Amiga.org
The "Not Quite Amiga but still computer related category" => Alternative Operating Systems => Topic started by: iamaboringperson on August 19, 2003, 01:44:13 AM
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Hi, I would just like to brag to you all about a book I bought seccond-hand the other day.
"Programming for Digital Computers: PUTTING COMPUTERS TO PROFITABLE USE"
By J. F. Davison
It's actually quite an interesting read, and if you all behave, and are interested, I might post some text from the book ;-) but you have to ask politely!
:-)
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Don't post any of it without permission from the publisher/author. It's not very nice, ya know!
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"Copyright (C) 1961 by J. F. Davison. No part of this book may be reproduced, except for normal review purposes, without permission of the publishers."
I guess this is a 'normal review purpose'! :P
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I, for one, would be most delighted to see what it says. I love the history! :-D
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Chapter 1: How to start the generator without shorting out the grid. :-D
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I've got a "fundamental computer concepts" book which gives the following rough guide:
Type - word size - cycle time - memory - cost - example
Home microcomputer - 8 bits - microseconds - 64k - $1000 - Apple IIc
Professional microcomputer - 16 bits - a microsecond - 256k - over $2000 0 IBM PC
Minicomputer - 16 bits - 250 nanoseconds - 512k - $10000+ - DEC PDP-11
Mainframe - 32 bits - 50 nanoseconds - 4Mb - $100000+ - IBM 3083
Supercomputer - 64 bits - 10 nanoseconds - 4+Mb - $1million+ - Crax X-MP/2
And it's copyrighted as recently as 1986 :-o
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OK,
Here's an interesting one:
Chapter 1
" ... The early machines were valiant efforts, and to some extent even did useful work, but they have been regarded as museum pieces for some time, even though they were hardly conceived in 1945. By the early 1950's however, the first machines to be made for sale on the commercial market were being planned, and from this point onwards the United States went ahead rapidly. By 1955 the number of orders for one very popular American machine were said to be over 1,000 and by now many more than this number have been delivered.
In the United Kingdom, computers only began to come off the end of the production line in any quantity in 1956 and 1957, and by 1960 over 200 had been delivered."
More to come! :-)
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I might be wrong, but isn't 42 years long enough for that book to now be public domain? and if so, you should scan and OCR it, and put it online for posterity, imho.
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xeron wrote:
I might be wrong, but isn't 42 years long enough for that book to now be public domain? and if so, you should scan and OCR it, and put it online for posterity, imho.
Even if I had the authors permission, I wouldn't bother scaning/typing it all in, there isn't much point. Heck, it actaully discuses a made up computer - not a real one!
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Reminds me of a friend who recently went to this shonky Polytech computer course.
They gave out these really old text books, a page I turned to read:
"the standard 8 inch diskette is the most popular storage medium of today, though it may eventually be replaced by the new 5.25 inch diskette".
It also had a photo of a "futuristic modern paperless office" with this massive mainframe taking up most of the office space and no paper anywhere.
Yeah right, as if that really happened!
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"the standard 8 inch diskette is the most popular storage medium of today, though it may eventually be replaced by the new 5.25 inch diskette".
:lol: I have a heap of old computer books! Some of the things I read in them are just funny. :-D
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More from the Intro. to Computers:
"The place of electronic digital computers among calculating machines
Calculating machines are basically of two kinds, analogue and digital."
"There is a very wide range of digital calculating machines, the simplest probably being either the abacus or the simple hand counter which registers one every time a button is pressed."
"The final step up the scale brings us to electronic digital computers as they are today. To avoid too many words, we shall henceforth refer to these as just computers. The word computer is sometimes used to mean a person who computes, but there is a tendancy to spell this word computor.
...
it should be noted that even the smallest general purpose computers cost around [pound sign]20,000 ..."
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xeron wrote:
I might be wrong, but isn't 42 years long enough for that book to now be public domain? and if so, you should scan and OCR it, and put it online for posterity, imho.
No. If the copyright wasn't renewed in time, it would be in the PD. If it was renewed, then it's copyright for 95 years from publication date. However, it's estimated that only some 6-17% of works were renwed in time. For more info look HERE (http://www.authorslawyer.com/c-term.shtml).
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if all of you are not shure, wheather it´s copyrighted, or not, i´d prefer a photo of the book for our picture gallery :-)
imho no one, not even the author would be hurt if parts of the book would be published here 8-)
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I have Volume 1, Issue 1 of "Amiga Computing" and that is a REAL funny read. I cant beleive we used to pay so much for dot matrix printers, 512k mem and a 10MB hard drive! :-o
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PhatBoiCollier wrote:
I have Volume 1, Issue 1 of "Amiga Computing" and that is a REAL funny read. I cant beleive we used to pay so much for dot matrix printers, 512k mem and a 10MB hard drive! :-o
Back then, an extra half-meg of RAM was always a good investment! ;-)
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The computer systems module i did in uni was based on a processor architecture the lecturer made up on the spot. Is it any wonder i failed? I mean try finding reference books forsomething your lecturer made up.
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@iamaboringperson
My mother told me that around 1950, IBM already had a training school here in Milan.
Ciao
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Yeah but it's not like IBM always made computers, they used to make all sorts of mechanical crap, like time punch clocks.
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@jeffimix
no, no IBM training school for its employers computers (first enormous systems, big like a room)
Ciao
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I think IBM once had schools and town's
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Turambar wrote:
The computer systems module i did in uni was based on a processor architecture the lecturer made up on the spot. Is it any wonder i failed? I mean try finding reference books forsomething your lecturer made up.
Then there is the other type which only uses examples from the book kind of pointless. :destroy:
My teacher at a javacourse was one of the creators of Simula. He hardly used the book at all and always said that Simula is better at whatever he was covering in the lecture. He had written his own simlpyfied IO-class for java because he didn´t like the one the other teachers used. :-)