Old IT Technical Manuals. Recycle or try to sell / give away?

John Galt III

John Galt III

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I have about 150 pounds of 1980's and 1990's computer programming manuals cluttering up the place. Subjects are mostly mainframe stuff like PL/ 1 , COBOL, CICS, DB2, JCL, IBM OS360/370 operating system, etc, etc. Too many to list. :) Also a couple pc related like Microfocus Cobol. Plus lots more.

I looked on Ebay and I see some cobol manuals are listed as "buy now" for $26 for one manual. But I can't tell if the seller ever sold any.

Anyone have any luck selling these old IT manuals?


Thanks
 
John Galt III said:
... I looked on Ebay and I see some cobol manuals are listed as "buy now" for $26 for one manual. But I can't tell if the seller ever sold any...
Click to expand...

You can look at the "Complete listings" and "Sold listings" to see how other offers fared.
 
I thought most of that was online today? At least the current is, not sure how far back legacy stuff does. There's probably some that would want a nice paper manual
I still have a copy of Principles of Operation, nice to curl up with and read, if you can't sleep. Please let us know how it goes.
 
Check with the Computer History Museum. There is also a listserv called IBM-Main. Somebody there might be interested. The Hercules projects might want some 360 stuff.

Some will only want to scan. Others might want paper.
 
A lot of this stuff is online, but some of the really old probably isn't, and there may be some interest as listed by Rustward. DH and I had COBOL and Pascal, to VB6 and PowerBuilder, to .NET and Java, also a lot of open source - as well as operating systems, platforms, etc...everything you listed above. Tried to give them away. Finally, recycled. But we didn't really want to spend a lot of time tracking down interested parties. Maybe you'll have better luck.
 
I donated a bunch of books last year to the San Diego public library; they definitely DO NOT want old computer books! :)
 
I would tend to vote for recycle. There will always be someone, somewhere who wants and/or needs your 'stuff'; be it an old pickle jar or VCR machine. Is that a demand for them? I don't think so. Give them new life as a fed ex box. Take the cover of the oldest, most unique manual, frame it and hang it in your den as a reminder of a great career and a remembrance of the people you worked with.

After all, its just stuff!
george carlin stuff - Bing Videos

Warning, adult language
 
For sentimental value, I kept a JCL text book. But ended up donating other text books. Manuals when in the recycle.
 
We've been going through all the books in our home this past week. We have about 18 boxes and five bags full of old books, staged to be donated to the church fair in early November. We also have about five bags of old IT books. We briefly considered finding one of those "Donate Books" dumpsters around town and burden those folks with disposing of them - instead we'll feed them into the town recycling as we can over the next few weeks.

I'm discarding even decade-old IT books that I could conceivably still use for my current job, because the information is far more accessible online.
 
I am definitely watching this thread for ideas since I have the following...

John Galt III said:
...pounds of 1980's and 1990's computer programming manuals cluttering up the place. Subjects are mostly mainframe stuff like PL/ 1 , COBOL, CICS, DB2, JCL, IBM OS360/370 operating system, etc, etc. Too many to list. :) Also a couple pc related like Microfocus Cobol. Plus lots more....
Click to expand...

along with...
chris66 said:
...Pascal, to VB6 and PowerBuilder, to .NET and Java, also a lot of open source - as well as operating systems, platforms, etc....
Click to expand...

easysurfer said:
For sentimental value, I kept...
Click to expand...
Most everything!
A couple of book shelves in my office along with several bins in the basement are filled with this kind of stuff. But, it has been such a large part of my life, I have trouble letting it go. Just the thought saddens me somewhat. Yes, I have issues to work through.
​
 
I think probably a lot of us have had this problem. I still have some books and manuals dating back about 30 years which I have not looked at in at least the last 20. I have kept some for sentimental reasons, but most are now simply being discarded to the paper recycling bin. If they could be considered a tax deduction I would have donated them, but really it was not worth the effort.

During my working years (up until this April!) I tried to always keep the same amount of bookcase and file cabinet space. When I got something new, something old had to go. It was never difficult to find things I had not used in 10 years to discard.

(Wow, I am outside in the patio while writing this and two humming birds just flew about a yard from my face hovering and watching at me while I type. Amazing! They are swarming around the feeders this time of year, getting ready for the migration south I guess.)

