Doug Freyburger wrote:
> Wayne Boatwright wrote:
>>
>> When I first started programming for IBM and Sperry Univac mainframes,
>> all coding was printed by hand on huge coding sheets which were handed
>> off to our keypunch department. A program could end up yielding
>> hundreds of cards which were then read into the computers and stored
>> on gigantic hard drives.
>
> As late as 1978 I used punch cards in my first full time
> job in computing. There was a line for the 2400 baud
> terminals. The next building had a room full of card
> punch machines sitting idle. So I used punch cards and
> submitted them at the data center in the time I could
> have spent waiting for one of the 2400 baud dial in
> terminals to come available.
>
> The first gigabyte disk drive I saw was the size of a
> wash machine. Funny that even wash machines have gotten
> smaller over the years though nowhere near the rate of
> Moore's Law. ;^)

How true .
The washing machine analogy strikes home .
There was one particular programme that really used to
make those Jumbo disks rock & roll

two rows of 7 jumbo disks
& Eight Tape drives (about the size of a decent fridge)


When this program used to get to its giant sort stage
better than a star trek set Lots of flashing lights etc
and the computer room also used to heat up substantially.

and the disk machines really used to go into a sort of unbalanced spin
cycle . BIG Honeywell set up .


Strange thing was when we went over to a Univac set up
same application never got the machines to dance as much


In fact the Univac was very silent and engineers rarely had to visit
to fix the tape drives . (Made by Italian branch of singer as I recall)
Singer also made sowing machines go figure .
Got bought out by ICL later on many of staff from those days
incl myself got head hunted when Fujitsu bought our the singer side of
the operation when they came to our shores
obscene money (for a while ) but boy did they want their pound of flesh
.. Was a shock to the wallet when went into the Army but a lot easier
job and the food was certainly different

Back to food we used to get the replacement magnatrons (before
microwaves came on the scene )

And cook our food and brews up in a shielded set up in the wharehouse
imagine a microwave type set up inside a Faraday cage about the size of
a dining table . Could a leg of lamb and spuds etc we could never get
it to cook right through though . Fantastic days and was second job
until put on the green suite