Re: pdp-11 assembly standards

[Brent Hilpert]

On 2017-Jan-09, at 6:27 AM, Pete Lancashire wrote:
> wow ... the memories ... someday I've got to get a PDP-11 again :-).
> 
> had most of the opcodes memorized, for a story 
> 
> Had a coworker who played the piano, he could enter/patch code from
> the 11/35's panel from memory so fast all you saw was a blur.
> 
> When we replacing the 11/35's with 11/34A he hated it.
> 
> -pete
> 
> On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 6:13 AM, Paul Koning  wrote:
>> 
>>> On Jan 9, 2017, at 12:38 AM, Don North  wrote:
>>> 
>>> On 1/8/2017 9:10 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote:
 OK, what was the standard (if there was one) number-base syntax for PDP-11 
 assembler?
 
 Despite all the PDP-11 assembly info on web sites, this seems to be a 
 buried bit of info.
 One assembler doc uses a prefix of "&o", another specifies octal as 
 default and prefix of zero for decimal (opposite of the common C-derived 
 standard . . great).
 
 Is this for example standard?:
 
 BIT #&o200, @#&o177564  ; test 2^7 bit at address 
 octal 177564
 
 (I'm just trying to make some written commentary consistent with common 
 policy.)
 
 
>>> MACRO11 Language Manual v5.5 section 6.4
>>> 
>>> All numbers are octal radix, unless the default radix is changed via the 
>>> .RADIX N directive (N can be 2, 8, 10, or 16). N blank resets the radix to 
>>> octal.
>>> 
>>> So 0100, 100 would be octal 100, decimal value 64.
>>> 
>>> Any number followed by a period (decimal point) is forced to be base 10.
>>> 
>>> So 100. would be decimal 100, octal 144.
>>> 
>>> Prefix operators ^B (binary), ^O (octal), ^D (decimal), ^X (hexadecimal) 
>>> force the following digits/characters to the designated radix.
>>> 
>>> So ^B101000 == ^O50 == ^D40 == ^X28 all represent the same value (decimal 
>>> 40.) irrespective of the current .RADIX N setting.
>> 
>> I don't remember ^X.  Other ways to specify numeric values is with prefix ' 
>> (single quote) for a single byte value, i.e., 'x is the ASCII code for 
>> character x.  Similarly, "xy is a 16 bit value for the two-character 
>> sequence xy (little endian).  And ^Rxyz is the RAD50 coded value for the 
>> three characters xyz.
>> 
>> &o doesn't match anything I've ever seen, not even in the wildly different 
>> world of Unix.


So the answer is, by modern expectations the old standard would be ambiguous or 
misleading.
I guess I should just comment it.

Re: Contacting Jay West

[ben]

On 1/9/2017 3:13 PM, geneb wrote:

On Mon, 9 Jan 2017, Rob Jarratt wrote:



No HP-2000 problem, just wasn't HP-2000 sure if I had sent it to the
right
place HP-2000.


"Meet single HP-2000 in your area!"

g.



Where are the Female Computers?
Hal

Re: Stinky resistors was Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Chuck Guzis]

On 01/09/2017 08:51 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote:
> You'd think that based on the looks on the faces of everyone around
> me.  I am not exaggerating when I say that everyone shouted "No!" when
> I said I was going to take the bus home...


Ah, high-school--and 7 AM zoology lab.  I definitely recall the
expressions of the students around me after working on my tiger shark
dissection.  Start the day by rolling up your sleeve and fishing around
from your "project" in a barrel of formaldehyde.   Not just the odor of
formaldehyde, but also that of rotting fish.   You couldn't wash that
stink out--it just sort of wore off during the day.

Today, of course, there's no way the authorities would let their
young'uns splash around in formaldehyde...

--Chuck

Re: Sunday brain tickler

[Chuck Guzis]

On 01/09/2017 02:58 PM, allison wrote:

> Low majik there...   8 bytes of 7 bit ascii means one free bytes
> worth of bits, to do that start with an 8byte area as 64 bits and
> stuff the bits.   The only question is are the left justified or
> right a few minutes by hand can discover that. Done that way 9
> characters fit in 8 bytes.

> Another allocation scheme is one page per track, about 1200-1500
> bytes, or about 35 pages for a 35track floppy.   So each tack is a
> page and the file header has the page name and a linked list to the
> next.

There are actually 16 150-byte sectors (4 byte header in the form of DB
TT SS CC where CC is the arithmetic sum of TT and SS, followed by 151
bytes of data, with the last byte being the simple sum of bytes 1-150
modulo 256. Encoding is simple FM, with no "funny" missing clock bits.

The sectors are ordered in two groups of 1200 bytes:

0,11,6,1,12,7,2,13 and 8,3,14,9,4,15,10,5

There are 70 groups on the disk, obviously.

I've learned that the 103 was a 32KB 8080 system, so not so sophisticated.

It's the filename encoding that has me stymied, not the data retrieval
itself.

--Chuck

Re: Sunday brain tickler

[allison]

On 01/09/2017 12:51 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
> On 01/09/2017 09:28 AM, Fred Cisin wrote:
>> Need there BE a filename?
>>
>> An OS, particularly for a word processor, could have an IMPLICIT list
>> of filenames on a disk of DOCUMENT1 DOCUMENT2 DOCUMENT3
>
> I found this document:
>
> http://www.dtic.mil/get-tr-doc/pdf?Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf&AD=ADA199551
>
> about transferring Lanier "No Problem" files to a Unix (Gould 9050)
> mini.  The interchange program was a serial-comms program, so no value
> to disk interpretation.
>
> However, in section 2.2, there's light shed on how the Lanier manages
> its files.  Very unusual, but might well explain some of the directory bits.
>
> But apparently files were named--and some sort of name compression
> appears to be in use as the name of the comms program is 9 characters
> long, while the file name area appears to be only 8 bytes in length.
Low majik there...   8 bytes of 7 bit ascii means one free bytes worth
of bits,
to do that start with an 8byte area as 64 bits and stuff the bits.   The
only
question is are the left justified or right a few minutes by hand can
discover
that. Done that way 9 characters fit in 8 bytes.

