrial-rated 12AU7's (constructed using materials to avoid cathode poisoning if biased off for a long time). They were designed to be true modules and have good interface descriptions. I have used 12AU7 SPICE models floating around the net to play with component selection etc. and the HP schematics are pretty optimal in design. I've built them from scratch on breadboards and they really do work. The HP units are cool because they use neon bulbs as both display decoders and as display elements. Berkeley Nucleonics and others built very similar modules. Some schematics and really good technical manuals on the web for these counters: http://www.hparchive.com/Manuals/HP-AC-4A-4B-Manual.pdf http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~hilpert/e/edte/HP520/index.html http://www.nixiebunny.com/hpac4/index.html Tim.

17 years, 8 months

Power One SPF4 series PS?

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

Does anyone here have a Power One switching power supply of the SPF4 series that I might talk them out of? This is a big, 1+kW power supply that's about the size of a couple of phone books stacked atop one another. It'll have a long model number starting with SPF4; the other numbers indicate what output modules are installed. I don't care about the output modules; my "base" unit is badly fried. Thanks, -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL

17 years, 8 months

software collecting (Was: OT: Microsoft crazy academic deal)

by tonym＠compusource.net

>-----Original Message----- >From: David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu >Sent 8/21/2008 2:13:41 AM >To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts cctalk at classiccmp.org >Cc: General at mail.mobygames.com >Subject: Re: UI (Was: OT: Microsoft crazy academic deal > >It's not amazing to me. I've sold a fair number of still-shrinked CP/M >packages. > > Even NOT shrinked CP/M fetches... I sold an extra complete set of original Osborne Executive disks, in binder, for about $90 on fleaBay a while back. Tony

17 years, 8 months

OT: Microsoft crazy academic deal

by tonym＠compusource.net

>-----Original Message----- >From: Sridhar Ayengar ploopster at gmail.com >Sent 8/21/2008 11:27:00 AM >To: General Discussion GeneralDiscussion@ >Subject: Re: OT: Microsoft crazy academic deal > >tonym wrote: > Not to be a jerk about it, but welcome to the Internet. People > swear, just like they do in real life. If your mom doesn't want you > to hear those words, set up an email filter or something. Hell, he > even censored himself, but you still felt the need to complain? > > I do agree that this topic is just fine on the list; it's not like > we have these sort of threads every day, and some people could find > this information (about the Academic Alliance and other things) > useful. > > Actually, if you read the messages in correct order, you will see > that *I* was the one that censored it in my response. > >I'm not a prude, but that really is unnecessary. I'd like to think >we're a little more civilized. > >*plonk* > >Peace... Sridhar > Oh, wow - I am SO impressed. You're only a day late, and a dollar short

17 years, 8 months

More ETH Lilith goodies available

by julianskidmore＠yahoo.com

Jos Dreesen wrote: > My "simple" Linux/X11 version is still not running... My 'simple' MCode interpreter doesn't compile yet (at least I haven't tried to compile it). It's complete apart from the Blitting ops, but it's basically a straight translation from the M2P interpreter. :-) Nevertheless, I think your emulator is more ambitious than what I'd do, I only want to emulate at the MCode level. I think that's true to the spirit of Lilith, it's an abstract machine so the microarchitecture would have changed with future versions. > Is your C-code available somewhere ? I'll send you the file once it compiles, is that OK? You're welcome to host it on your ftp site. > Some more interesting facts : > 1 No hierarchical filesystem, > 2 dodgy & very noisy diskdrive, > 3 4 big & loud fans, > 4 apple-II compatible floppy disk with a 9600 bd serial access > 5 keytronics keyboard with those damned foampads > 6 problematic 4116's ( 128 of them ) > 7 asynchroneous access to the memory by graphics hardware > 8 instruction fetch unit and CPU etc. etc I've been aware of the Filesystem issue - if I were to implement a MCU-baesd PocketLilith I'd redo the filesystem to support directories and a useful disk size - 256Mb? (64K * 4K blocks). Otherwise, not having used one, I didn't know they were so temperamental. Going back to the whole Modula-2 / Lilith theme for the moment. For me, it really is all interesting. Let me take you back to my University days in the UK: 1986 - 1989. At the time we were taught Pascal and C as the main languages (with some 68000 assembler) and had the use of 512K Macs, 1Mb Mac Plusses and some brand-new Mac IIs. We missed out on object-orientation, but in our 3rd year, 1st year Students were being taught Modula-2, a 'big-boys' language, using an early version of MacMeth. But we never knew about Lilith; so we didn't know that Modula-2 wasn't just a conventional language hosted on a graphical computer, but a self-hosted universal systems language integrated with an early graphical computer. So, despite the weaknesses of the platform, the ambition of Lilith/Modula-2 is a real revelation. -cheers from Julz @P

