[Novalug] Unix

Miles D. Oliver miles.d.oliver@gmail.com
Wed Oct 26 05:25:12 EDT 2011


At 48 I'm not ready to wear the 'Old Timer' label just yet but I'm sure we
all have those 'stupid user tricks' that stick with us during our work life.

I never graduated college, only a few semesters over a couple years because
I was always too busy 'scratchin; out a life'.  and 'fell into' this
career.  I stared out in the mail room at Western Union in their Electronic
Mail division.   "Show of hands" who remembers those yellow letters of 'hard
copy SPAM" that would wind up in your mailbox. Email put a stop to that
business venture.   I'm only responsible for 'some' of that mess.

I applied for the punch card operator job in the computer room and got it.
Thus started my life of 'dropped card decks' and 'chads' long before the
term became a word used in the news during an election.

To this day I still believe that I was given the job because I was a
'Strapping Lad' , big enough to carry 2, sometimes 3 boxes of 'green bar'
paper at a time to the printers during the course of a shift.

I was the company 'pack mule' for a time but it gave me access to a shelf of
manuals and a lunch hour to read.  I couldn't sign them out or let them
leave the floor because they were the only copies but it was a start.  I ate
it up and still do....

On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 9:55 PM, Mark Smith <mark@winksmith.com> wrote:

> write up a collection of old-timer stories and put it up on novalug.
> even better, put up a wiki dedicated to old timer stories so that
> people can write it up themselves without an intermediary putting it up.
> have fun.
>
> On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 08:23:26PM -0400, Miles D. Oliver wrote:
> > I was playing with punch cards at the time you were born..
> >
> >  I'm coming up on 28 years since I was a 'punch card operator at Western
> > Union" and there are others in this group with much more time in than I.
> We
> > should take a few moments at one of the meetings to share our experiences
> > we've all had over the years. I'm sure we'd all have some tales to tell
> and
> > have a few good laughs.
> >
> > Like the time the PDP-11 disk cabinet with an 80MB drive 'walked' across
> the
> > floor and pulled the cables out of the back during a sort sequence where
> the
> > head 'thrashed violently in and out a lot' causing the whole cabinet to
> move
> > across the floor..
> >
> > Or the time there was an issue where several 'floppy' disks were mailed
> to
> > NJ several times and couldn't be read on the other side and I was
> discovered
> > that the reason they could not be read at their destination was the woman
> > who was saving the files put the sticky label on the floppy and then "RAN
> > THE FLOPPY THROUGH THE ROLLER I THE TYPEWRITER" and the hammers struck
> the
> > label and imprinting the platen inside thus ruining the disk where it
> > couldn't spin..
> >
> > Or the time I almost strangled myself with my tie (Yes, Computer
> operators
> > wore smocks and ties on the floor) by closing it up in the printer
> carriage
> > with the screw closing the printer door and pulling me an the tie into
> the
> > printer.
> >
> > We should take some time to share.
> >
> >
> >
> > On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 6:54 PM, Alex Smith (K4RNT)
> > <shadowhunter@gmail.com>wrote:
> >
> > > The PDP-11 was before my time, unfortunately (I was born in '83). I
> > > started with a Commodore 64. My first exposure to UNIX was Digital
> > > UNIX, SunOS 4.1.4, then Linux and Solaris. I still prefer the latter
> > > two.
> > >
> > > R.I.P. DEC and Sun pre-Oracle acquisition. They were damn innovative
> > > companies. :)
> > >
> > > On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 18:44, Andrew Scott Beals
> > > <andrew.beals@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > Or go for JOVE, which nets you the power of emacs with the memory
> > > footprint and speed of vi.  Real vi, not that memory-hog vim thing.
>  Even
> > > runs on a PDP-11!
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > On Oct 25, 2011, at 5:16 PM, Mark Smith wrote:
> > > >
> > > >> the difference between micro-emacs and emacs is that it's notably
> > > missing
> > > >> the global-thermo-nuclear-war option, but that's okay, because i
> didn't
> > > >> use it much anyway.
> > > >>
> > > >> On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 11:31:16AM -0400, David Sachdev wrote:
> > > >>> And emacs is a great operating system....if they had only
> remembered to
> > > >>> include an editor
> > > >>>
> > > >>> On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 11:21 AM, Alex Smith (K4RNT) <
> > > shadowhunter@gmail.com
> > > >>>> wrote:
> > > >>>
> > > >>>> But remember, if all you have is a hammer, everything starts to
> look
> > > >>>> like a nail. ;)
> > > >>>>
> > > >>>> On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 11:18, Roger W. Broseus <
> rogerb@bronord.com>
> > > >>>> wrote:
> > > >>>>> "Unix is the best screwdriver ever built."
> > > >>
> > > >>
> > > >> --
> > > >> Mark Smith
> > > >> mark@winksmith.com
> > > >> mark@tux.org
> > > >> _______________________________________________
> > > >> Novalug mailing list
> > > >> Novalug@calypso.tux.org
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> > > >
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> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > --
> > > " ' With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech
> > > censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied,
> > > chains us all irrevocably.' Those words were uttered by Judge Aaron
> > > Satie as wisdom and warning... The first time any man's freedom is
> > > trodden on we’re all damaged." - Jean-Luc Picard, quoting Judge Aaron
> > > Satie, Star Trek: TNG episode "The Drumhead"
> > > - Alex Smith (K4RNT)
> > > - Dulles Technology Corridor (Chantilly/Ashburn/Dulles), Virginia USA
> > > _______________________________________________
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> > >
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>
> --
> Mark Smith
> mark@winksmith.com
> mark@tux.org
>
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