On Fri, Apr 23, 2010 at 12:06 PM, J.C. Roberts <list-...@designtools.org> wrote: > > Of course, the people at PARC figure this out eons ago by accident. A > particular sequence or reads/seeks/writes caused such a beast to walk > across the floor and block the only door, and they had to cut a hole in > the wall to get back into the datacenter. Afterwards, they used to hold > races with it after work. >
Old guy alert! I thought I was the only one with this kind of story. It involved an NCR 8270, circa 1980, unlocked wheels, and a sort routine. Didn't need no stinkin' assembler code either. A COBOL sort statement could do it just fine, although it didn't block the door. Maybe that's where some assembler *might* have helped with the steering. Gerald.