17 years, 8 months

TSS/8 (was Closed vs. open source timeline.)

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> I believe > that TSS-8 and PS/8 were distributed as source, though OS/8 may > have had an extra license fee. A TSS/8 customer received a listing of the monitor which was customized for their machine. Very few sites received machine-readable sources. UWM was unusual since we made SO many mods that they were able to get the sources and the source to TSS/8 BASIC.

17 years, 8 months

Users groups (was Closed vs. open source timeline)

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> Just to mention, IIRC, SHARE, the IBM user group, which I believe was intended > both for sharing software amongst members and presenting a coordinated front of > members to IBM, was started back in the late 50's, or very early 60's IBM had SHARE and GUIDE, for scientific and commercial users. SHARE was formed in 1955. Every large computer maker had a user's group, with differing restrictions on program redistribution. Many of the groups were run by the computer companies themselves, and had restrictions on who could join. Individual programs were published in a catalog with a modest charge to cover copying costs (though it would add up very quickly if you wanted ALL the programs). Groups like ACM maintained a collection of algorithms. For a few years in the 70's, ACM actually published a book of all available non-commercial software. I can't think of any organization that was a large-scale clearinghouse/repository for different vendor's unencumbered software until archives began to spring up in the late 70's. The result of this is very little early software has survived, because as computer companies disappeared, no one saved the bits. As someone else has mentioned, the actual distribution restrictions varied. The use of copyright as a mechanism to force source code to remain available is a relatively modern invention (early 80's) by FSF/RMS. Before that, it either was placed in the Public Domain, or was copyrighted with varying restrictions. The rules for copyright have changed over the past 50 years, so there are programs which have gone into the Public Domain even though they were published with a copyright notice. "Closed" sources are generally considered proprietary, unpublished works. The earliest versions of UNIX, for example, carry no copyrights or other notices, but were considered proprietary, unpublished works.

17 years, 8 months

OT: Microsoft crazy academic deal

by korpela＠ssl.berkeley.edu

On Wed, Aug 20, 2008 at 10:52 PM, tonym <tonym at compusource.net> wrote: > > Funniest, is that "feature" makes it unusable at, oh, 9 out of 10 universities in this country, and countless > numbers of businesses. I know I couldn't use it at work - it wouldn't open hardly anything. > I guess I'm also at one of the 1 in 10 where you can use OpenOffice. And it's not my problem if the place you work has a brain-dead gotta-have-the-latest-version-of-office IT policy. Every time you send a document in Office 2007 format you are forcing the person you send it to consider upgrading as well. Ever wonder if that's why Microsoft offers these cheap copies? But then again when I use Bessel functions in a spreadsheet, people who are still using Office 2000 can't read it because they don't have Bessel functions. I suppose I should bend over backwards to maintain compatibility and write my own Bessel function macros. But if I can save things in Office 2000 format with OpenOffice, couldn't the idiots using Office 2007 do the same thing? In other words, when someone sends you something in Office 2007 format, do the same fscking thing you would if you were running Office 2003, tell them you don't have Office 2007 and don't intend to buy it. Tell them to send you an earlier format or a PDF for FSM sake. I typically don't do business with companies that insist on sending me things in incompatible formats. When it comes to incompatible formats you can be part of the problem or part of the solution.

