In replay to my moan about engineers not being able to build Christmas
tree lights, Tony Duell writes:
> Do you own a suitably large LART?
I've given up with the LART, it just doesn't work - re-education is a better
approach - but then it doesn't work on the brain dead.
> I must have told the story of the 362.8 ohm resistor. In case I haven't,
> it goes like this......
I used to own an 8in Shugart drive a long time ago. For some strange reason
that I couldn't understand it was stuffed with E96 resisors. Perhaps they were
cheaper than E24 ?
> I've come to the conclusion that the best (electronic?) engineers and
> programmers are all essentially self-taught. It's probably much the same
> in all creative subjects.
I'd agree
> ......You may argue that much of engineering these days is not about making
> things, and that engineers rarely need these skills (that is a separate
rant)...
I'd argue that engineering is all about making things. OK, perhaps engineers
don't need practical skills so much these days, but an understanding of other
engineering disiplines is essential. You have to be able to understand the
"other guy's" point of view, whether it be hardware, software, manufacturing
or management.
Lawrence Walker wrote:
> Well from what I've heard about the "father of electricity" and Henry Ford
for
> that matter, he would hire a bunch of "promising" engineers like Tesla,
> take what they've already discovered, claim them as products of his own
> and become a wold-famous inventor. And of course, like Marconi, become the
> "inventor of Radio" which we are now celebrating, despite the fact that
Tesla
> won a court decision in US courts to his primacy with it. History is
written by
> the Victors.
I hope you meant Faraday as the "father of electricity" and not Edison.
As for Marconi, I'd say he "pioneered" radio engineering but wouldn't have
got very far if it hadn't been for Hertz. I'm not sure how Tesla fits into the
picture, he did invent the squirel cage induction motor but I'm not aware
of any major contributions he made to radio engineering.
Chris
On December 31, Fred Cisin (XenoSoft) wrote:
> The only place that I have EVER met any people who claimed to be
> "engineers" who might "have never heard of Amphenol" would be some
> university folk who have never set foot into the real world.
Ahh, those "engineers" who don't know which end of a soldering iron
gets hot.
A fond memory from around 1991, while working for a small defense
contractor in NJ, talking with a 2nd-year "summer slave" on loan from
MIT (of all places!). I'd assigned him to write some data reduction
code in FORTRAN for a remote sensing project, and later wound up
having to do it myself:
Me: "This program needs a lot of work."
Weenie: "Hah! Where did *YOU* go to school? See here:"
[weenie scribbles some incomprehensible equation on the whiteboard]
Me: "I didn't. But I damn well know a REAL*4 on this VAX won't
deal with the IEEE-format floating point numbers from the
spectrometer without format conversion, for starters.
Weenie: "WHAT?! [horrified look] You actually want to RUN this program?"
Me: "Of course. Why the hell do you think I asked you to write it?"
Weenie: "Isn't this just an exercise?"
Me: "We are a defense contractor. We build machines to kill
people. Look at the size of my gut...we NEVER exercise
around here."
Weenie: "Does this mean I have to type this program in, like on a computer?"
Me: "No. You're fired."
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire
St. Petersburg, FL "Less talk. More synthohol." --Lt. Worf
Be sure of the result before you suggest.
I used to also handle automotive product so I have a better
than average knowledge of the ourcome.
Allison
From: William Donzelli <aw288(a)osfn.org>
To: classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org>
Date: Saturday, December 29, 2001 5:24 PM
Subject: Re: Try it!!!! (Was - Re: One More PCB Dishwasher Question)
>> But is not that change the same as going from COLD to HOT when you
apply
>> power to the chip under normal operation of the computer?
>
>For the big stuff, sure. Not for the small stuff (glue, I/O, memory, and
>other stuff that does not suck much power).
>
>Here is a test. Boil some water in a big pot, as if you were to make
>pasta. Turn the gas off, let it cool just a few seconds, then dump all
your
>favorite chips in. I am sure one will not comeout alive (or maybe
crippled).
>
>William Donzelli
>aw288(a)osfn.org
>I install fire alarm systems... Now, if you had asked me which one connects
>the handset to the phone, you'd have me stumped!
I had been taught that was a Rj-11 "handset", which has never really sat
well with me... but it is what I was taught, and it is what my telco
catalogs list the part as, so I had to accept it.
Thanks to that link, it is claimed to be an RJ-22, which sits MUCH better
with me since it has its own designation. I can't speak for its accuracy
as it is the first time I have heard that, but if I had to pick, I would
go with RJ-22 over RJ-11 "handset".
Oh, and I was taught in the field all my telco knowledge, never went to
school... it is learned from various Bell and private
installers/techs/whathaveyou... so who knows how accurate they are, but I
tend to give them more credence than most schools (except maybe some Bell
installers, the older ones are good, but most of the younger ones suck
royally)
-chris
<http://www.mythtech.net>
On December 30, Chris wrote:
> >Would they call common network connectors "8 pin RJ-11"?
> >Or would they call them "8 pin telephone connectors"?
