Showing posts with label Computer History. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Computer History. Show all posts
Friday, February 23, 2018
Monday, June 12, 2017
The Oldest Known Surviving PC Operating System
By Jenny List
You’ll all be familiar with the PC, the ubiquitous x86-powered workhorse of desktop and portable computing. All modern PC's are descendants of the original from IBM, the model 5150 which made its debut in August 1981. This 8088-CPU-driven machine was expensive and arguably not as accomplished as its competitors, yet became an instant commercial success.
The genesis of its principal operating system is famous in providing the foundation of Microsoft’s huge success. They had bought Seattle Computer Products’ 86-DOS, which they then fashioned into the first release version of IBM’s PC-DOS. And for those interested in these early PC operating systems there is a new insight to be found, in the form of a pre-release version of PC-DOS 1.0 that has found its way into the hands of OS/2 Museum.
Sadly they don’t show us the diskette itself, but we are told it is the single-sided 160K 5.25″ variety that would have been the standard on these early PCs. We say “the standard” rather than “standard” because a floppy drive was an optional extra on a 5150, the most basic model would have used cassette tape as a storage medium.
The disk is bootable, and indeed we can all have a play with its contents due to the magic of emulation. The dates on the files reveal a date of June 1981, so this is definitely a pre-release version and several months older than the previous oldest known PC-DOS version. They detail an array of differences between this disk and the DOS we might recognize, perhaps the most surprising of which is that even at this late stage it lacks support for .EXE executables.
You will probably never choose to run this DOS version on your PC, but it is an extremely interesting and important missing link between surviving 86-DOS and PC-DOS versions. It also has the interesting feature of being the oldest so-far-found operating system created specifically for the PC.
If you are interested in early PC hardware, take a look at this project using an AVR processor to emulate a PC’s 8088.
You’ll all be familiar with the PC, the ubiquitous x86-powered workhorse of desktop and portable computing. All modern PC's are descendants of the original from IBM, the model 5150 which made its debut in August 1981. This 8088-CPU-driven machine was expensive and arguably not as accomplished as its competitors, yet became an instant commercial success.
The genesis of its principal operating system is famous in providing the foundation of Microsoft’s huge success. They had bought Seattle Computer Products’ 86-DOS, which they then fashioned into the first release version of IBM’s PC-DOS. And for those interested in these early PC operating systems there is a new insight to be found, in the form of a pre-release version of PC-DOS 1.0 that has found its way into the hands of OS/2 Museum.
Sadly they don’t show us the diskette itself, but we are told it is the single-sided 160K 5.25″ variety that would have been the standard on these early PCs. We say “the standard” rather than “standard” because a floppy drive was an optional extra on a 5150, the most basic model would have used cassette tape as a storage medium.
The disk is bootable, and indeed we can all have a play with its contents due to the magic of emulation. The dates on the files reveal a date of June 1981, so this is definitely a pre-release version and several months older than the previous oldest known PC-DOS version. They detail an array of differences between this disk and the DOS we might recognize, perhaps the most surprising of which is that even at this late stage it lacks support for .EXE executables.
You will probably never choose to run this DOS version on your PC, but it is an extremely interesting and important missing link between surviving 86-DOS and PC-DOS versions. It also has the interesting feature of being the oldest so-far-found operating system created specifically for the PC.
If you are interested in early PC hardware, take a look at this project using an AVR processor to emulate a PC’s 8088.
Wednesday, December 28, 2016
FORTRAN for the Web
By Al Williams
There’s an old saying: “I don’t know what programming
language scientists and engineers will use in the 22nd century, but I
know it will be called FORTRAN.” FORTRAN was among the first real
programming languages and, along with LISP, one of the oldest still in
common use. If you are one of those that still loves FORTRAN, you no
longer have to be left out of the Web development craze thanks to Fortran.io.
Naturally, the Fortran.io site is served by — what else — FORTRAN. The system allows for Jade templates, SQLite databases, and other features aimed at serving up web pages. The code is hosted on GitHub, and you can find several examples there, as well.
If you’ve ever wanted to do formatted I/O to a web page, here’s your chance. Come to think of it, why not? We’ve seen servers in BASIC and even in Linux shell script. Of course, today’s FORTRAN isn’t the one we learned back in the 1970’s (we assume if you didn’t learn about FORTRAN in the 1970’s, you quit reading this post a while back… prove us wrong and show us your FORTRAN projects).
