Subject: Re: Computer History Association of California (long)

From: [email-masked] (Ethan Dicks)
Date: 5 Sep 93 00:23:16 EDT

In article <[email-masked]>, Douglas W. Jones ([email-masked]) writes:
>I've just discovered an interesting organization, the Computer History
>Association of California, and it's clear that their goals are very much
>in keeping with the goals of many of the readers who follow these
>newsgroups.

Yup.

>As near as I can figure, they're the first general membership association
>devoted to historic preservation of computers.  Thus, they may be able
>to provide the kind of hacker-centered orientation that is lacking in
>places like the Computer Museum and the Smithsonian.

Could be.

>I feel that we preservationists should support them actively, either by
>joining their organization (particularly, those of us in the bay area),
>or by referring California hardware and documentation rescue work to them.
>They've picked up a significant membership outside of California, but my
>long-term hope is that we can get similar local organizations running on
>the east coast and in the midwest.  We've got the critical mass in both
>places, but here in the midwest, we may not have the critical density.

I've been toying with the idea of a preservation group, myself, but have
been far too busy with job-related activities to actually sit down and write
up a charter and incorporate.  CHAC may actually be the kick-in-the-pants
that I need.  I am already interested and have already begun to collect
the physical material that such a group would need to have access to.
I have been (compulsively) collecting manuals and schematics for years
and have quite a collection of aged equipment.  One of the jewels of
the collection is a VAX-11/750 S/N BT000254 with disks and other accessories,
running as a production machine from shipment until last month.  I also
have a pair of classic PDP-8 (no TTL) CPUs, but with only DF-32 disks; these
haven't been used in over 15 years - one of these units is in the ad on the
back of "CPU WARS".

My real question is this: how much interest is there in trying to put up an
information preservation society, here in the midwest?  Doug Jones is in Iowa;
I am in Ohio; who else is close?  What kind of information are people most
interested in preserving?  I have operating systems, system manuals,
maintenance manuals, several dozen cartons of computer magazines from the 
70's, and dozens of CPUs to go with the info.  Most of my stuff is either
IBM mainframe, DEC mini or Commodore micro related.  There's obviously a lot
more out there than that.

I, too, am a bit sickened by the attitudes and actions of the Computer
Museum in Boston.  I've been to the technology exhibit at the Smithsonian
and think it's a good start, but the history of computers is not the focus
there, merely a reoccuring theme throughout the exhibit.  We need groups
(like CHAC) to study, collect and disseminate rapidly dwindling info on
systems which are more than a few years old.  Who here can read a LINCtape?
I can't.  If I get my PDP-8 hardware in better shape, I could read a
DECtape, but not a LINCtape.  Who here can read 7-track magtape?  Not me.
I can't even read 800 bpi magtape (if I could, I'd get a bunch of old BASIC
games for RSTS off of a couple of tapes I've got which were cut in the
late 1970's - if they are still legible).  Even preserving non-technical
information (like price/performance, kbytes/kilowatt, KIPS/metric ton, bytes/
BTU) is useful, because it lets us know how we got to where we are and where
else we might be expected to go.

Someone mentioned to me that microfische is an inexpensive way to go... 1000
pages/$20 for the first copy, subsequent copies cheaper.  As was mentioned
elsewhere, space is a premium, diskspace doubly so.  Scanned pages take up
a lot of space, but might be appropriate for a CD-ROM.

So... who's willing to put up time, equipment, space or money?  I am already
preparing to start a 501(c3) organization to provide a home for wayward
information and equipment.  Do I hear any support from the people near me?
Do I hear any support from people not near me?  My first interest is in
founding a library; my second, a museum.  The library is a lot easier and
cheaper.  The museum would require at least 1000 sq. ft. of open space (which
is not as large as you probably think it is) and would probably take about
$10,000 - $20,000 annually for rent, electricity, A/C and other kinds of
building related overhead; salaries (in the absence of an all-volunteer staff)
would be a lot more.  I don't see a museum happening for quite a few years (if
ever), but it's been a distant goal of mine for a long time.

The only way to get members (over the long term) is to provide a benefit
for membership.  A newsletter/magazine is one way, but the costs of
providing a publication eat into the benefits to the organization.  Another
benefit for membership might be data conversion either free or at reduced
prices to members.  Still another might be repair of certain kinds of
hardware at reduced prices or free to members.  These other benefits also
can produce hidden costs which can inhibit the growth of an organization.
A very potential benefit might be the sale of spares and repair parts as
well as manuals (duplicates of originals, or legal copies) to members only.
This would not be the same as selling useful parts to gawking spectators,
but could assist interested parties in keeping their own machines going.  All
proceeds of the sales would go towards maintenance and aquisitions.

Feedback?  Sugestions?  Flames?  Offers for help?

-ethan

---

From: [email-masked] (Charles Lasner)
Date: 7 Sep 1993 05:21:07 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>,

>late 1970's - if they are still legible).  Even preserving non-technical

Ethan's words don't go on deaf ears.  We all get busy, but there are things
that can be done, and the spirit of the CHAC people should at least be a
guiding principle for some of us, but we have to have the time for it, which
for me, sometimes seems to just disappear!

OK, here's a run-down of what I do/can do.  In no particular order, all of the
following apply to me:

1)	I do have a life! (This is more than a vicious rumor.)

2)	I run a consulting business to eat, and it does occasionally take up
	large hunks of time as it should.  It encompasses everything from
	PDP-8 programming to data conversion to PC construction/configuration
	upgrade/repair/trade-in/sell-off/application writing/installation
	MIDI applications to expert witnessing to the legal profession to
	computer advisor/consultant to the Board of Ed. locally.  (Yeah, I
	wear a lotta hats :-).)

