How many of you like HP41C calculators?

From: Vintage Computer Festival <vcf_at_siconic.com>
Date: Thu Nov 20 09:31:34 2003

On Wed, 19 Nov 2003, William R. Buckley wrote:

> > > Moreover, there is the _analog computer_ with programming very
> > > similar to the unit record equipment, and such machines have always
> > > been known as computers.
> >
> > Hardly. That's like saying French and Spanish are the same language
> > because they share a common character set. They are computers in a wholly
> > different sense of the word and have nothing at all to do with a Turing
> > Machine, and thereby this discussion has suddenly drifted off into bizarre
> > and meaningless abstracts.
>
> Both systems, analog computers and unit record equipment use plug boards
> for programming. It may even be that the plug board as a physical item does
> not exist, in which case the analog computer is programmed by a means of
> wires hanging all about. For both cases, the mechanism of programming is
> identical. The point is the means of programming.

You're missing the point, which is that your analogy is invalid. They may
use the same manner of "programming", but the way they "compute" are two
entirely different things, and that is what is relevant here.

-- 
Sellam Ismail                                        Vintage Computer Festival
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Received on Thu Nov 20 2003 - 09:31:34 GMT

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