-----Original Message-----
From: Sam Ismail <dastar_at_ncal.verio.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp_at_u.washington.edu>
Date: Sunday, January 17, 1999 8:00 PM
Subject: Re: Disasters and Recovery
>On Sun, 17 Jan 1999, Doug wrote:
>
>> > Paper will last longer than anything we've been discussing so far (save
>>
>> Where did you get that idea? Paper will disolve in just about any
>> solvent, including water, and is subject to tearing. Again, if we're
>> talking about preservation in controlled environments, a CD-ROM kicks
>> paper's butt.
>
>What are you talking about? The whole aversion to using CD's was the fact
>that they have a theoretical shelf life of only 50-100 years. Like I
>said, the Dead Sea scrolls lasted more than two millenia without much
>thought going into how to preserve them. And here you are talking about
>going thru the trouble of filling a chamber with inert gasses to promote
>preservation. Unless your line of thinking is to fill the chamber with
>water just to give paper a challenge.
>
But - The dead sea scrolls were on parchment, not paper, weren't they?
>Paper has passed the test of time. You can go into antique book shops and
>find volumes hundreds of years old that are still very readable and very
>intact.
>
>CDs, on the other hand, have only been with us a couple decades.
>
>> What makes some of today's technology fragile is simply the density, or
>> equivalenty, the lack of redundancy in a given area. A plain old EPROM
>> should be fine for 100 years if you include 100 copies of the information
>> within it.
>
>100 copies on what? 100 other EPROMs? On CD? Or encoded on paper?
>
Or was that 100 copies of the same information in the single EPROM?
--
-Jason Willgruber
(roblwill_at_usaor.net)
ICQ#: 1730318
<http://members.tripod.com/general_1>
Received on Mon Jan 18 1999 - 00:58:52 GMT