Another allocation scheme is one page per track, about 1200-1500 bytes,
or about 35 pages for a 35track floppy.   So each tack is a page and the
file
header has the page name and a linked list to the next.

There are more ways to organize a disk than Carter has liver pills.

Allison

>
> --Chuck
>

Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Pete Lancashire]

Do a Google search on

cellulose acetate butyrate

the 'stink' is mostly acetic acid and as it has been stated, the key
is ACID, think what would happen if you poured a cup of white vinegar
inside you favorite classic.

Yea not a bad but the idea is the same.

I emailed the Apex Tool Group a year ago and their response was live
with the coating, which became a challenge. You can't clean them but
you can buff the handles and then polish. But there is no way to stop
the chemical reaction.

Saying that, does not explain why I have some "Parks Metal Ware"
drivers that have not decayed.

-pete

On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 2:31 PM, Ethan Dicks  wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 4:17 PM, Pete Turnbull  
> wrote:
>> On 09/01/2017 20:30, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>>
>>> Esters... we mixed a variety of alcohols with a variety of fatty acids
>>> and let the audience smell the results... it was all fun and games
>>> until I spilled 200ml of Butyric Acid on myself...  :-P  )
>>
>> Ooooh!  I know that smell.  And it doesn't come off easily!
>
> I was just put out because they sent me home but wouldn't let me take
> the bus.  I had to wait for my mother to pick me up.
>
> -ethan
>

Re: Stinky resistors was Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Ethan Dicks]

On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 9:48 PM, Jon Elson  wrote:
> On 01/09/2017 04:30 PM, Charles Dickman wrote:
>>
>>   it was all fun and games
>> until I spilled 200ml of Butyric Acid on myself...  :-P  )
>
> YIKES!  200 ml?  Nowadays, that would cause everybody from the EPA to
> Homeland Security to get involved!

Most likely.

> I think that might be worse than being sprayed by a skunk point blank.

You'd think that based on the looks on the faces of everyone around
me.  I am not exaggerating when I say that everyone shouted "No!" when
I said I was going to take the bus home...

-ethan

Re: Stinky resistors was Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Mark Linimon]

On Mon, Jan 09, 2017 at 10:31:50PM -0600, Chris Elmquist wrote:
> These are the things you learn while having to _wait_ (and wait and
> wait) to use the Teletype 33 and dialup modem in the room next to the
> little chemistry lab.

Did we go to the same high school?

mcl

Re: Stinky resistors was Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Chris Elmquist]

On January 9, 2017 9:30:57 PM CST, Mark Linimon  wrote:
>On Mon, Jan 09, 2017 at 08:48:14PM -0600, Jon Elson wrote:
>> YIKES!  200 ml?  Nowadays, that would cause everybody from the EPA to
>> Homeland Security to get involved!
>
>I'm not sure the statute of limitations has run out on what my friend
>(we'll call him "Joe") and I got up to in high school chemistry.
>
>But in today's edition of Did You Know:
>
>  Did You Know that canisters labeled Hydrogen act differently than
>  canisters labeled Helium?
>
>mcl

oh ya...   and Did You Know that those little rubber bumps on the top of a 3/4" 
test tube stopper can inflate to about 4" diameter before they burst when they 
are used to try to stop the flow of natural gas from the spigot that supplies a 
Bunsen burner?

Did You Know you can evacuate 600 students in about 5 minutes due to "gas leak"?

These are the things you learn while having to _wait_ (and wait and wait) to 
use the Teletype 33 and dialup modem in the room next to the little chemistry 
lab.

cje
-- 
Chris Elmquist

Re: Stinky resistors was Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Mark Linimon]

On Mon, Jan 09, 2017 at 08:48:14PM -0600, Jon Elson wrote:
> YIKES!  200 ml?  Nowadays, that would cause everybody from the EPA to
> Homeland Security to get involved!

I'm not sure the statute of limitations has run out on what my friend
(we'll call him "Joe") and I got up to in high school chemistry.

But in today's edition of Did You Know:

  Did You Know that canisters labeled Hydrogen act differently than
  canisters labeled Helium?

mcl

Re: Stinky resistors was Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Jon Elson]

On 01/09/2017 04:30 PM, Charles Dickman wrote:

  it was all fun and games
until I spilled 200ml of Butyric Acid on myself...  :-P  )
YIKES!  200 ml?  Nowadays, that would cause everybody from 
the EPA to Homeland Security to get involved!
I think that might be worse than being sprayed by a skunk 
point blank.


Jon

Re: Sunday brain tickler

[Chuck Guzis]

On 01/09/2017 03:33 PM, Jules Richardson wrote:

> It seems unlikely that a simple system would resort to something
> like frequency analysis of characters when encoding filenames,
> though, particularly given the size of the data (the overhead would
> probably not make it worthwhile) - so I'm guessing we should be
> looking at "plain text", just with some unusual character size or
> distribution.
> 
> I did hack some quick code to alter the character size (6, 7 and 8 
> bits), spacing between characters (0, 1 and 2 bits) and offset from
> the start of the stream, then 'slide' the resulting data through the
> ASCII table and search for the "LTER" name that you mentioned
> previously, but without any luck. That does make the assumption that
> values for A-Z are contiguous, which seems likely but not certain.


