First personal computer nostalgia

From: Chuck McManis <cmcmanis_at_mcmanis.com>
Date: Thu Nov 16 15:52:36 2000

Approximately:

1972 - Was allowed to use a PDP-8/E while waiting for my Mom to take me home
        from school (phone company). Started writing a very long FOCAL program
        while reading the book.

1973 - Discovered that my new high school has a computer room consisting of
        two ASR-33's with modems that can dial into a Univac system running
        BASIC.

1976 - Make "real" money writing a COBOL program for the teachers union on
        UNLV's CDC mainframe.

1976 - Desperately want an Altair but setting for building the ELF out of
        Popular Electronics for $99.

1977 - Make more money and live away from home at IBM's "summer intern"
        program. Get to play with a 370 and learn BAL.

1977 - Finally save up enough money to buy a four board system from the Digital
        Group (no chassis though, it runs on a board) Have to send the CPU board
        to them to get it working. :-(

1979 - In college I spring for a Quest Super-ELF and discover that there is
        some field around me the forces one of my computers to always be broken.
        Also in college I become a systems programmer for an engineering lab
        and get to hack on PDP-11's (RSC), DEC-10's (TENEX, TOPS-20, TOPS-10, ITS)
        and a VAXen (11/730 free gift from DEC :-)

1983 - Graduate from college and work for Intel. Convince my wife if I just
had a
         decent system I would be happy. Splurge on a use Cromemco System III

1984 - Get the Amiga bug and spend many years enjoying some really nice
software.

1986 - Join Sun Microsystems and start hacking UNIX full time.

1998 - Am given a PDP-8 (think "Gee, its not hard to store 1 old computer.")

1999 - Get a couple of MicroVAX II's and go to my first VCF. Uh-oh, this is
serious.

Present - surrounded by old computers I find now that I have to be very
selective
        in what I get. Enjoy hacking UNIX on VAXen, still trying to get a decent
        RSX-11M setup on an 11.
Received on Thu Nov 16 2000 - 15:52:36 GMT