Naturally, the Fortran.io site is served by — what else — FORTRAN. The system allows for Jade templates, SQLite databases, and other features aimed at serving up web pages. The code is hosted on GitHub, and you can find several examples there, as well.
If you’ve ever wanted to do formatted I/O to a web page, here’s your chance. Come to think of it, why not? We’ve seen servers in BASIC and even in Linux shell script. Of course, today’s FORTRAN isn’t the one we learned back in the 1970’s (we assume if you didn’t learn about FORTRAN in the 1970’s, you quit reading this post a while back… prove us wrong and show us your FORTRAN projects).
Friday, December 2, 2016
DS Programming For Newbies
This is a PDF file that contains the posts made by Foxi4 in this post as an introduction into C programming.
This is so that people can download & view on mobile devices or print out, without having to go through each & every post he's done.
This is so that people can download & view on mobile devices or print out, without having to go through each & every post he's done.
Sunday, March 6, 2016
500 rare Apple II programs and games are now preserved online
By Chris O'Brien
In an industry that constantly lusts toward the future, the Internet Archive has once again helped retain tech’s past by announcing that it has saved more than 500 Apple II programs.
The San Francisco-based non-profit has been doing yeoman’s work for years now, maintaining everything from historical copies of webpages to archiving sound and video to digitizing out-of-copyright books. The program to preserve the catalogue of Apple II programs is yet another example of this work, and one that provides an important record of the dawn of the personal computing age.
The actual work of finding and uploading the programs is being done by a person (or possibly an anonymous collective) who goes under the name “4am.”
According to a post on the Internet Archive blog, the 4am collection now has passed the 500 program milestone. In fact, the 4am page now says it has 631 Apple II programs. These are part of a larger collection of Apple II programs that stands at 3,897 at the Internet Archive.
But the 4am set is focused on the rarest and hardest to find Apple II programs. As such, users can now experience games like Muppetville, Spy Hunter and Battlezone.
So get ready to relive your childhood or teenage years and watch hours of your adult life disappear into a black hole of nostalgic ecstasy.
In an industry that constantly lusts toward the future, the Internet Archive has once again helped retain tech’s past by announcing that it has saved more than 500 Apple II programs.
The San Francisco-based non-profit has been doing yeoman’s work for years now, maintaining everything from historical copies of webpages to archiving sound and video to digitizing out-of-copyright books. The program to preserve the catalogue of Apple II programs is yet another example of this work, and one that provides an important record of the dawn of the personal computing age.
The actual work of finding and uploading the programs is being done by a person (or possibly an anonymous collective) who goes under the name “4am.”
According to a post on the Internet Archive blog, the 4am collection now has passed the 500 program milestone. In fact, the 4am page now says it has 631 Apple II programs. These are part of a larger collection of Apple II programs that stands at 3,897 at the Internet Archive.
But the 4am set is focused on the rarest and hardest to find Apple II programs. As such, users can now experience games like Muppetville, Spy Hunter and Battlezone.
So get ready to relive your childhood or teenage years and watch hours of your adult life disappear into a black hole of nostalgic ecstasy.
Sunday, April 20, 2014
5 Unemulated Computer Experiences
By Jason Scott
While I and many others work to turn the experience of emulation into one as smooth and ubiquitous as possible, inevitably the corners and back alleys of discussions about this process present people claiming that there are unemulated aspects and therefore the entire project is domed.
I thought I would stoke that sad little fire by giving you five examples of entirely unemulated but perfectly valid vintage computer experiences.
Disk Drive Spin Vibration
Some games on home computers would feature permanent player death and the requirement to start over in the event of a catastrophic loss. To ensure the death was permanent, the player status would have to be recorded on a floppy disk drive with a floppy disk in it. Therefore, a trick could be implemented: by putting your finger underneath the latch of a floppy disk drive, you could feel the vibration of the disk beginning to spin, and you could flip up the drive door, disengaging the magnetic head and ensuring that the death was not recorded.
Computer Fans
There are currently no attempts to emulate the sound of a computer fan or have it speed up and slow down slightly over time, eventually reflecting the decay of the fan and the steadily noisier experience as time goes on. In a tangential relation, there are currently no emulations of system failure due to overheating.