Given the simple 8080 architecture, we may be looking at "rotated" bits
also; I don't know.

But rest assured, every block after the first (directory) block contains
text.  There are no "hidden" file names.

--Chuck

Re: Sunday brain tickler

[Jules Richardson]

On 01/09/2017 11:51 AM, Chuck Guzis wrote:

On 01/09/2017 09:28 AM, Fred Cisin wrote:

Need there BE a filename?

An OS, particularly for a word processor, could have an IMPLICIT list
of filenames on a disk of DOCUMENT1 DOCUMENT2 DOCUMENT3



I found this document:

http://www.dtic.mil/get-tr-doc/pdf?Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf&AD=ADA199551

about transferring Lanier "No Problem" files to a Unix (Gould 9050)
mini.  The interchange program was a serial-comms program, so no value
to disk interpretation.


I suppose *if* you had a disk with the program on then it would give a 
known name to be searching for... except that the doc seems to call it 
TTY_ASCII in places and ASCII-TTY in others :-(



But apparently files were named--and some sort of name compression
appears to be in use as the name of the comms program is 9 characters
long, while the file name area appears to be only 8 bytes in length.


It seems unlikely that a simple system would resort to something like 
frequency analysis of characters when encoding filenames, though, 
particularly given the size of the data (the overhead would probably not 
make it worthwhile) - so I'm guessing we should be looking at "plain text", 
just with some unusual character size or distribution.


I did hack some quick code to alter the character size (6, 7 and 8 bits), 
spacing between characters (0, 1 and 2 bits) and offset from the start of 
the stream, then 'slide' the resulting data through the ASCII table and 
search for the "LTER" name that you mentioned previously, but without any 
luck. That does make the assumption that values for A-Z are contiguous, 
which seems likely but not certain.


I didn't look at 5 bit characters, which is a possibility if only alpha 
characters and not numerics are allowed in filenames.


I'm not sure if filenames are stored in their entirety, though - I think 
there was an example in that PDF which seemed to imply that pages have 
their own short names, and that these might be concatenated to form an 
overall name for the group of pages - I need to do more than just skim-read 
the document to understand that. It makes me wonder if there isn't some 
very short (2 or 3 character) limit on individual directory entries though, 
and these are chained together to make a larger name (and file)?


cheers

Jules

Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Ethan Dicks]

On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 4:17 PM, Pete Turnbull  wrote:
> On 09/01/2017 20:30, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>
>> Esters... we mixed a variety of alcohols with a variety of fatty acids
>> and let the audience smell the results... it was all fun and games
>> until I spilled 200ml of Butyric Acid on myself...  :-P  )
>
> Ooooh!  I know that smell.  And it doesn't come off easily!

I was just put out because they sent me home but wouldn't let me take
the bus.  I had to wait for my mother to pick me up.

-ethan

Stinky resistors was Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Charles Dickman]

On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 3:30 PM, Ethan Dicks  wrote:
> I have some Xcelite tools from the early 1980s.  They have been stinky
> for over 30 years.

Same experience. I have some in a drawer on my work work-bench that
were purchased in the early 80s and they still smell.

>   Definitely a butyrate stink (I used to
> run chemistry shows at The Center of Science and Industry - one was on
> Esters... we mixed a variety of alcohols with a variety of fatty acids
> and let the audience smell the results... it was all fun and games
> until I spilled 200ml of Butyric Acid on myself...  :-P  )

In high school chemistry we did some experiments with that stuff. I
think the teacher just liked to stink up the school every year.

Now I also have a bunch of drawers filled with Allen-Bradley carbon
composition resistors from around 1970. All the leads have a whitish
film on them that has a peculiar odor. They've been in the electrical
lab at work, in an office environment since that time. I've always
been a little curious about what caused it.

-chuck

RE: Contacting Jay West

[geneb]

On Mon, 9 Jan 2017, Rob Jarratt wrote:



No HP-2000 problem, just wasn't HP-2000 sure if I had sent it to the right
place HP-2000.


"Meet single HP-2000 in your area!"

g.

--
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.
http://www.diy-cockpits.org/coll - Go Collimated or Go Home.
Some people collect things for a hobby.  Geeks collect hobbies.

ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment
A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes.
http://scarlet.deltasoft.com - Get it _today_!

Re: pdp-11 assembly standards

[Pete Lancashire]

wow ... the memories ... someday I've got to get a PDP-11 again :-).

had most of the opcodes memorized, for a story 

Had a coworker who played the piano, he could enter/patch code from
the 11/35's panel from memory so fast all you saw was a blur.

When we replacing the 11/35's with 11/34A he hated it.

