Did you read that NASA is looking for fortran programmers?PJ_in_FL wrote:Oh how I remember those fun days of muddling through cryptic Job Control Language statements to run my simulations. We had a little Fortran based program called CSMP, Continuous System Modeling Program, that I had fun with. So good in fact that my manager had to call me in and ask why I had used 2 HOURS of CPU time on our 370's and 303X's in the past month. Most jobs ran in under 3 seconds or so. Seems his budget didn't account for people actually simulating all the variables in a Monte Carlo systems analysis. <sigh>
Things got much nicer when I got away from the mainframe that used CMS/SPF and moved to VM/360 and REXX! Mike Cowlishaw quickly became our hero when he published that language.
Please congratulate me
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- 5StarLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
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- 5StarLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
Did you see this???
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-39803425" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Lisa
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-39803425" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Lisa
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- BronzeLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
I do remember being able to speed up Fortran programs by writing the I/O routines in assembly language. But I think their I/O might have advanced more than a little since then, and my software improvements might be somewhat redundant. And I'm an Aussie, so ineligible for a cut of the lucre.LisaGreen wrote:Did you read that NASA is looking for fortran programmers?
Alan
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- 5StarLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
LOL!LisaGreen wrote:Did you see this???
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-39803425" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Lisa
My geek days are long past. Now I just spend my days helping build the hardware the code runs on. Much easier and I don't want to lose any more hair from pulling it out when the compiler abends on every line of code.
PJ in (usually sunny) FL
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- PlatinumLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
It's hardly lucre, more like petty cash!AlanMiller wrote:I'm an Aussie, so ineligible for a cut of the lucre.
I seem to remember a Linda Evangelista quotation on this topic...
John Gray
If you are having problems with solitude, you are not alone.
If you are having problems with solitude, you are not alone.
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- 5StarLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
Chris:
"Hmm. What does this button do?" Said everyone before being ejected from a car, blown up, or deleting all the data from the mainframe.
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- BronzeLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
I'd have to agree. And it's one thing wanting something for nothing; NASA is expecting 10 to 10,000 times faster ... for (next to) nothing! "Bon chance", I'd say.John Gray wrote:It's hardly lucre, more like petty cash!
Alan
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- PlutoniumLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
Brings back memories.PJ_in_FL wrote:... ask why I had used 2 HOURS of CPU time on our 370's and 303X's in the past month. ...
I remember, one night (2am to 6am was my time slot) running my "matrix determinant calculator" program and then running it a second time to see if it came up with the same answer ("Do the six holes in the output cards match up?").
Given that I used to choose best-of-three or best-of-five when doing it with pencil and paper, I was amazed that the computer was so clever (laugh) to get the same answer twice in a row, that I ran the program twenty times that night, trying to see if it would make a mistake, as I did, when it got tired.
So you see, I was pretty naive back then, too!
Cheers
Chris
By definition, educating the client is the consultant’s first objective
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- PlutoniumLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
Thanks Skitterbug.Skitterbug wrote:I congratulate you Chris. Did you celebrate by eating a tub of ice cream? You should have!
Yes, I guess I should have, except for circumstances :-
(1) I am not sure of the exact day in May 1967, so I would have had to eat a 2-litre brick of ice-cream every day in May, just to be sure and
(2) I am seriously trying to lose weight, so nowadays I buy a two-litre brick of Chapman's Butterscotch Ripple only on days when I discover that my ten-day running average(1) has dropped another pound.
Cheers
Chris
(1) Don'r get smart with me! You know exactly what is meant by a running average!
By definition, educating the client is the consultant’s first objective
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- PlutoniumLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
I remember WatFor.AlanMiller wrote:...7 using the Watfor implementation of Fortran IV.
In September 1982 i arrived in Toronto and found a Waterloo interpreter of APL on a Commodore computer that was, in essence, a keyboard that I could fit into my briefcase.
In Adelaide we had spent three years developing APL on a good-old 96KB ICL 1903A, and here was a MUCH flashier APL, that fit into my briefcase ...