Chip Unseating
One common cause of machine issues in older systems would be the slow working out of seated chips on motherboards and other circuits. The resulting glitches and behavior would be noticed by experienced owners, resulting in a reseating of the chips, either by full-board pressure or by pressing down on individual chips and experiencing the clicking into place.
Damaged Floppy Noise
One of the most terrifying and disheartening sounds was the sound of a distraught grinding across a damaged or demagnetized portion of a floppy disk. The noise told you that it was going to be a crapshoot whether the data would ever be heard from again. Variations in the sound also told you how close you were to total data loss, and whether you were at the beginning of a slow decline for that sector.
Power Outage
Emulators do not have an option for sudden and dramatic loss of power. Is not possible to indicate a lightning strike, a brownout, a black out, or the yanked out power cord. This is a central and fundamental aspect of the Atari 2600, where careful glitching of a system including yanking and replacing cartridges could allow you to access game options and experiences that would otherwise never be reached.
The point of me bringing all these up is not to be particularly weird, but to point out that emulation is not a binary experience – it is a continuum, a spectrum. For some people, the mere reappearance of older computing information is a miracle. For others, it is a endless opportunity to point out flaws, complain about glitches, and otherwise drag the conversation into a Xeno’s paradox of unfulfilled promises and impossibly high hurdles.
As time goes on, I expect some experiences to fall by the wayside, and to live only in lore and stories. Unfortunately, that is the nature of history, and computers don’t get a pass, just because the material involved gets re-created with such fidelity.
So, let’s focus on what’s been done and refine that, instead of a mystical set of experiences that may never see the light of day again except in our stories.
While I and many others work to turn the experience of emulation into one as smooth and ubiquitous as possible, inevitably the corners and back alleys of discussions about this process present people claiming that there are unemulated aspects and therefore the entire project is domed.
I thought I would stoke that sad little fire by giving you five examples of entirely unemulated but perfectly valid vintage computer experiences.
Disk Drive Spin Vibration
Some games on home computers would feature permanent player death and the requirement to start over in the event of a catastrophic loss. To ensure the death was permanent, the player status would have to be recorded on a floppy disk drive with a floppy disk in it. Therefore, a trick could be implemented: by putting your finger underneath the latch of a floppy disk drive, you could feel the vibration of the disk beginning to spin, and you could flip up the drive door, disengaging the magnetic head and ensuring that the death was not recorded.
Computer Fans
There are currently no attempts to emulate the sound of a computer fan or have it speed up and slow down slightly over time, eventually reflecting the decay of the fan and the steadily noisier experience as time goes on. In a tangential relation, there are currently no emulations of system failure due to overheating.
Chip Unseating
One common cause of machine issues in older systems would be the slow working out of seated chips on motherboards and other circuits. The resulting glitches and behavior would be noticed by experienced owners, resulting in a reseating of the chips, either by full-board pressure or by pressing down on individual chips and experiencing the clicking into place.
Damaged Floppy Noise
One of the most terrifying and disheartening sounds was the sound of a distraught grinding across a damaged or demagnetized portion of a floppy disk. The noise told you that it was going to be a crapshoot whether the data would ever be heard from again. Variations in the sound also told you how close you were to total data loss, and whether you were at the beginning of a slow decline for that sector.
Power Outage
Emulators do not have an option for sudden and dramatic loss of power. Is not possible to indicate a lightning strike, a brownout, a black out, or the yanked out power cord. This is a central and fundamental aspect of the Atari 2600, where careful glitching of a system including yanking and replacing cartridges could allow you to access game options and experiences that would otherwise never be reached.
The point of me bringing all these up is not to be particularly weird, but to point out that emulation is not a binary experience – it is a continuum, a spectrum. For some people, the mere reappearance of older computing information is a miracle. For others, it is a endless opportunity to point out flaws, complain about glitches, and otherwise drag the conversation into a Xeno’s paradox of unfulfilled promises and impossibly high hurdles.
As time goes on, I expect some experiences to fall by the wayside, and to live only in lore and stories. Unfortunately, that is the nature of history, and computers don’t get a pass, just because the material involved gets re-created with such fidelity.
So, let’s focus on what’s been done and refine that, instead of a mystical set of experiences that may never see the light of day again except in our stories.
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