-pete



On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 6:13 AM, Paul Koning  wrote:
>
>> On Jan 9, 2017, at 12:38 AM, Don North  wrote:
>>
>> On 1/8/2017 9:10 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote:
>>> OK, what was the standard (if there was one) number-base syntax for PDP-11 
>>> assembler?
>>>
>>> Despite all the PDP-11 assembly info on web sites, this seems to be a 
>>> buried bit of info.
>>> One assembler doc uses a prefix of "&o", another specifies octal as default 
>>> and prefix of zero for decimal (opposite of the common C-derived standard . 
>>> . great).
>>>
>>> Is this for example standard?:
>>>
>>>  BIT #&o200, @#&o177564  ; test 2^7 bit at address 
>>> octal 177564
>>>
>>> (I'm just trying to make some written commentary consistent with common 
>>> policy.)
>>>
>>>
>> MACRO11 Language Manual v5.5 section 6.4
>>
>> All numbers are octal radix, unless the default radix is changed via the 
>> .RADIX N directive (N can be 2, 8, 10, or 16). N blank resets the radix to 
>> octal.
>>
>> So 0100, 100 would be octal 100, decimal value 64.
>>
>> Any number followed by a period (decimal point) is forced to be base 10.
>>
>> So 100. would be decimal 100, octal 144.
>>
>> Prefix operators ^B (binary), ^O (octal), ^D (decimal), ^X (hexadecimal) 
>> force the following digits/characters to the designated radix.
>>
>> So ^B101000 == ^O50 == ^D40 == ^X28 all represent the same value (decimal 
>> 40.) irrespective of the current .RADIX N setting.
>
> I don't remember ^X.  Other ways to specify numeric values is with prefix ' 
> (single quote) for a single byte value, i.e., 'x is the ASCII code for 
> character x.  Similarly, "xy is a 16 bit value for the two-character sequence 
> xy (little endian).  And ^Rxyz is the RAD50 coded value for the three 
> characters xyz.
>
> &o doesn't match anything I've ever seen, not even in the wildly different 
> world of Unix.
>
> paul
>
>
>

Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Pete Turnbull]

On 09/01/2017 20:30, Ethan Dicks wrote:


Esters... we mixed a variety of alcohols with a variety of fatty acids
and let the audience smell the results... it was all fun and games
until I spilled 200ml of Butyric Acid on myself...  :-P  )


Ooooh!  I know that smell.  And it doesn't come off easily!

--
Pete
Pete Turnbull

Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Ethan Dicks]

On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 3:28 AM, Adrian Graham
 wrote:
> We have 2 or 3 sets if Xcelite nut spinners at work with the torque sleeve
> and they've always stunk, I started there in 2004 and they weren't new then
> so it's obviously been a thing for a long while!

I have some Xcelite tools from the early 1980s.  They have been stinky
for over 30 years.  The large amber handles with the metal insert (for
screwdrivers and nutdrivers) even frequently accumulate a crusty white
"rind" that wipes off with a little effort, but returns after sitting
in a drawer for a few months.  Definitely a butyrate stink (I used to
run chemistry shows at The Center of Science and Industry - one was on
Esters... we mixed a variety of alcohols with a variety of fatty acids
and let the audience smell the results... it was all fun and games
until I spilled 200ml of Butyric Acid on myself...  :-P  )

RE: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Sam O'nella]

On a side note Dave, incase you hadn't already you should change your password 
since that was included in the original post.

Re: Polycorp Poly repair (b)log

[Ian S. King]

On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 12:53 AM, Terry Stewart 
wrote:

> A few months ago I picked up some Polycorp Polys, a computer designed
> specifically for the educational market in New Zealand.  One worked and one
> didn't.  The latter is now fixed.  As usual I've written it up with lots of
> pictures.  If anyone is interested you can read about it here.
>
> http://www.classic-computers.org.nz/blog/2017-01-08-second-poly1-fix.htm
>
> Cheers
>
> Tez
>

Nice fix!  It always amazes me how little of the inside of this sort of
machine was actual digital electronics, and how much was power, video and
sometimes drives.  I brought a TeleVideo TPC-1 back to life a few months
ago, and your restoration brings back memories (some of them cringeworthy).
 -- Ian

-- 
Ian S. King, MSIS, MSCS, Ph.D. Candidate
The Information School 
Dissertation: "Why the Conversation Mattered: Constructing a Sociotechnical
Narrative Through a Design Lens

Archivist, Voices From the Rwanda Tribunal 
Value Sensitive Design Research Lab 

University of Washington

There is an old Vulcan saying: "Only Nixon could go to China."

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Ian S. King]

On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 10:28 AM, Lyle Bickley 
wrote:

>
> FYI - I use MANY email vendors (yahoo, comcast, arrl, acm, any my own
> bickleywest.com, cerfnet.net, cerfnet.org, etc.) and ALL conform to the
> DMARC policy and have no issues sending to or receiving mail from gmail.
>
> Cheers,
> Lyle
>
>
> FWIW, the account on which I'm sending this is the UW's domain hosted by
Gmail, and I've had no problems sending email to the list.  Just another
data point -- Ian

>
>
>
>
> --
> 73  AF6WS
> Bickley Consulting West Inc.
> http://bickleywest.com
>
> "Black holes are where God is dividing by zero"
>



-- 
Ian S. King, MSIS, MSCS, Ph.D. Candidate
The Information School 
Dissertation: "Why the Conversation Mattered: Constructing a Sociotechnical
Narrative Through a Design Lens

Archivist, Voices From the Rwanda Tribunal 
Value Sensitive Design Research Lab 

University of Washington

There is an old Vulcan saying: "Only Nixon could go to China."

