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* [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
@ 2021-12-22 15:11 Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
  2021-12-22 20:31 ` josh
                   ` (3 more replies)
  0 siblings, 4 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Alexander Jacocks via TUHS @ 2021-12-22 15:11 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: The Unix Heritage Society

Hello,

I’m looking for photographs of university computer labs from 1985 until 1995, particularly labs full of unix workstations, of course. Does anyone here have photos like that in their collection?

I’m also thinking of reaching out to university archivists, but I don’t have any direct connections to any.

Thanks much!
- Alex

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-22 15:11 [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
@ 2021-12-22 20:31 ` josh
  2021-12-22 21:07   ` Rob Pike
  2021-12-22 21:14 ` Win Treese
                   ` (2 subsequent siblings)
  3 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: josh @ 2021-12-22 20:31 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Alexander Jacocks; +Cc: The Unix Heritage Society

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Hi Alex,

On Wednesday, December 22, 2021, Alexander Jacocks via TUHS <
tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org> wrote:
>
> I’m looking for photographs of university computer labs from 1985 until
> 1995, particularly labs full of unix workstations, of course.


This is from a few years earlier than you requested, but in Rob Pike's
"Unix History, An illustrated memoir" talk (
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_2NI6t2r_Hs
<https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_2NI6t2r_Hs&t=932s>), at around ~11:18, Rob
shows a photo of the University of Toronto's computer graphics lab (with
Unix machines :P). He doesn't say the exact date, but based on context it
should be from around 1979ish.

Hope this helps,
Josh

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-22 20:31 ` josh
@ 2021-12-22 21:07   ` Rob Pike
  2021-12-22 21:15     ` Rob Pike
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Rob Pike @ 2021-12-22 21:07 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: josh; +Cc: The Unix Heritage Society


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And here they are. The images are lousy scans of prints.

[image: 20181026-unix 4.jpg]

[image: 20181026-unix 5.jpg]

-rob


On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 7:32 AM josh <joshnatis0@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi Alex,
>
> On Wednesday, December 22, 2021, Alexander Jacocks via TUHS <
> tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org> wrote:
>>
>> I’m looking for photographs of university computer labs from 1985 until
>> 1995, particularly labs full of unix workstations, of course.
>
>
> This is from a few years earlier than you requested, but in Rob Pike's
> "Unix History, An illustrated memoir" talk (
> https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_2NI6t2r_Hs
> <https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_2NI6t2r_Hs&t=932s>), at around ~11:18,
> Rob shows a photo of the University of Toronto's computer graphics lab
> (with Unix machines :P). He doesn't say the exact date, but based on
> context it should be from around 1979ish.
>
> Hope this helps,
> Josh
>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-22 15:11 [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
  2021-12-22 20:31 ` josh
@ 2021-12-22 21:14 ` Win Treese
  2021-12-23  0:48   ` Adam Thornton
  2021-12-23  1:30 ` Adam Sampson
  2021-12-25  0:00 ` [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs Mike Markowski
  3 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Win Treese @ 2021-12-22 21:14 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Alexander Jacocks; +Cc: The Unix Heritage Society


> On Dec 22, 2021, at 10:11 AM, Alexander Jacocks via TUHS <tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org> wrote:
> 
> Hello,
> 
> I’m looking for photographs of university computer labs from 1985 until 1995, particularly labs full of unix workstations, of course. Does anyone here have photos like that in their collection?
> 
> I’m also thinking of reaching out to university archivists, but I don’t have any direct connections to any.

There may be some photos of MIT’s Project Athena rooms in the collections of the MIT Museum (http://mitmuseum.mit.edu/contact) or the Institute Archives at the MIT Libraries (https://libraries.mit.edu/distinctive-collections/collections/institute-archives/). In a quick search online, I only found photos of the original terminal rooms, with terminals connected to VAXen running UNIX. The workstations were deployed in 1986 +/-, I think.

 - Win




^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-22 21:07   ` Rob Pike
@ 2021-12-22 21:15     ` Rob Pike
  2021-12-23  4:28       ` Warren Toomey
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Rob Pike @ 2021-12-22 21:15 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: josh; +Cc: The Unix Heritage Society

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I responded with a couple of modest jpgs but the 100kB limit on this list
is once again blocking photographic history.

I'll send them to Josh directly.

-rob

>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-22 21:14 ` Win Treese
@ 2021-12-23  0:48   ` Adam Thornton
  0 siblings, 0 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Adam Thornton @ 2021-12-23  0:48 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Win Treese; +Cc: The Unix Heritage Society

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I can well remember how the Ab Lab (in the Abercrombie mechanical
engineering building) looked and smelled at Rice University from 1990-1994,
as its Sun 3s and RT-6000s were replaced by SparcStations...but I don't
have any pictures of it.

