Sentiment favors old computers

[sebugg@presby.edu (Stephen Buggie)]

This memo came on the psychology teachers' network but I think many
readers of the A2 net will enjoy the viewpoint presenred:

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     Nineteen years ago, I built a nine key system for use with
          pigeons. It used (and still uses) a 8080A microprocessor
          that I program in octal machine language. 12K of memory
          that is plenty for any experiment (Clock speed= 750K). Call
          me crazy, but I love writting programs in three digit codes.
          Example: 076 (take the following #), 002 (the bulb I want
          turned on), 323 (OUT-send it to), 011 (inline # 9, 9 is 11
          in octal).  There is a beauty in developing logic like this.
          My machine uses the same processor as the VOYAGER
          PROBES, which means that I could have programmed that
          satelite, even though I never attended engineering school,
          a fact that even today gives me a great sense of
          accomplishment.  I am sorry that young people today don't
          write their own programs anymore in Basic, Foretran, but
          rely on canned software. I remember when BYTE magazine
          provided basic programs for people to use and truly interact
          with the machine. Now its all ads for the latest black box.
          Also, I have never lost a day of research waiting for a
          technician to fix the machine.  I believe that we lost
          something when we stopped running research with
          electromechanical equipment, or the BRS plugboard systems
          that we learned to program as grad students. These
          rely on canned software. I remember when BYTE magazine
          provided basic programs for people to use and truly interact
          with the machine. Now its all ads for the latest black box.
          Also, I have never lost a day of research waiting for a
          technician to fix the machine.  I believe that we lost
          something when we stopped running research with
          electromechanical equipment, or the BRS plugboard systems
          that we learned to program as grad students. These
          experiences honed our logic skills that turned up to be
          useful when designing research or writing papers. I grew up
          with POPULAR ELECTRONICS, and other magazines that gave you
          skematics for projects and explained how they work.  No
          modern black box computer with windows can do that for me.





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   ** S. Buggie  sebugg@presby.edu  IIe/IIc  Ph: (803) 833-8337, 833-1632 **
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