I started out in the Mechanical Engineering program at Oregon State in the fall of 1980. The introductory ME course, ME101, had a computing component. We wrote a program using punch cards in a room of the Milne Computing Center, but they were pretty much unbolting the punch machines to haul them away as soon as we stood up. I recall they were all gone by the next quarter. Later, I took a Fortran course from a chain-smoking redheaded research assistant guy named David Cawlfield.
My ASR33 & paper tape experience came prior to that at Sunset High School. Primarily, we played Trek during lunch and we'd generate a long spool of paper tape logging the game for no particular reason. Because of the oil impregnated paper, the punched tape has a very particular smell and beautiful exactly-round punched holes. I presently have two ASR33's and a few assorted parts parked in my garage awaiting restoration. One of them belonged, I believe, to a sadly departed PLUG personality, Pete Lancashire. On Tue, Sep 21, 2021 at 10:09 AM John Sechrest <[email protected]> wrote: > > My first one was a HP 2100 series with paper tape, cards and 16K of > memory. > It had flippy switches too. I had to memorize the boot sequence to load the > tape, to load the OS. > > Basic and Fortran. > > The fortran compiler was multi-pass, so that meant being available to load > the second part of the tape after the first pass was generated. > > I remember tapes piling up on the floor and getting good at rolling them > back up. > Still have cards that I use as book marks. > > > On Tue, Sep 21, 2021 at 9:26 AM Randy Bush <[email protected]> wrote: > > > funny, i came in a different door; so used hollerith cards (1130, 1401, > > 709x) and a lot of assembler before tape (pdps). > > > > side excursion to more modern technology: i recently got a cheap usb-c > > cable tester. https://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/product/B07Y8BPVV4 (home url > > is https://bit-trade-one.co.jp/adusbcim/) and no longer have to wonder > > whether the cable will carry and/or supply power, video, ... > > > > randy > > > > > -- > [image: www.seattleangelconference.com] > <http://www.seattleangelconference.com/> > > *JOHN SECHREST* > *Founder, *Seattle Angel Conference > TEL (541) 250-0844 EMAIL [email protected] > Schedule A Meeting <https://sechrest.youcanbook.me/> > > http://seattleangelconference.com > @sechrest