On Wed, Dec 22, 2021 at 2:21 PM Win Treese <treese@acm.org> wrote:

>
> > On Dec 22, 2021, at 10:11 AM, Alexander Jacocks via TUHS <
> tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org> wrote:
> >
> > Hello,
> >
> > I’m looking for photographs of university computer labs from 1985 until
> 1995, particularly labs full of unix workstations, of course. Does anyone
> here have photos like that in their collection?
> >
> > I’m also thinking of reaching out to university archivists, but I don’t
> have any direct connections to any.
>
> There may be some photos of MIT’s Project Athena rooms in the collections
> of the MIT Museum (http://mitmuseum.mit.edu/contact) or the Institute
> Archives at the MIT Libraries (
> https://libraries.mit.edu/distinctive-collections/collections/institute-archives/).
> In a quick search online, I only found photos of the original terminal
> rooms, with terminals connected to VAXen running UNIX. The workstations
> were deployed in 1986 +/-, I think.
>
>  - Win
>
>
>
>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-22 15:11 [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
  2021-12-22 20:31 ` josh
  2021-12-22 21:14 ` Win Treese
@ 2021-12-23  1:30 ` Adam Sampson
  2021-12-23  2:18   ` Larry McVoy
  2021-12-25  0:00 ` [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs Mike Markowski
  3 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Adam Sampson @ 2021-12-23  1:30 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Alexander Jacocks via TUHS

Alexander Jacocks via TUHS <tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org> writes:

> I’m looking for photographs of university computer labs from 1985
> until 1995, particularly labs full of unix workstations, of
> course. Does anyone here have photos like that in their collection?

Here's a computer lab at Dundee Institute of Technology (now Abertay
University), Dundee, Scotland around 1985:

http://stuff.offog.org/dct/torch-lab-c1985.jpg

It's unlikely that there was any Unix involved in that picture -- the
Torch machines pictured are modified BBC Micros with a Z80 coprocessor
so they can run a CP/M clone, and DIT's computer centre had a TOPS-20
system and several VMS machines at that point.

-- 
Adam Sampson <ats@offog.org>                         <http://offog.org/>

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-23  1:30 ` Adam Sampson
@ 2021-12-23  2:18   ` Larry McVoy
  2021-12-23 13:05     ` Michael Kjörling
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Larry McVoy @ 2021-12-23  2:18 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Adam Sampson; +Cc: Alexander Jacocks via TUHS

On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 01:30:38AM +0000, Adam Sampson wrote:
> Alexander Jacocks via TUHS <tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org> writes:
> 
> > I???m looking for photographs of university computer labs from 1985
> > until 1995, particularly labs full of unix workstations, of
> > course. Does anyone here have photos like that in their collection?
> 
> Here's a computer lab at Dundee Institute of Technology (now Abertay
> University), Dundee, Scotland around 1985:
> 
> http://stuff.offog.org/dct/torch-lab-c1985.jpg
> 
> It's unlikely that there was any Unix involved in that picture -- the
> Torch machines pictured are modified BBC Micros with a Z80 coprocessor
> so they can run a CP/M clone, and DIT's computer centre had a TOPS-20
> system and several VMS machines at that point.

The terminal rooms bring back memories.  I learned *so* much looking
over someone else's shoulder and going "how did you make vi do that?".

The CP/M machines bring back different memories, using that and BDS
C because an 11/780 with 4MB of ram and 40 users meant each user was
getting 1KB so it swapped and swapped and swapped.  128K less the space
for video on a CP/M machine was slower when you had the VAX to yourself
(as in never) and much faster in general.  Wrote a boatload of funky C
code on my CP/M machine.  More lonely but more productive code wise.

--lm

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-22 21:15     ` Rob Pike
@ 2021-12-23  4:28       ` Warren Toomey
  2021-12-23  4:31         ` Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
  2021-12-23  4:45         ` Rob Pike
  0 siblings, 2 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Warren Toomey @ 2021-12-23  4:28 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs

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I've just bumped the limit up to a massive 1M :-) I could be persuaded 
to go even higher!

Cheers, Warren

On 23/12/21 8:15 am, Rob Pike wrote:
> I responded with a couple of modest jpgs but the 100kB limit on this 
> list is once again blocking photographic history.
>
> I'll send them to Josh directly.
>
> -rob
>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-23  4:28       ` Warren Toomey
@ 2021-12-23  4:31         ` Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
  2021-12-23  4:45         ` Rob Pike
  1 sibling, 0 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Alexander Jacocks via TUHS @ 2021-12-23  4:31 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: The Unix Heritage Society

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Rob,

I was the original requestor. Thanks for the images!

Thanks for upping the limit, Warren.

- Alex

> On Dec 22, 2021, at 11:28 PM, Warren Toomey <wkt@tuhs.org> wrote:
> 
> I've just bumped the limit up to a massive 1M :-) I could be persuaded to go even higher!
> 
> Cheers, Warren
> 
> On 23/12/21 8:15 am, Rob Pike wrote:
>> I responded with a couple of modest jpgs but the 100kB limit on this list is once again blocking photographic history.
>> 
>> I'll send them to Josh directly.
>> 
>> -rob


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* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-23  4:28       ` Warren Toomey
  2021-12-23  4:31         ` Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
@ 2021-12-23  4:45         ` Rob Pike
  1 sibling, 0 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Rob Pike @ 2021-12-23  4:45 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Warren Toomey; +Cc: The Eunuchs Hysterical Society

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Thank you!

