> -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Jay Jaeger > Sent: 16 July 2015 01:56 > To: cctalk@classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: Reproducing old machines with newer technology (Re: PDP-12 at > the RICM) > > Saul is indeed cited in the ACM article, > > http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=365671 > > I know that Purdue had some folks that did their own maintenance, and > sure, by the late 1960's one could certain pick them up cheap - the gold > scrappers were not quite the issue they became later. I know this because, > besides the 7094 II that I did some work on (including replacing a germanium > transistor with a modern silicon one at one point), the U. Wisconsin > Chemistry department had a 7090 (oil core) on the 9th floor. Some folks > from Purdue came up at one point and helped fix a problem with it. > > Around 1975 the IBM 1410 and the IBM 7094 II we played with at UW were > sold to a company in Ohio - or at least pieces were. Paul Pierce and I went > back to that same company in 1998 and recovered some of the IBM > 1410 and IBM 709x tapes that he lists on his site - Paul has an amazing setup > where he reads the tapes *analog* using a 7 track drive, and then post- > processes the results to de-skew and recover the data. > > JRJ >
Apparently the School of Medicine, Manchester University, England were given a 7090 which they later connected to a PDP-8. A bit of googling turned this up :- http://www.ukuug.org/newsletter/linux-newsletter/linux@uk12/dclark.shtml sadly Dave passed away about a year ago, but he kept many tapes and card decks the which are with the TNMOC at Bletchly. Dave > On 7/15/2015 7:12 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > > On 07/15/2015 04:05 PM, Jay Jaeger wrote: > > > >> Paul adapted PUFFT (Purdue University Fast FORTRAN Translator) to do > >> RS-232 bit serial I/O through a sense switch, and I wrote a spooling > >> program that ran on a Datacraft 6024 located in the same room to do > >> the card reading and printing. I suppose somewhere inside of it the > >> DC 6024 was humiliated - I expect that it was much faster than the > >> 7094 II. ;) > > > > I remember PUFFT--that was Saul Rosen's baby, wasn't it? A FORTRAN > > for undergrads--put in anything that *resembled* a FORTRAN statement > > and get some sort of result. Missing parentheses? Misspelling? > > Outright syntax errors? No problem. I think Purdue had two 709x > > systems for PUFFT The CDC 6500 was reserved for Serious Work. > > > > I understand that at the time, 7090/7094's were comparatively > > plentiful and (comparatively) inexpensive, hence their use. > > > >> Liquid nitrogen would be the "or worse" part. ;) > > > > Neil had a lot of interesting stories about the ETA-10 (originally > > named the GF-10 for the target of 10 gigaflops). It all seemed so > > fantastic back then. > > > > Ah, it's all fun... > > > > --Chuck > > > > > > > > > >