>
> Neither, 8 pin RJ's are an RJ-45 (11 is a 4 pin, comes in either standard
> or handset sizes... can also have just 2 pins for "cheap" cords... 12 is
> a 6 pin, same physical size as a standard RJ-11)
It's important to note that the RJ designations specify not only the
connector type, but the pinout.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire
St. Petersburg, FL "Less talk. More synthohol." --Lt. Worf
Please read this message:
http://www.faqs.org/save_faqs-org.html
I don't know how many of you use faqs.org to get FAQs (I don't myself) but
I happened to run by this message and thought I would pass it along.
They're in need of funding as they've lost their previous sponsorship.
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org
* Old computing resources for business and academia at www.VintageTech.com *
You DEC old-timers out there will probably chuckle at my little
"discovery", but I'm posting my findings for us who are "DEC challenged"....
Yesterday I was pulling my hair out trying to get my VAX 4000-500 to
recognize an external RRD-43 CD-ROM that was attached to a KZQSA SCSI
adapter. No matter what I did, it wouldn't recognize the fact that anything
SCSI was connected.
The problem turned out to be the address that the KZQSA was set to. It was
set to address 761400, and the 4000 was reporting the card to be a DEFQA,
which to even a DEC newbie as myself, was VERY wrong. A search through the
"VMS wizard" archives at Compaq.com turned up the statement that the KZQSA
was shipped with a default address of 761300.
So I fiddled with the address jumpers and set it to 761300 and *voila*, the
4000 found the KZQSA. I hooked the external SCSI enclosure to the card, and
it found the CD-ROM.
It was able to boot VMS from the CD, and I'm on my way.
Again, don't laugh too hard, I hope this message helps others who are
"Unibus Ignorant"....
- Matt
Matthew Sell
Programmer
On Time Support, Inc.
www.ontimesupport.com
(281) 296-6066
Join the Metrology Software discussion group METLIST!
http://www.ontimesupport.com/cgi-bin/mojo/mojo.cgi
"One World, One Web, One Program" - Microsoft Promotional Ad
"Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Fuhrer" - Adolf Hitler
Many thanks for this tagline to a fellow RGVAC'er...
My sister-in-law works at the Post Office and knows lots of the
local customers. She happened to learn that one gentleman had
some "old computers" in the attic. When I called him, it turned
out to be an XOR S-100 box w/dual 8" drives, a Liberty 100
terminal, and some loose S-100 cards (including a Cromemco
serial/parallel card still in the shrink wrap, a few 8K cards
(2102 and 2114-based) and a couple of SMS video cards, one as
yet unstuffed with the chips under plastic).
No OS, few docs (some of the cards _do_ have manuals).
He kept the S-100 prototype card he once wrapped for his first CPU
(sockets intact, chips missing, wires removed).
The sad news is that he mentioned that he used to have an old computer
that he threw out... his son brought it home ($20 at a yard sale)
back when Dad had a 386 in the living room - it was a Digital Group
machine. :-(
So... Anyone have any info on XOR boxen? I have a CP/M disk for
the C-128 and stuff for the Kaypro, but nothing on 8". Can I mail
anyone blank disks to be copied onto? What sort of information
would I have to provide to be able to put together a compatible
disk? Brand of disk controller? Type and manufacturer of CPU card?
Serial card vendor?
Also, how did S-100 video cards work? Did you still have a console
terminal but use the video card as a secondary peripheral?
-ethan
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Send your FREE holiday greetings online!
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> -----Original Message-----
> From: Fred Cisin (XenoSoft) [mailto:cisin@xenosoft.com]
> Has anybody ever actually SEEN and USED any software for the catweasel
> that will make an Amiga disk (NOT duplicate one that is present)?
Not me, though, I've seen documents (probably in UAE) that say you can write disks to images and images to disks if you use it. The linux/netbsd/freebsd drivers, from all I've seen and heard, should access disks fine for making images and the like.
> I think that "MatchPoint" might be their board that you're
> thinkking of.
I was thinking of compati-card, actually. I was un-aware that it had this same limitation.
I may have to see if I can find one of these "MatchPoint" boards now, though. What are my chances?
> What software is available for Mac to do Amiga disks?
Again, I seem to remember from docs that UAE will use it directly. So you'd be stuck with a chicken-egg scenario where you need an image of the O/S (or boot disk) to get it working. :) Otherwise it would work fine.
I have seen mappings for the linux fdparam (I think that's the program..) which will make your system use the format at a low level, and have heard that catweasel works with linux. In that case you can image/unimage the disks pretty simply.
As for a program that reads/writes the filesystem (I assume that's what you're asking...), I don't know of one, but I believe that given the number of people interested in amiga emulation, somebody must have written one. If they havent, get an amiga emulator set-up, and chances are that will do it for you. (Again, I seem to remember mention of this in the UAE docs)
I would, of course, be interested to hear from anyone who's really tried it. :)
Regards,
Chris
Christopher Smith, Perl Developer
Amdocs - Champaign, IL
/usr/bin/perl -e '
print((~"\x95\xc4\xe3"^"Just Another Perl Hacker.")."\x08!\n");
'
