On the other hand, we have kids here who are high school graduates and can't count change without the computer telling them how to do it! VERY frustrating to be stuck in a checkout line because the computer blinked, and the cashier can't figure out how to make change. The first calculator for public use came out in 1977, that I know of. It was a TI, and was the size of a sheet of typewriter paper. Only 4 functions, and it cost $100! We were allowed slide rules, but the basic repitition of multiplication tables ended at 2nd grade for us. After that, if you did not know the basics, you were held back until you did. When my kids went to school, math was so firmly emphasized that they all had to know the basics, including multiply and dividing fractions and decimals, changing decimals to other bases, etc by the end of 5th grade, or you got held back. Computer lab started in 6th grade, computer basics was mandatory by 8th grade, and by 9th grade all written assignments were required to be done on the computers. Entire classes were computer based and modularized, so the kids who understood how to use the computers well could easily complete 8 or more semester classes in the first 90 days of school. They seemed to retain it, and each module built on the one before it, so the retention was increased. Then the state stepped in, and said that the computerized classes did not meet the mandated teaching requirements of interaction with the students, so they were discontinued, and the students went back to being bored. -----Original Message----- From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Seth Morabito Sent: Friday, March 01, 2013 2:30 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Calculators [was: Re: Raspberry Pi] * On Thu, Feb 28, 2013 at 02:05:30PM -0800, Chris Tofu <rampaginggreenhulk at yahoo.com> wrote: Out of curosity, why? I certainly wish I could have had a calculator in class when I was in school, it would have made math much less tedious. I come from the awkward in-between era when calculators existed, but were not yet permitted in the classroom, or (God forbid!) on tests. My most unpleasant memories of math from grade school through high school were arithmetic. The pointless drudgery and tedium of calculating rote answers on paper or in my head, instead of using my brain to solve REAL problems, put me off math until college. When I discovered what a joy algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and calculus were, I was even more angry at the years I spent doing times tables, addition, subtraction, and multiplication when a tiny machine could have freed me up to care about the more interesting stuff. Personally, I say every kid should be armed with a basic scientific calculator from the moment they start learning. Ban arithmetic and teach the fun stuff from the get-go. You'll get more engineers that way! :) -Seth ----- No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 2013.0.2899 / Virus Database: 2641/6139 - Release Date: 02/28/13 ----- No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 2013.0.2899 / Virus Database: 2641/6139 - Release Date: 02/28/13

From: Seth Morabito <lists at loomcom.com> * On Thu, Feb 28, 2013 at 02:05:30PM -0800, Chris Tofu <rampaginggreenhulk at yahoo.com> wrote: Out of curosity, why? I certainly wish I could have had a calculator in class when I was in school, it would have made math much less tedious. I come from the awkward in-between era when calculators existed, but were not yet permitted in the classroom, or (God forbid!) on tests. My most unpleasant memories of math from grade school through high school were arithmetic.? The pointless drudgery and tedium of calculating rote answers on paper or in my head, instead of using my brain to solve REAL problems, put me off math until college. When I discovered what a joy algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and calculus were, I was even more angry at the years I spent doing times tables, addition, subtraction, and multiplication when a tiny machine could have freed me up to care about the more interesting stuff. Personally, I say every kid should be armed with a basic scientific calculator from the moment they start learning. Ban arithmetic and teach the fun stuff from the get-go. You'll get more engineers that way!? :) -Seth C: And you actually don't believe there's any merit in strengthening your problem solving ability by doing a certain number of rote calculating, particularly in the young mind? How do you move on to algebra, which is difficult enough for most people (a severe transition, probably much more so then transitioning from calculus to differential equations). And calculus apart from theory, which you nip in the bud in the first week for the most part, is all technique. That is algebra on steroids, or better yet crack. ?If you don't use it you lose it.

I attempted to see if a demo was possible along with the possible cost of the application. It seems to still be in development, so perhaps that is the reason. Is there a description and an estimate of how much it costs. SST (Super Star Trek) from the late 1970s (written in F IV) was an excellent game to play on a PDP-11 terminal to learn geometry. Any user had to be able to calculate graph co-ordinates over a two dimensional galaxy of 8 by 8 sectors with each sector having 10 by 10 elements for a total of 800 elements. SST is available at dbit as one of the RT-11 games. Jerome Fine

Sometimes I test RT-11 programs under the RSTS/E RTS for RT-11 compatibility with RSTS/E. However, there does not seem to be any utility to copy files under V10.1-L of RSTS/E from an RT-11 file structure into the RSTS/E file structure so that the program can be executed and tested. In addition, I do not seem to be able to MOUNT an RT-11 disk under RSTS/E, the pack-id being unknown even when I user /PRIVATE /OVERRRIDE, etc. Maybe I missed that program or maybe the utility was not included with the distribution I am using. What am I missing? Jerome Fine

THANK YOU!! I found AUXLIB$:FIT, so at least I can move files around. Then I attempted: MOUNT DU1: /OVERRIDE But I still can't MOUNT an RT-11 disk pack. If I don't provide a pack-id, there is an error. Does an RT-11 pack have a standard ID? Under VMS, it used to support the "/FOREIGN" switch for INTERCHANCE, but RSTS/E does not seem to support such a pack. Does anyone have any suggestions? Jerome Fine

On Sun, Mar 03, 2013 at 03:11:03PM -0500, Jerome H. Fine wrote: In RSTS, mounting is for mounting RSTS RDS volumes only, to be accessed by the regular file system. For raw access, you don't have do to anything, as long as you have privs. FIT can see the disk already. John Wilson D Bit

On 03/03/2013 07:14 PM, Jerome H. Fine wrote: It's my pleasure to help. RSTS is a bit different. As John explained, MOUNT is a filesystem access thing in RSTS, not a device access thing. Well, think of it this way. FITS is a file interchange utility; most people used it for things like floppy disks. In a production PDP-11 installation, I think it would be pretty unusual to have large (i.e., large enough to have logical disks) RT-11 installation on a drive(s) attached to a RSTS system. It was typically one or the other. Since RSTS' RT-11 runtime system gives you most of the facilities of RT-11 anyway, including running most RT-11 binaries, there's even less reason to have a full RT-11 installation sitting on another drive attached to a system that usually runs RSTS. -Dave -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA

On Mar 2, 2013, at 1:57 PM, Tony Duell wrote: Use Macsyma (or the open source version Maxima). [ducks] Use infinite precision math libraries in various languages (lisp being the obvious one). ;-) I don't disagree with what you're saying...just couldn't resist pulling your chain. ;-) TTFN - Guy