Now I have considerably reduced my bookcase space and am discarding more. Some of the ones I kept for sentimental reasons are also now being discarded, they were not that sentimental after all. I feel it is sometimes good to clear away these cobwebs from you mind to be ready to accumulate new and unrelated adventures.

I find the more I get rid of, the freer I feel.
 
I can't believe there is much of a market for this stuff... I did keep some old IT manuals from the early 60's that were given to me (and that don't take up much room) but I've tossed the bulk of my IT books from the 70s, 80's and 90's. I kept a few but not many.

I remember at work, every so often, people would stack their old/outdated technology books in the break room with a sign saying "take what you want". Most (if not all) found their way to the re-cycle boxes.
 
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I have thrown out early game consoles (Fairchild) and and early (12 inch) video disk machine that if I had kept, would be worth something now, but I doubt that keeping old IT books would ever fetch much, even if held for a generation.

As for some high prices on half.com, those prices can be total BS. The only price to pay attention to is the lowest price, and the book may not ever sell at that price. By the way, manuals are not well adapted to selling on half.com because they often do not have an ISBN assigned.

Put the old IT books in the recycle bin and save on your next move!
 
Unless you are a hoarder or use these materials regularly, definitely do not keep. If you're interested in a little project, try to sell them or give them away. I would recycle them and move on to more interesting things in life.
 
I got rid of all of my old books/manuals on specific technologies long ago. But I still have one college textbook that I hope is considered a classic: Donald Knuth's Fundamental Algorithms. I think a lot of "coders" should study that book first.
 
I did sell some mainframe reference cards I had from college on ebay for a few $$$ each. I was truly surprised there was any interest. I think once you get off of mainframes the value for old books hits $0 pretty quick.
 
You must have the same books as I did. I have been donating mine to the Vietnam veterans. They offer pick up at my house.
 
Thanks for all the replies! Brings back the memories, does it not? May take a couple of these manuals down to recycling today and turn them into Fedex boxes. :)
 
John Galt III said:
Thanks for all the replies! Brings back the memories, does it not? May take a couple of these manuals down to recycling today and turn them into Fedex boxes. :)
Click to expand...
Yep. I feel your pain. At first we hung onto old books and manuals because, well, maybe someone would ask us to look at old code, right? At least that's what we told ourselves. But, really, DH and I are bibliophiles. When we got together, the biggest issue we had in combining households was all the books. We purged a lot back then (both IT and non-IT).

We retired in March. It was freeing recently to get rid of the IT books. We still have tons of others. DH has the largest quantity of literature. I have a thing for how-to's of every kind (especially cookbooks, gardening, home improvement, dog training) as well us understanding people/society (history, biography, women's issues). We're in the process of a complete home remodel, and during this, have to move things from a room being worked on to a room not being worked on from time to time. This was the real tipping point that caused us to purge the IT books. It was stronger than nostalgia.

Good luck.
 
I saw this thread on my phone, so the title was truncated as "Old IT Technical Manuals. Recycle or..."

My first thought was 'please tell me the missing word is "burn".

:)
 
Is it crazy that soo far in my entire 10 year IT career I have not had to purchase a manual? I am thinking as hard as I possibly can but I cannot recall actually having to pay for a physical book or manual...

I've read plenty of manuals, but I have never paid for dummies, 101s, how-tos or OS/Guides and manuals.

My dad has a bunch of manuals (Cisco) and a bunch of old server and pc hardware from the 90s he thinks he will sell on ebay some day. The funny thing is most of his equipment and books were aquired or paid for by the compnay. I can remmeber when they paid for my Microsoft Encarta CD that I used to help me with school projects as a kid. Loved Encarta!
 
kgtest said:
Is it crazy that soo far in my entire 10 year IT career I have not had to purchase a manual? I am thinking as hard as I possibly can but I cannot recall actually having to pay for a physical book or manual...

I've read plenty of manuals, but I have never paid for dummies, 101s, how-tos or OS/Guides and manuals.
Click to expand...


Not at all, most of the manuals are online. Things have changed for the better in that respect.

In the old(diansour) days they(manuals) were precious. I remember paying $150 for one hardcopy. Everything in it referred the reader to Appenix B. There was no Appenix B. Complained after the second one arrived. They send an SE with the third, he watched as I unwrapped the precious document, no Appenix B. here either.


Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I337 using Early Retirement Forum mobile app
 
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