3)	I started this newsgroup personally.  (I can post the control messages
	if anyone's interested.  Thanks to some net gurus who helped me
	immensely.)  I contribute here regularly, and also to other groups such
	as comp.sys.dec.micro, alt.folklore.computers, and alt.folklore.urban.
	(I do *not* contribute to alt.sex.bondage.hamster.duct-tape.)  And
	apparently our readership has grown over the approx. one year that
	a.s.p has been in business!

4)	In my spare (!) time I support Kermit-12, the PDP-8/-12/DECmate Kermit
	program and related utilities, slowly develop P?S/8, the alternate
	O/S for the -8/-12/DECmates, and slowly develop OS/8 Version 5, the
	replacement OS/8 system that unifies all of the "orphan" versions
	currently around due to hardware dependencies, etc.  One of the most
	significant aspects of this is to reveal the "secrets" of the DECmates,
	especially the DM II, III, III+.  This has lead to various efforts of
	pleading with DEC people, mostly to no avail, and to a whole lot of
	disassembly of -8 binary, much of which has been obtained by dumping
	ROM's, and having to write whole sets of utilities to bring the code
	back to the appropriate form just to carry it out, etc.  (Many thanks
	to the relevant contributors of the information I need to carry out
	a lot of this; you know who you are!)

5)	I get a whole lot of e-mail! :-) (Who doesn't?)

6)	I distribute lotsa -8/12/DECmate programs to many people, often
	through e-mail.  Sometimes this involves using utilities for unix,
	PC's, and various RX50-based DEC machines all at once.  I personally
	upgraded the specification for the Columbia University .BOO
	distribution format to eliminate design errors, and created the first 
	correct version - the PDP-8 version for the OS/8 family.  Others have
 	followed suit with versions for unix, MS-DOS, VMS, etc., so there is
	now another whole level of compatibility between the -8 and other 
	systems, etc.

7)	I maintain a PDP-8 archives at sunsite.unc.edu in the
	/pub/academic/computer-science/history/pdp-8 area.  Sources and
	binaries of PDP-8 and DECmate programs and even RX50 images can be
	obtained there through anonymous ftp.  Archives of this newsgroup
	are stored in:
	/pub/academic/computer-science/history/pdp-8/usenet/alt.sys.pdp8
	The file format is month-by-month.  The August archive file has
	just been placed there as 9308.asp.  Archive files are generally
	placed a few days into the following month.  Read the associated
	file 00-INDEX in the same directory for more details, etc.

8)	I have a few machines that can interact to allow media conversion
	to/from all of the following:

	DECtape (PDP-8/e-a with TC08/TU56 (4 drives)
	LINCtape (LINC-8 which can read/write DECtape and is also interfaced
	to the PDP-8/e-a)
	Paper-tape (PC04 reader/punch)
	RX01 (DSD-210 which can also *FORMAT* RX media!)
	RX02 (RX02 sharable between DECmate I, DECmate II, and PDP-8/e-a)
	RK8E (various RK05's on several 8/e, 8/e-a machines)
	800/1600/3200 BPI 9-track magtape (M4 on PDP-8/e-a)
	1.2 Meg floppy (on SCSI adaptor on PDP-8/e-a) (with some effort, it
	is possible to create 1.44 Meg 3.5" diskettes as well.  Of course I
	can also support all of the popular PC versions of these diskettes,
	but I am referring to PDP-8 bootable floppies in these HD formats.
	Moreover, these bootable floppies can be used by various emulators
	such as PC-based PDP-8 emulators, etc.  Someone has requested the
	3.5" version for use with a MAC-based -8 emulator, etc.)
	80 MByte MFM disks (on PDP-8/e-a SCSI)
	SyQuest SQ-555 45 MB cartridge disks (on PDP-8/e-a and also on PC)
	RX50 (DECmates)
	Colorado Memories DJ-10 and DJ-20 cartridge tape drives (on PC).

All of the machines support serial communications between any two of them
or to a modem and indirectly the net, etc.  All of the machines run Kermit
except the 4K LINC-8 which can transfer data to/from the PDP-8/e-a using
either a hand-made bidirectionally interface or the LINC-8's ability to
transfer data to/from DECtape due to hardware modifications made to it some
years ago, etc.

	The DJ-20 tapes store 120 MBytes (Hyped ads talk about 250 MB; this
is a boast about compression; your mileage may vary.  Better to pre-compress
the data with known better methods such as LHARC or PKZIP) and today the
media can be had for about $16 quantity one if you shop around.  Storing lotsa
PDP-8 files in compressed form means that archiving our information can be
done fairly cheaply, etc.  These tapes lend themselves to snail-mailings if
needed, etc.  In any case, there is no reason to lose PDP-8 information if
we all get our act together towards preserving what we have, etc.

cjl

ps: my own personal stack overflow is partially attributed to two major
events in my life.  One is self-induced, the other is circumstantial:

The latter first: I have just come back from a family medical emergency
where my mother was gravely ill and recently operated on, etc.  Hopefully
she will recover, but it's still too early to get any dependable data, etc.

The former is that I have also spent the best part of the past year in
major renovations of my building.  One of the objectives is the better use
of the facilities for different aspects of computing.  Several rooms devoted
exclusively to computers have been created, and are nearly completed a/o this
writing.  As a result, the long-term outlook is that other rooms already
devoted to this purpose will no longer be (as) overloaded, etc.