Rick I believe they used straight-up Dartmouth BASIC, but maybe that's obvious and does not need to be stated. I have a paper tape exercise saved by someone who took intro training in use of the system, with the intro brochure materials, etc. When I printed the paper tape it contained BASIC code and the output. The first time I printed the tape it was upside down, with confusing results!
Sorry I dont have the actual BASIC but it very well may be a simH GE mini tape file(s) out there GE 225 or 235. I seem to remember seeing this but did not find after a quick google search just now. Bill On Sat, Oct 26, 2024, 1:35 PM Rick Bensene via cctalk <cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote: > Hello, all, > > I know that there has been great effort to gather up and make available > via emulation (SIMH) timeshared Operating Systems for DEC machines, as well > as Hewlett Packard 2000-Series Timeshared BASIC systems, but I was > wondering if there has been any efforts made to archive and perhaps emulate > any versions of General Electric's timesharing systems? > > GE's architecture was similar to Hewlett Packard's timeshared BASIC > (2000A, C, C', F, /ACCESS) in that there was a main computer that took care > of managing the user-space and running user programs, and a communications > processor that acted as the front-end that did the terminal services > handling. > > At one point, GE's timesharing system service was the largest timeshared > computing service bureau out there, getting an early start in timesharing > out of the timesharing research done at Dartmouth, as GE computers were > used in this research. The GE timeshare service had local dial-up lines in > most major cities, and eventually were connected into Tymnet, further > adding to the places where a local dial-up number could get you into any of > a number of different GE timeshare systems that were connected to the > network. > > Has anyone done work on emulating any of GE's processors (200-series, > 400-series, DATANET machines) that were used in the Mark I and Mark II > timesharing systems? > > GE's place in timesharing history is quite significant, and seems > certainly deserving of efforts to procure and preserve the code, and > perhaps make it live on through emulation. However, GE being the huge > entity that it is (and was back then), getting hands on the code as well as > permission to do anything with it could be a challenge that may have been > attempted and failed who knows how many times over the years. > > I'm just wondering if anyone out there may have old listings, mag-tapes, > or card decks laying around that have the source(or binary distributions) > for any of these GE timesharing systems? > > If, so, any such media should certainly be put in the hands of an entity > that can assure that they are preserved, and perhaps at some point, made > available online so that others who may have interest could begin work on > emulating these systems. > > I thought of this today because an old memory came to the fore out of the > blue. The memory is very clear despite the many years that have elapsed > since then. It is as clear in my mind as it was the day it happened. I > have no idea why it has stuck so clearly in my mind. > > Back in high school, there was a service man that would come in to > repair/tune-up the Teletype model 33-ASR's we used to dial into the school > district's HP Timeshared BASIC system. These machines were heavily used by > students who didn't always treat them gently, and the 33-ASR's weren't > really designed for the use they were exposed to, so he would come in > frequently to fix machines that had broken down. > > After he had worked on a Teletype, he would dial-in to some kind of > timeshare system with a local phone number and run some test programs to > validate the proper operation of the terminal. and then log his work by > running a BASIC program that would ask him questions about the job, and > he'd fill in the answers. > > One day, I happened to be working at a Teletype next to the one he was > working on, and he had just finished up his work on the machine. He and I > had chatted numerous times in the past, so he was comfortable with me, as I > was with him. I watched as he dialed up the phone number for the system > and I memorized it as he dialed it. I also watched as he entered his > account to log into the system. It was IBB00999, and the password was > "INFO". I couldn't see the print out from my angle, so I had to watch his > fingers as he typed in the information. I tried to be as inconspicuous as > possible while watching him, but he made no attempt to block my view or > otherwise keep me from seeing what he was doing. He always made a point of > taking the printout of his session with him rather than leaving it on the > machine or tearing it off and tossing it in the trash. I figure that was a > security measure as the at least the user ID would be listed on the paper. > But, it didn't stop someone from watching him enter the information. I > had become pretty good at watching people's fingers on the keyboard to > figure out what they were typing. > > After he had finished his work, I dialed up the system, and when it asked > "USER NUMBER--", I typed in "IBB00999,INFO", and pressed [RETURN]. I > guess I had observed what he'd typed correctly, because then the TTY > clattered out "SYSTEM--", which I did not happen to note the service man's > answer to this query, but I figured it wanted to know what language to use, > so I typed in "BASIC", and hit [RETURN]. The system then said "NEW OR > OLD--", and since I didn't know what programs were already in the > directory, I typed in NEW, and then pressed [RETURN]. I was then greeted > with "READY". I'd seen this NEW/OLD used on a DEC RSTS/E system, so I knew > it meant either to start fresh with a new program, or if OLD was typed, > it'd want to know the name of a program to load from the catalog. > > I typed in a simple BASIC program, something like generating a listing of > numbers and their square roots from 1 to 100, and typed "RUN", and it > paused for a short time, then began rattling off the list of numbers. I > got nervous, though, and logged out after the program finished (I didn't > know how to stop it, though I later figured out that pressing the [BREAK] > key would work, just like it did on the HP Timeshared BASIC system. > > Over the following days, I logged into the system and played with it here > and there, making sure to only log short sessions so as not to rack up too > much time, as the company that the service guy worked for may have been > charged for the online time. I never stayed logged in for more than > perhaps 10 minutes at a time, and the programs I tried didn't chew up much > in the way of resources. I didn't save any programs, nor did I try to do > anything that would leave traces of my visits, other than the fact that I > had dialed in and logged in. > > The system seemed to have a FORTRAN subsystem also, and I was able to > enter a small FORTRAN program and RUN it, which was kind of cool. I had > learned FORTRAN by taking a class at a local community college that had an > IBM 360/30, so I knew enough to be able to enter a simple FORTRAN program > and try it out. I thought it was really cool that this system could do > both BASIC and FORTRAN. I tried to see if it had COBOL (which I had also > learned by taking another class at a community college), but alas, it did > not. > > I don't know if the languages on the system were interpreted, > semi-compiled (into pseudo-code which was then interpreted), or fully > compiled into machine code. I do know that when you typed RUN to execute a > program, the system would pause for some time before execution began, so > there must have been some kind of processing going on that could have been > compilation of some form. > > I remember that the system seemed to be quite a bit more responsive than > the HP 2000C Timeshared BASIC system the school had access to. It would > generally respond to commands immediately, while sometimes the HP system > would pause a bit before anything happened. Admittedly, I knew that our HP > 2000C system was very busy all the time during the school days as it was > shared by quite a few different school districts in the county. I had no > idea how many users may have been on the GE timeshared system. > > It would take longer on the GE system after you typed RUN on a BASIC > program before the program started executing, but once it did, it would rip > through the program considerably faster than the HP system, especially when > it came to doing lots of math. I once entered a program that would > calculate factorials, and I ran the programs side by side, one on the HP > 2000C, and the other on the GE timeshared system (I didn't know it was a GE > system at the time, but figured it out later). I gave the GE system a > little head-start because of the processing before the program ran. The > program would generate a list of integers and their factorials from 1 to > 40. As the numbers got larger, the HP timeshared system would print out > the integer and some spaces, then stop for a bit, taking longer as the > factorial was computed, and then print the factorial. The program was the > same on both systems, but the GE system never paused during the output, and > finished just under a minute faster than the HP system. > > I didn't have any manuals or other documentation for the system, and so I > just had to trial-and-error my way through. I'm sure I didn't even begin > to scratch the surface of the capabilities of the system, but it was > nonetheless interesting to poke around in a system that was different than > our timeshare system. After I had tinkered around with it intermittently > for a few weeks, I ran out of things to try, and stopped playing with it, > partly out of worry about getting caught somehow. > > A few months later, I thought about it again, and when I tried to login, > it appeared that the user had been deleted or the password changed. > Perhaps my tinkering had showed up as a larger than usual bill for > services, and that resulted in the change. Or, maybe it was policy to > change the user/password every so often. It was fun to explore while it > lasted. > > The Teletype service guy would be much more careful when he was dialing up > the system and entering his userID/password, and would ask anyone nearby to > please turn away while he was connecting up to the system. I have no idea > if it was my tinkering that caused this change in behavior, but if I was > nearby, I would comply with his request, so I never got a chance to gather > up another userID/password. > > Some years later, my father's business, which was a precision machine > shop, had an account on a GE Timeshare System that had the "APT" "part > programming language" that was used to describe a machined part. When the > APT program was "compiled", it would result in a punched paper tape that > would be fed into a Numerically-Controlled machining center to actually > create the part. It was very expensive to use, and though my Dad did let > me log in once and look around a little, I didn't want to rack up charges, > and stayed away from messing with it. The service was discontinued when > MASTERCAM came out for the IBM PC and they bought a couple of high-end PC > clones and licenses for MASTERCAM. > > Anyway, enough old memories. If anyone out there had experience with GE > timeshared systems, or may know of existence of any distribution media or > source listings of the systems, or perhaps has memories of using them, I'd > love to read about it. If you think it might be of general interest to > the list, post it to the list, but you are certainly welcome to send it to > me directly at > moc-dot-enesneb+at+bkcir (backwards with special characters spelled out > to hopefully prevent it being snarfed up by 5p@mm3rZ). > > Thanks for reading, and best to all! > > Rick Bensene > https://oldcalculatormuseum.com > Beavercreek, Oregon USA > > >