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Lyle Bickley]

On Mon, 9 Jan 2017 14:43:51 +0100
Tor Arntsen  wrote:

> On 9 January 2017 at 14:37, william degnan 
> wrote:
> > On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 8:09 AM, Liam Proven 
> > wrote: 
> >> On 9 January 2017 at 10:06, Dave Wade 
> >> wrote:  
> >> >  Why does this keep on happening? What is google doing to cause
> >> > this to happen?  
> >>
> >>
> >> Damned if I know, but it's happening to me frequently, too. >:-(
> >>
> >> --
> >>  
> >
> > My first thought is that gmail is huge, they load balance email
> > servers and they may bounce on a timing schedule that conflicts
> > with the schedule used by the mail server cctech uses.[..]  
> 
> I initially thought that as well, even though I found it unlikely
> (I've never observed delays when I email from somewhere to a gmail
> account, and never any bouncing due to load).
> 
> What I think happens, because it's so frequent, is that some list
> members use addresses that fail gmail's verification. We already know
> that yahoo and aol emails suffer from this, their address come through
> in the mailing list but the sender is not yahoo or aol (it's the
> mailing list server), and there are some hoops to go through to avoid
> those problems (I had to set an option to not automatically have those
> emails go to spam).
> 
> So, in short, I think the problem is caused by posts from some
> particular subscribers getting bounced by some servers (among them,
> gmail), not that the receving servers (e.g. gmail) are overloaded or
> otherwise failing.

This is absolutely correct. As an admin that manages a CHM list on
Google, I agree that the problem is NOT with Google Gmail per se.
They are merely enforcing what they promised to do months ago.
Enforce the DMARC policy. Here's a typical response from Google when a
mail server does not follow practices initiated to reduce SPAM (actual
domain hidden by me with xx.xxx):
---
host gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com [173.194.203.27]
SMTP error from remote mail server after end of data:
550-5.7.1 Unauthenticated email from xx.xxx is not accepted due
to domain's 550-5.7.1 DMARC policy. Please contact the administrator of
xx.xxx domain 550-5.7.1 if this was a legitimate mail. Please visit
550-5.7.1  https://support.google.com/mail/answer/2451690 to learn
about the 550 5.7.1 DMARC initiative. q12si89233361pgc.52 - gsmtp
---

BTW, this typically happens when an email is posted to an email server
which is then redirected to Gmail via another server.

More and more mail systems will be enforcing DMARC policies - so it
would be good to make sure your ISP is setup correctly.

FYI - I use MANY email vendors (yahoo, comcast, arrl, acm, any my own
bickleywest.com, cerfnet.net, cerfnet.org, etc.) and ALL conform to the
DMARC policy and have no issues sending to or receiving mail from gmail.

Cheers,
Lyle






-- 
73  AF6WS
Bickley Consulting West Inc.
http://bickleywest.com

"Black holes are where God is dividing by zero"

Re: Sunday brain tickler

[Chuck Guzis]

On 01/09/2017 09:28 AM, Fred Cisin wrote:
> Need there BE a filename?
> 
> An OS, particularly for a word processor, could have an IMPLICIT list
> of filenames on a disk of DOCUMENT1 DOCUMENT2 DOCUMENT3


I found this document:

http://www.dtic.mil/get-tr-doc/pdf?Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf&AD=ADA199551

about transferring Lanier "No Problem" files to a Unix (Gould 9050)
mini.  The interchange program was a serial-comms program, so no value
to disk interpretation.

However, in section 2.2, there's light shed on how the Lanier manages
its files.  Very unusual, but might well explain some of the directory bits.

But apparently files were named--and some sort of name compression
appears to be in use as the name of the comms program is 9 characters
long, while the file name area appears to be only 8 bytes in length.

--Chuck

Re: Sunday brain tickler

[Chuck Guzis]

The web search breadth increases a bit when the term "No Problem" is
substituted for "103" when looking for Lanier documents.  Not much, but
there are some tidbits.

Such as:

" Its main drawback was that it was a page-oriented program as opposed
to a document-oriented program. You got only 99 lines on a page, and
then you had to store that on disk and start the next page. That made it
cumbersome to go back and review what was on previous pages. That
99-line limitation was in part a function of limited memory. In those
days memory was expensive and most computers had only 32K of RAM. The
Lanier No Problem was a 32K machine and both the program and the
document you were working on had to be in memory at the same time. To
get around these shortcomings the Lanier would repaginate, that is, take
your original document and break it up into pages of the length you
wanted. "

--Chuck

Re: Sunday brain tickler

[Fred Cisin]

Need there BE a filename?

An OS, particularly for a word processor, could have an IMPLICIT list of 
filenames on a disk of

DOCUMENT1
DOCUMENT2
DOCUMENT3

in which case, the table that you have found could be little more than 
record keeping of which "documents" are allocated V free-space, how 
much of the "document" is used (file-length), and maybe date?

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Fred Cisin]

On Mon, 9 Jan 2017, Adrian Graham wrote:

A Bournemouth you say? Over to Auntie Beeb:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/lookaroundyou/programmes/computers/
:)


Is THAT the gmail Bournemouth?
It manages gmail and has been bouncing?
Maybe it just needs another blank 5.25" floppy to hold the excess to stop 
the bouncing?

(Perhaps any single email larger than 200K SHOULD bounce)

It can compete favourably with the PET at the top of the page.
Did they sell 10,000 of those?



--
Grumpy Ol' Fred ci...@xenosoft.com

Re: Stripping an RA80

[Tony Duell]

On Sun, Jan 8, 2017 at 8:57 PM, allison  wrote:

> Depending on vintage of those HDAs they may have been in the large pool
> of SNs that had bad (incorrect) adhesive
> used to assemble the platters and would after about 1.5-2.2 years of
> spinning would have the glue migrate out

Is it therefore likely that if an HDA has lasted this long it is likely to have
been made with the 'good' adhesive?


> All my VAXen and PDP-11s use RX, RL, RD, and RZ media due to
> reliability.  The only ones worse was RA60 then RC25.

