Hi,
John Foust <jfoust_at_threedee.com> said:
>
In short, report says "emulation is an answer". Another relevant
> point in the discussion jumped out at me: all the estimates of
> theoretical media longevity (be it CD, CD-R or whatever) have
> nothing to do with the longevity of media *in use*, and that
> any media in use may tend to fail after only a few years,
> and this greatly increases the need for media recopying practices,
> and for schemes of metadata to record info about the info,
> from digitizing the label on up.
Also I think we need to preserve information on the way computers
were *operated*. There are plenty of people alive now who know how
to toggle in a boot loader, for example, but will this sort of
info be readily available to historians in 50 years time?
One of my other interests is Morse code telegraphy, for which a lot
of original early operational data still exists but I've not seen
much similar material for early computers.
I was reminded of this sort of thing recently when watching a tv
program about "pioneer" re-enactors and seeing a woman struggling
to use a washboard[1]. Having access to old technology is a
different thing to understanding exactly how it was used.
[1] Yes I know how to use one properly :-)
--
Cheers,
Stan Barr stanb_at_dial.pipex.com
The future was never like this!
Received on Fri Oct 18 2002 - 14:57:00 BST