Musings on Ancient Computing

I should bow out, 1969 wins. We didn’t have computers in elementary school back then.

But… learning basic using mark sense cards in junior high math class in 1972? Coding PL/I on green coding forms that went to the school district’s keypunch pool and then run, getting the output the next week?

How about the oldest machine? I worked on an antique Raytheon machine once. You started it up by entering some boot code using toggle switches, watching progress in binary on Nixie tubes, then fed it programs on paper tape that were stored on a huge drum device with a few K of storage. I wasn’t into audio at the time, so I didn’t think to check if it was built from tube flipflops. Being the size of a couple of refrigerators it was probably too small for that. :slight_smile:

We used to hack the keypunch control cards in the university’s keypunch room to ensnare the unwary.

Now I can deploy a service to fleets of hosts in datacenters around the world by clicking a button on a webpage and impact millions of customers. What a journey!

Thanks,

  • Eric
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