I have an RA60 (but no media for it). What was the problem with that
one? At least you can replace heads in the field (although getting new
heads is going to be 'fun').

Problem for me is that I have the compact 11/730 system. The CPU box
is pretty much full -- CPU, IDC (I don't have the floating point board, but
it's a dedicated slot anyway so I can't put something else there), 4M
RAM, TSU05 controller. I don't have space for another disk controller
(certainly not a UDA50). I really want to keep the machine in the short
rack too.

Which means using an R80 or something that emulates one. I wonder
how hard it would be to interface some other storage device to the IDC.

-tony



>
> Allison
>
> Allison

RE: Contacting Jay West

[Rob Jarratt]

> -Original Message-
> From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Jay West
> Sent: 09 January 2017 15:12
> To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'
> 
> Subject: RE: Contacting Jay West
> 
> Ed, that's actually supremely funny *grin* And probably would work as
well.
> 
> Rob;
> Got your email, swamped at the moment, should get back to you today.
> My entire hosting infrastructure is being moved... so I'm a bit behind the
> 8ball right now. Apologies for the delay!
> 


No HP-2000 problem, just wasn't HP-2000 sure if I had sent it to the right
place HP-2000.

:-)

Regards

Rob

Re: Fwd: Stinky screwdrivers

[Al Kossow]

Exactly the problem with tool sets that are kept in sealed plastic containers.

BTW, you NEVER want to keep anything that outgasses/chemically decomposes in
a sealed container. Sealed PLASTIC containers are even worse.

Reminds me that I need to throw out the plastic latching-lid tool boxes that I 
have.

On 1/8/17 9:17 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:

> Reminds of the issue with cellulose acetate-based film and tape.  Most
> conscientious people placed said objects in airtight storage containers,
> which apparently is exactly the thing *not* to do.  I'm not aware of any
> process to reverse the decomposition.
> 

RE: Contacting Jay West

[Jay West]

Ed, that's actually supremely funny *grin* And probably would work as well.

Rob;
Got your email, swamped at the moment, should get back to you today.
My entire hosting infrastructure is being moved... so I'm a bit behind the
8ball right now. Apologies for the delay!

J
-
/P
put hp-2000 in the title? 

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Jules Richardson]

On 01/09/2017 08:07 AM, Adrian Graham wrote:

A Bournemouth you say? Over to Auntie Beeb:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/lookaroundyou/programmes/computers/


Git, I went away to find that link, came back to paste it, and you'd got 
there first :-)

Re: pdp-11 assembly standards

[Paul Koning]

> On Jan 9, 2017, at 12:38 AM, Don North  wrote:
> 
> On 1/8/2017 9:10 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote:
>> OK, what was the standard (if there was one) number-base syntax for PDP-11 
>> assembler?
>> 
>> Despite all the PDP-11 assembly info on web sites, this seems to be a buried 
>> bit of info.
>> One assembler doc uses a prefix of "&o", another specifies octal as default 
>> and prefix of zero for decimal (opposite of the common C-derived standard . 
>> . great).
>> 
>> Is this for example standard?:
>> 
>>  BIT #&o200, @#&o177564  ; test 2^7 bit at address octal 
>> 177564
>> 
>> (I'm just trying to make some written commentary consistent with common 
>> policy.)
>> 
>> 
> MACRO11 Language Manual v5.5 section 6.4
> 
> All numbers are octal radix, unless the default radix is changed via the 
> .RADIX N directive (N can be 2, 8, 10, or 16). N blank resets the radix to 
> octal.
> 
> So 0100, 100 would be octal 100, decimal value 64.
> 
> Any number followed by a period (decimal point) is forced to be base 10.
> 
> So 100. would be decimal 100, octal 144.
> 
> Prefix operators ^B (binary), ^O (octal), ^D (decimal), ^X (hexadecimal) 
> force the following digits/characters to the designated radix.
> 
> So ^B101000 == ^O50 == ^D40 == ^X28 all represent the same value (decimal 
> 40.) irrespective of the current .RADIX N setting.

I don't remember ^X.  Other ways to specify numeric values is with prefix ' 
(single quote) for a single byte value, i.e., 'x is the ASCII code for 
character x.  Similarly, "xy is a 16 bit value for the two-character sequence 
xy (little endian).  And ^Rxyz is the RAD50 coded value for the three 
characters xyz.

&o doesn't match anything I've ever seen, not even in the wildly different 
world of Unix.

paul

Re: Contacting Jay West

[COURYHOUSE]

In a message dated 1/9/2017 6:45:32 A.M. US Mountain Standard Time,  
pon...@update.uu.se writes:

On Mon,  Jan 09, 2017 at 01:31:28PM -, Rob Jarratt wrote:
> I sent a private  email to Jay West a few days ago but I have not had a
> reply. He may be  away or I may have the wrong address for him. What is 
the
> best way to  contact him?
> 

A bit of patience I think. He seems quite busy  sometimes.

/P
put hp-2000 in the title? 

