Entering the Big Bad Bit Barn

[braumeister]

Another funny story.
I had a friend who loved his Osborne portable computer (the size and weight of a heavy suitcase with a 5" monochrome screen, 64K RAM, and two floppy drives) so much that he decided it was the ultimate computer and could never be surpassed. So he bought a second one to always have spare parts for it. That was in the mid 80s.

Edit: Reminded me of the old military saying that "portable" meant you could weld handles on it.

 

[REWahoo]

The accurate description of the Osborne was "luggable", not portable..

 

[MRG]

The accurate description of the Osborne was "luggable", not portable..

Yeah I remember the IBM portables in the early 90s. Probably 386s and heavy, their price tag was heavy too. We'd play a game of taking one to a client site and leaving it for the next person, cause nobody wanted to pack it home.

One lady said sure, I'll bring it back. She checked it as luggage! That was it's last trip.

 

[rodi]

In middle school, 8th grade, I think, the math teacher had some computer that we had to program punch cards for. Then in high school the physics teacher started a computer club with an Altair computer.

In College, as an EE major we had to do Fortran programming. Fortunately, there was a program that converted our typed input to the punch cards that ran on an IBM mainframe. As Athena mentioned - you'd wait your turn to run your batch... then if it failed, you'd start over again. Fun times hanging out on Saturdays in the computer lab... all because you put a character in the wrong spot. (Fortran was unforgiving.)

Later we had a bios class - using the "new" IBM PCs. We'd use EDLIN to write assembly code to run on the PC. That was my first taste of hardware specific programming - which is how I spent my career. (Embedded software, aka Firmware)

My dad was an early adopter of computers and all things digital. In high school I used to borrow his HP-35 calculator (reverse polish notation). He'd spent $450 on it but it did trig functions!!! By college the TI-30 did all the same functions and only cost $30. But I used an HP 15C for most of college. Very nice to be able to program it to solve for roots in multivariable equations. My dad also bought an IBM PC when I was in college.

My first job was writing assembly code to control military transmitters and receivers... We used PCs. We then moved on to C code with microprocessor specific cross assemblers. Back then the main code would be in C - but all the device drivers and interrupt handlers were in assembly language. We had some legacy code we had to maintain on old KayPro "luggable" CPM machines. We also had IBM "portable" 286 PCs for when we had to go to a customer site.

The bulk of my career was doing C and C++, with some scripting (python, awk, etc) and my last few years some Java on a linux platform.

My kids are fully digital. Both know Java and are active on robotics (FIRST FRC) team. They can't imagine life without smart phones, gaming PCs, and tech skills. It's a different world for them.

 

[jim584672]

I had a Timex Sinclair 1000 with 16k expansion module.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timex_Sinclair_1000

Loaded programs with a cassette recorder.

 

[socca]

There are four punched-hole yellow tapes sitting on my desk as a reminder of my early days in tech. These tapes were fed into a tape reader mounted on a NCR teletypewriter. Old timers here will remember the racket those NCR machines made while printing (and yes, carriage return and line feed were once separate, meaningful operations). I wrote the programs on those tapes while in high school in the late 1970s. My high school was one of the lucky few to have a dedicated line to Battelle Memorial Institute in Columbus, OH.

 

[aja8888]

Took FORTRAN in engineering college (three courses - 1973 or so).

Took one class in COBAL.

Went to work as an Industrial Engineer.

Bought an Apple IIe. Added a drive and color card. Fun machine! Donated it to a elementary school.

Worked for 30 + years as an engineer/manager/consultant.

Built a few dozen work/gaming computers in the 2000's and started a part time computer repair and network installation business with a friend. Sold my interest in that business several years later when it was consuming all my free time.

Now I have a Chromebook and a homemade desktop.

 

[GalaxyBoy]

In College, as an EE major we had to do Fortran programming. Fortunately, there was a program that converted our typed input to the punch cards that ran on an IBM mainframe. As Athena mentioned - you'd wait your turn to run your batch... then if it failed, you'd start over again. Fun times hanging out on Saturdays in the computer lab... all because you put a character in the wrong spot. (Fortran was unforgiving.)

OMG that brings back memories of engineering computer classes in the late '70s. There were keypunch machines around campus and a few were in very strange and out-of-the-way places. Those were the ones that, once found, you never told anyone else about. Otherwise you'd be lined up waiting your turn late into the night.

 

[ttvjef]

Wow great thread, I haven't thought about my first computer in years. Had a lot of fun with it and it did launch my IT career.
My first was a Radio Shack TRS-80. Had 640k, and dual 5 1/4 floppy drives! This was I think about 1988. Spent countless hours teaching myself basic banging away staring at a 12" color tv. Loved it and joined old school user group to share software and ideas.

 

[braumeister]

beep!
syntax error

 

[athena53]

My dad was an early adopter of computers and all things digital. In high school I used to borrow his HP-35 calculator (reverse polish notation). He'd spent $450 on it but it did trig functions!!!

I remember the HP-35! Never owned one but Engineering majors would spend their entire summer's earnings to buy one. The first time the Physics professor asked us to do a calculation for him as he lectured, one proud HP-35 owner read off the answer to 6 digits before we could even whip out our slide rules. I remember we laughed because it was so unexpected to get an answer to that level of precision.

 

[Rustward]

370/145 (Ibm 3145) in 1973 running OS/VS1 later field upgraded to 370/148 progressing to OS/VS1 under VM/370, then OS/VS2 R1 (SVS) under VM/370, then native SVS.

And I had (and still have) an HP-35 and in the late 70's-early 80's worked for the company that originally supplied the HP-35 processors.