Sigh!
By definition, educating the client is the consultant’s first objective
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- PlutoniumLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
Yes it is, and I can still remember when it used to be what it was!John Gray wrote:Nostalgia isn't what it used to be...
I also recall a Burroughs 6700 that had to "run up" for seven hours. We thought it was "getting up to speed", but now I suspect that most of that seven hours was spent in Formatting the new disk or drum.
Cheers
Chris
By definition, educating the client is the consultant’s first objective
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Re: Please congratulate me
I liked this bit:-LisaGreen wrote:Did you see this??? http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-39803425" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; Lisa
Significant improvements could be gained just by simplifying a heavily used sub-routine so it runs a few milliseconds faster, said Nasa on the webpage describing the competition. If the routine is called millions of times during a simulation this could "significantly" trim testing times, it added.
Just think, if you run the code millions of times, you could save ... SECONDS!
Quentin Van Abbe and I re-wrote some code in the BHP payroll program for the IBM 1401.
Our boss, Bob Moon, listened politely, then sent us away to multiply our loop-savings by the number of employees at BHP multiplied by 26 pay-periods per year.
He was a great teacher was Bob ...
Cheers
Chris
By definition, educating the client is the consultant’s first objective
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- GoldLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
Congratulations, Chris!ChrisGreaves wrote:This month marks my fifty years in programming computers.
May 1967.
FORTRAN II on an IBM 1620 at the University of Western Australia.
(Later on I found and purchased a copy of Daniel D. McCracken's book)
Punched cards.
No printing on the output.
No printers.
This means I am noe entring my fifty-first year of maiking the moost appauling errours and mithtakes.
(And thank you for making me feel youngish for a second or two. )
(Pascal on BSD Unix, SunOS, Ultrix etc. (and only because it was compulsory) an eon after you.)
(Printers: Reminds me about the discussions; people complaining about the printers, then some would say that they had to run 4 floors up & down to get to The printer, and then others would chime in: printer?)
Byelingual When you speak two languages but start losing vocabulary in both of them.
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- BronzeLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
(GASP) I never would do a thing like that........ChrisGreaves wrote:Thanks Skitterbug.Skitterbug wrote:I congratulate you Chris. Did you celebrate by eating a tub of ice cream? You should have!
Yes, I guess I should have, except for circumstances :-
(1) I am not sure of the exact day in May 1967, so I would have had to eat a 2-litre brick of ice-cream every day in May, just to be sure and
(2) I am seriously trying to lose weight, so nowadays I buy a two-litre brick of Chapman's Butterscotch Ripple only on days when I discover that my ten-day running average(1) has dropped another pound.
Cheers
Chris
(1) Don'r get smart with me! You know exactly what is meant by a running average!
I do wish you the best of luck in the 'weight' department! Hope it doesn't take long!
Skitterbug
A cup of coffee shared with a friend is happiness tasted and time well spent.
A cup of coffee shared with a friend is happiness tasted and time well spent.
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- BronzeLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
Printers? We used to dream of owning a printer!Argus wrote:(Printers: Reminds me about the discussions; people complaining about the printers, then some would say that they had to run 4 floors up & down to get to The printer, and then others would chime in: printer?)
We had to supply our own chisel bits to get our output carved into stone slabs. Today's younguns have no idea what carting around a tablet means!
Alan
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- PlutoniumLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
yep!Argus wrote:... they had to run 4 floors up & down to get to The printer, and then others would chime in: printer?)
Also submitting job-decks by 10a.m. each morning so that the van driver could pick them up and drive them to the computer five miles away ...
Cheers
Chris
By definition, educating the client is the consultant’s first objective
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- PlutoniumLounger
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Re: Please congratulate me
Oh dear.AlanMiller wrote:Printers? We used to dream of owning a printer!
Does this mean i have to track down The Four Yorkshiremen Sketch and then try to lure Hans into watching it again, again?
Cheers
Chris
By definition, educating the client is the consultant’s first objective