17 years, 8 months

OT: Microsoft crazy academic deal

by sellam＠vintagetech.com

Are people still having a shitfit when someone uses a "curse" word? Fucking-A, grow up already. -- Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org [ Old computing resources for business || Buy/Sell/Trade Vintage Computers ] [ and academia at www.VintageTech.com || at http://marketplace.vintage.org ]

17 years, 8 months

Schematics of Atanasoff-Berry Computer logic circuits?

by wbblair3＠yahoo.com

> I'm not very familiar with vacuum tube circuit design, but I > have a PDF copy of the 1952 USAF technical order TO16-1-255 > "Basic Theory and Application of Electron Tubes" which looks > like it might be sufficient. > > Is that on line, or could you post it? I found it on an excellent vacuum tube resource page intended for audio amp builders, but I can't find that specific page right now nor will a google search for that title and with filetype:pdf result in proper hits, so I've uploaded the 16.6MB pdf here: http://tinyurl.com/5dh946 You can review the entire document on-line. Just click on the tiny "download" icon above the preview to download it. You've got to register to download from this site, but it's free, doesn't result in any spam and is well worth it. I've found lots of interesting tech stuff there over time. > Logic circuits are DC coupled, though, unlike audio > amplifiers. So the shift in operating point from the plate > voltage change (or, for that matter, from a change in vacuum tube > type, if you're doing that) probably means you'd have to change all > the coupling resistors. Man, do I know that now. I posted my comment before I'd fully digested the ABC web page. A multi-stage direct coupled vacuum tube circuit. Fun.

17 years, 8 months

OT: Microsoft crazy academic deal

by tonym＠compusource.net

>Not to be a jerk about it, but welcome to the Internet. People swear, >just like they do in real life. If your mom doesn't want you to hear >those words, set up an email filter or something. Hell, he even >censored himself, but you still felt the need to complain? > >I do agree that this topic is just fine on the list; it's not like we >have these sort of threads every day, and some people could find this >information (about the Academic Alliance and other things) useful. > >John "Potty Mouth" Floren >-- >Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn > > Actually, if you read the messages in correct order, you will see that *I* was the one that censored it in my response. I'm not a prude, but that really is unnecessary. I'd like to think we're a little more civilized. Speaking vocally, it may have an effect, but spelling it out in words really looks rather ignorant and uneducated. I'm not going to keep with this thread, just like I didn't respond to his immature response, but I wanted to make sure you were aware that it was I that censored it with *'s. 'nuff said Tony

17 years, 8 months

Free DECMATE (now gone)

by ken.rauhala＠nokia.com

I posted this yesterday to this list, the system is now with a new owner, saved from the dump!! ken

17 years, 8 months

IBM LPFK reverse engineering

by classiccmp＠philpem.me.uk

I've just been playing around with the LPFK again. In loopback mode, it seems to actively send data out of the 8051's serial port, then loop it back through. I've caught it sending data at 9600 Baud, apparently 8 bit data with a parity bit: Keys numbered left to right, top to bottom: Key Binary data #11 S_0101_0000_1 #14 S_1011_0000_0 Format: StartBit_D0-D3_D4-D7_Parity It appears that keys are numbered from zero, odd parity. Of course this doesn't really help with the "active" mode. I suspect the loopback switch is being used to toggle a GPIO, and redirect TXD to RXD somewhere. In "active" mode, sending a serial BREAK causes the LPFK to reset itself. Sending "SFFFFFFFF" followed by an LF causes the LEDs to blink once, then shut off. I don't think there's much that can be done with the LPFK without desoldering the 8051 chip and reading out the program. Catch is, the chip has probably had its encryption table programmed, and probably the lock bits as well... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

17 years, 8 months

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