11 Mar
2016
11 Mar
'16
11:52 a.m.
On 09/03/16 20:44, devin davison wrote:
I do not know much at all about what it would take to
compile this
into a working system. My first step is going to be to get over to the
library and get everything into a digital format. Ill be putting
everything i scan up online.
The last set of microfiche I have is V4.something. I think V5 is where
they went to CD, but my earliest source listings are
V6.2. Scanning the fiche is a good thing to do, but turning that into a
real digital format (i.e. a text file) will, I suspect, be
something of a challenge.
At one stage I thought I read that someone had gathered up all the old
listings and put them on CD. Whether that's
survived inside DEC ... err ... HP (or maybe even VMS Software Inc.) I
have no idea.
It will be interesting to see, in years to come, whether the microfiche
survives longer than the listings CDs.
My expectation is that the fiche will last longer than the CDs, that the
CDs will last longer than the last working
CD reader, that the fiche will be trivially readable hundreds of years
from now (since a reader is fairly low tech)
and
(probably) the contents of the listings CDs will be readable forever
(once they make it onto the internet ...)
Antonio