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Adrian Graham]

A Bournemouth you say? Over to Auntie Beeb:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/lookaroundyou/programmes/computers/

:)

On 9 January 2017 at 13:50, william degnan  wrote:

> On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 8:44 AM, Pontus Pihlgren 
> wrote:
>
> > On Mon, Jan 09, 2017 at 02:40:06PM +0100, Liam Proven wrote:
> > > On 9 January 2017 at 14:37, william degnan 
> wrote:
> > > > the gmail Bournemouth
> > >
> > >
> > > Er. Pardon?
> > >
> >
> > "behemoth" + spell checking ?
> >
> > /P
> >
>
> LOL!  Yup.  ha.
>
> I deal with mail every day.  I have an international client that has to
> weed through all of the crazy domain extensions (crazy to an American
> anyway) used by businesses in emerging countries.  Sending and receiving
> mail through that sea of crap is challenging and I have had to do a lot of
> tweaking to make it work.
>
> Bill
>



-- 
adrian/witchy
Owner of Binary Dinosaurs, the UK's biggest home computer collection?
www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Liam Proven]

On 9 January 2017 at 14:44, Pontus Pihlgren  wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 09, 2017 at 02:40:06PM +0100, Liam Proven wrote:
>> On 9 January 2017 at 14:37, william degnan  wrote:
>> > the gmail Bournemouth
>>
>>
>> Er. Pardon?
>>
>
> "behemoth" + spell checking ?


Oh, good guess, could be. :-)

I don't know, I mean, the GMail Bournemouth makes a pleasant change
from the Beast of Redmond and the evil Cupertino. I've never been to
Bournemouth myself, but I've heard it's very nice. Pleasant little
seaside town.

What next? Microsoft, the Mousehole of computing? Apple, known as the
Cowdenbeath of the smartphone industry? Facebook, the Luleå of social
networking?

-- 
Liam Proven • Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk • Google Mail/Talk/Plus: lpro...@gmail.com
Twitter/Facebook/Flickr: lproven • Skype/LinkedIn/AIM/Yahoo: liamproven
UK: +44 7939-087884 • ČR/WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal: +420 702 829 053

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[william degnan]

On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 8:44 AM, Pontus Pihlgren  wrote:

> On Mon, Jan 09, 2017 at 02:40:06PM +0100, Liam Proven wrote:
> > On 9 January 2017 at 14:37, william degnan  wrote:
> > > the gmail Bournemouth
> >
> >
> > Er. Pardon?
> >
>
> "behemoth" + spell checking ?
>
> /P
>

LOL!  Yup.  ha.

I deal with mail every day.  I have an international client that has to
weed through all of the crazy domain extensions (crazy to an American
anyway) used by businesses in emerging countries.  Sending and receiving
mail through that sea of crap is challenging and I have had to do a lot of
tweaking to make it work.

Bill

Re: Contacting Jay West

[Pontus Pihlgren]

On Mon, Jan 09, 2017 at 01:31:28PM -, Rob Jarratt wrote:
> I sent a private email to Jay West a few days ago but I have not had a
> reply. He may be away or I may have the wrong address for him. What is the
> best way to contact him?
> 

A bit of patience I think. He seems quite busy sometimes.

/P

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Pontus Pihlgren]

On Mon, Jan 09, 2017 at 02:40:06PM +0100, Liam Proven wrote:
> On 9 January 2017 at 14:37, william degnan  wrote:
> > the gmail Bournemouth
> 
> 
> Er. Pardon?
> 

"behemoth" + spell checking ?

/P

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Tor Arntsen]

On 9 January 2017 at 14:37, william degnan  wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 8:09 AM, Liam Proven  wrote:
>
>> On 9 January 2017 at 10:06, Dave Wade  wrote:
>> >  Why does this keep on happening? What is google doing to cause this to
>> > happen?
>>
>>
>> Damned if I know, but it's happening to me frequently, too. >:-(
>>
>> --
>>
>
> My first thought is that gmail is huge, they load balance email servers and
> they may bounce on a timing schedule that conflicts with the schedule used
> by the mail server cctech uses.[..]

I initially thought that as well, even though I found it unlikely
(I've never observed delays when I email from somewhere to a gmail
account, and never any bouncing due to load).

What I think happens, because it's so frequent, is that some list
members use addresses that fail gmail's verification. We already know
that yahoo and aol emails suffer from this, their address come through
in the mailing list but the sender is not yahoo or aol (it's the
mailing list server), and there are some hoops to go through to avoid
those problems (I had to set an option to not automatically have those
emails go to spam).

So, in short, I think the problem is caused by posts from some
particular subscribers getting bounced by some servers (among them,
gmail), not that the receving servers (e.g. gmail) are overloaded or
otherwise failing.

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Liam Proven]

On 9 January 2017 at 14:37, william degnan  wrote:
> the gmail Bournemouth


Er. Pardon?

-- 
Liam Proven • Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk • Google Mail/Talk/Plus: lpro...@gmail.com
Twitter/Facebook/Flickr: lproven • Skype/LinkedIn/AIM/Yahoo: liamproven
UK: +44 7939-087884 • ČR/WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal: +420 702 829 053

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[william degnan]

On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 8:09 AM, Liam Proven  wrote:

> On 9 January 2017 at 10:06, Dave Wade  wrote:
> >  Why does this keep on happening? What is google doing to cause this to
> > happen?
>
>
> Damned if I know, but it's happening to me frequently, too. >:-(
>
> --
>

My first thought is that gmail is huge, they load balance email servers and
they may bounce on a timing schedule that conflicts with the schedule used
by the mail server cctech uses.  I'd check the bounce/reply spool, which I
am sure Jay does, but that's the kind of thing to look at.  It's impossible
to please every server and how it handles the greylisting type stuff, and
dance the fine line to not look like spam.  Gmail is not forgiving of such
things, and thus the extra bounces to verify that the message is legit.  It
would almost be necessary to set up an SMTP smart spool to handle gmail if
you wanted zero bounces, not really worth it.  This is simply the case of
an older mailer program hitting up against the gmail Bournemouth, you have
to play by their rules.
b

Contacting Jay West

[Rob Jarratt]

I sent a private email to Jay West a few days ago but I have not had a
reply. He may be away or I may have the wrong address for him. What is the
best way to contact him?

