when dinosaurs ruled the Earth

[sergebroom]

In the days when dinosaurs ruled the Earth, which was at about the time I graduated from college, people did all their programing on mainframes. With punched cards. In the snow, uphill both ways. Eventually Evolution reached the current state of affairs, and I found myself in a situation when one of my younger co-workers, upon hearing that I used to do it all with punchers, said she remembered seeing one of those in a museum. Kids! No respect for their elders.

Even I moved on to unix-based stuff, since I didn't wish to become trapped in a perceived dead-end. Still... Still... I do get some satisfaction from the fact that the only programs in our group's system that never break are the mainframe ones cooked up by yours truly, a record that remained unblemished until Friday night. And that was only because the feed we had been provided contained some garbage data, thus confirming the old GIGO Principle.

Take that, you fancy shmancy servers.

Comments

[miltonthales.livejournal.com]

If I had a spare room and a large budget, I'd find an old IBM 029, a 360/20 mainframe and a DSTE console and create a 1960s telecomm museum.

[serge-lj.livejournal.com]

Travelling down Memory Lane?

[miltonthales.livejournal.com]

Well, sorta. I had that equipment in both Japan and Kwajalein when I worked there. The DSTE thing was 30 feet long, 6 feet high and about 3 feet wide. I remember that the Japan mainframe died for three days once, and the IBM US citizen tech rep couldn't fix it. It took a day or two to get IBM Japan engineers temporarily cleared (I'm guessing that's what the delay was) to get inside the Comm Station. Meanwhile we used the DSTE for all incoming/outgoing traffic, and it just spewed yellow tape in incredible bursts 24 hours a day for as long as it took to get the 360/20 repaired.

[serge-lj.livejournal.com]

Bleh. If I had an extra room, I wouldn't clutter it with remembrances from technological things gone awry. But that's just me.

[miltonthales.livejournal.com]

Grins. I wasn't serious. In actuality, I'd probably drop 'em off the end of the island to create an artificial reef.

[serge-lj.livejournal.com]

Or you could make the whole thing into a mouse labyrinth.

[miltonthales.livejournal.com]

A mouse labyrinth? Paging Dr. Skinner. Dr. Skinner to the white courtesy phone, please.

[serge-lj.livejournal.com]

Rats! There goes Algernon.