 

Regards

 

Rob

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Liam Proven]

On 9 January 2017 at 10:06, Dave Wade  wrote:
>  Why does this keep on happening? What is google doing to cause this to
> happen?


Damned if I know, but it's happening to me frequently, too. >:-(

-- 
Liam Proven • Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk • Google Mail/Talk/Plus: lpro...@gmail.com
Twitter/Facebook/Flickr: lproven • Skype/LinkedIn/AIM/Yahoo: liamproven
UK: +44 7939-087884 • ČR/WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal: +420 702 829 053

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Mouse]

> Why does this keep on happening?  What is google doing to cause this
> to happen?

>> Your membership in the mailing list cctalk has been disabled due to
>> excessive bounces

"Bouncing mail", presumably.  Certainly every time I've gotten that and
investigated, I've found record of my rejecting list mail.

But why are you asking us rather than Google (who is in a position to
tell you what they're doing, including mail they reject) or our
listowner (who's in a position to tell you what behaviour the list is
seeing from Google)?

/~\ The ASCII Mouse
\ / Ribbon Campaign
 X  Against HTMLmo...@rodents-montreal.org
/ \ Email!   7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39  4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B

Re: GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Adrian Stoness]

Some mailing list stuff goes to my junk mail folder not sure why

On Jan 9, 2017 3:16 AM, "Dave Wade"  wrote:

> Folks,
>  Why does this keep on happening? What is google doing to cause this to
> happen? Is it doing greylisting and mailman ignoring the retry-after time?
> Dave
>
> -Original Message-
> From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of
> cctalk-requ...@classiccmp.org
> Sent: 09 January 2017 04:11
> To: dave.g4...@gmail.com
> Subject: confirm 3a692ae231ea12a659548c4fb64ac8f80c8fe658
>
> Your membership in the mailing list cctalk has been disabled due to
> excessive bounces The last bounce received from you was dated 08-Jan-2017.
> You will not get any more messages from this list until you re-enable your
> membership.  You will receive 3 more reminders like this before your
> membership in the list is deleted.
>
> To re-enable your membership, you can simply respond to this message
> (leaving the Subject: line intact), or visit the confirmation page at
>
> http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/confirm/cctalk/
>
>
> You can also visit your membership page at
>
> http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/options/cctalk/
>
>
> On your membership page, you can change various delivery options such as
> your email address and whether you get digests or not.  As a reminder, your
> membership password is
>
> potter123
>
> If you have any questions or problems, you can contact the list owner at
>
> cctalk-ow...@classiccmp.org
>
>

GMAIL accounts suspended.

[Dave Wade]

Folks,
 Why does this keep on happening? What is google doing to cause this to
happen? Is it doing greylisting and mailman ignoring the retry-after time? 
Dave

-Original Message-
From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of
cctalk-requ...@classiccmp.org
Sent: 09 January 2017 04:11
To: dave.g4...@gmail.com
Subject: confirm 3a692ae231ea12a659548c4fb64ac8f80c8fe658

Your membership in the mailing list cctalk has been disabled due to
excessive bounces The last bounce received from you was dated 08-Jan-2017.
You will not get any more messages from this list until you re-enable your
membership.  You will receive 3 more reminders like this before your
membership in the list is deleted.

To re-enable your membership, you can simply respond to this message
(leaving the Subject: line intact), or visit the confirmation page at

http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/confirm/cctalk/


You can also visit your membership page at

http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/options/cctalk/ 


On your membership page, you can change various delivery options such as
your email address and whether you get digests or not.  As a reminder, your
membership password is

potter123

If you have any questions or problems, you can contact the list owner at

cctalk-ow...@classiccmp.org

Re: Sunday brain tickler

[Adam Sampson]

Chuck Guzis  writes:

> I can get the raw text, but how it's linked together and what file
> names might is still a mystery.

The Lanier 103 is apparently a rebadged AES Superplus, and one owner
says:

"The word processor had some strange features, such as each page had to
be stored as a separate file, which made adding text to page 1 quite a
chore!"
http://vintagecomputers.site90.net/aes/

So perhaps there's something unusual going on with the "filesystem"
structure...

-- 
Adam Sampson  

Polycorp Poly repair (b)log

[Terry Stewart]

A few months ago I picked up some Polycorp Polys, a computer designed
specifically for the educational market in New Zealand.  One worked and one
didn't.  The latter is now fixed.  As usual I've written it up with lots of
pictures.  If anyone is interested you can read about it here.

http://www.classic-computers.org.nz/blog/2017-01-08-second-poly1-fix.htm

Cheers

Tez

Re: Stinky screwdrivers

[Adrian Graham]

On 09/01/2017 04:16, "Al Kossow"  wrote:

> 
> I sent this out to some friends at the end of December
> 
>  Forwarded Message 
> Subject: Stinky screwdrivers
> Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2016 08:51:02 -0800
> From: Al Kossow 
> To: Eric Schlaepfer , Kenneth Sumrall 
> CC: Hedley Rainnie , Alvaro 
> 
> 
> http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/archive/index.php/t-153147.html
> 
> I've been buying a lot of Xcelite tools lately, and was wondering why some of
> the handles stunk.
> 

We have 2 or 3 sets if Xcelite nut spinners at work with the torque sleeve
and they've always stunk, I started there in 2004 and they weren't new then
so it's obviously been a thing for a long while!

-- 
Adrian/Witchy
Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator
Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer
collection?