-rob


On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 3:29 PM Warren Toomey <wkt@tuhs.org> wrote:

> I've just bumped the limit up to a massive 1M :-) I could be persuaded to
> go even higher!
>
> Cheers, Warren
> On 23/12/21 8:15 am, Rob Pike wrote:
>
> I responded with a couple of modest jpgs but the 100kB limit on this list
> is once again blocking photographic history.
>
> I'll send them to Josh directly.
>
> -rob
>
>>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-23  2:18   ` Larry McVoy
@ 2021-12-23 13:05     ` Michael Kjörling
  2021-12-23 14:19       ` Larry McVoy
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Michael Kjörling @ 2021-12-23 13:05 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs

On 22 Dec 2021 18:18 -0800, from lm@mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy):
> The CP/M machines bring back different memories, using that and BDS
> C because an 11/780 with 4MB of ram and 40 users meant each user was
> getting 1KB so it swapped and swapped and swapped.

4 MB RAM and 40 users works out to 100 KB of RAM per user for me. Even
accounting for a large at the time OS it should be several tens of
kilobytes per user on average for actual useful data. So, because
there's probably some detail here that means you're right and I'm
wrong, how do you arrive at the figure 1 KB of RAM per user in that
scenario?

-- 
Michael Kjörling • https://michael.kjorling.se • michael@kjorling.se
 “Remember when, on the Internet, nobody cared that you were a dog?”


^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-23 13:05     ` Michael Kjörling
@ 2021-12-23 14:19       ` Larry McVoy
  2021-12-23 15:29         ` [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic Dr Iain Maoileoin
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Larry McVoy @ 2021-12-23 14:19 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Michael Kj??rling; +Cc: tuhs

On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 01:05:55PM +0000, Michael Kj??rling wrote:
> On 22 Dec 2021 18:18 -0800, from lm@mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy):
> > The CP/M machines bring back different memories, using that and BDS
> > C because an 11/780 with 4MB of ram and 40 users meant each user was
> > getting 1KB so it swapped and swapped and swapped.
> 
> 4 MB RAM and 40 users works out to 100 KB of RAM per user for me. Even
> accounting for a large at the time OS it should be several tens of
> kilobytes per user on average for actual useful data. So, because
> there's probably some detail here that means you're right and I'm
> wrong, how do you arrive at the figure 1 KB of RAM per user in that
> scenario?

Probably boomer doing math wrong.  You are right, I'm wrong.  Though I
will say that 100K/student was _painful_.  Not enough to run make/cc in
any reasonable time.  About the only thing that worked was ^t (I think
that was it) that showed you some basic info about performance.

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 14:19       ` Larry McVoy
@ 2021-12-23 15:29         ` Dr Iain Maoileoin
  2021-12-23 16:00           ` Larry McVoy
  2021-12-23 16:02           ` Warner Losh
  0 siblings, 2 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Dr Iain Maoileoin @ 2021-12-23 15:29 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs

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On 12/23/21 2:19 PM, Larry McVoy wrote:
> On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 01:05:55PM +0000, Michael Kj??rling wrote:
>> On 22 Dec 2021 18:18 -0800, from lm@mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy):
>>> The CP/M machines bring back different memories, using that and BDS
>>> C because an 11/780 with 4MB of ram and 40 users meant each user was
>>> getting 1KB so it swapped and swapped and swapped.
>> 4 MB RAM and 40 users works out to 100 KB of RAM per user for me. Even
>> accounting for a large at the time OS it should be several tens of
>> kilobytes per user on average for actual useful data. So, because
>> there's probably some detail here that means you're right and I'm
>> wrong, how do you arrive at the figure 1 KB of RAM per user in that
>> scenario?
> Probably boomer doing math wrong.

I might get flamed for this comment, but is a number divided by a number 
not arithmetic.  I cant see any maths in there.

In my support I point out that the "dc" manual page says

  dc  is a reverse-polish desk calculator which supports unlimited precision arithmetic.

In Scotland - at least years ago - arithmetic was an examinable subject 
at the lower grades (you also get a mathematics exam at the same grade).

Arithmetic could not be taken past the basic level, mathematics could.

Nowadays they have lumped arithmetic into maths (pronounced "maffs").

Do other countries have this change in language?

Sorry for the intrusion. It is Christmas with me (or is it "happy 
holiday" to be politically correct).

>   You are right, I'm wrong.  Though I
> will say that 100K/student was _painful_.  Not enough to run make/cc in
> any reasonable time.  About the only thing that worked was ^t (I think
> that was it) that showed you some basic info about performance.
I had forgotten about control-t - does anything modern still do that ;-)



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* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 15:29         ` [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic Dr Iain Maoileoin
@ 2021-12-23 16:00           ` Larry McVoy
  2021-12-23 16:28             ` Dr Iain Maoileoin
  2021-12-23 16:02           ` Warner Losh
  1 sibling, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Larry McVoy @ 2021-12-23 16:00 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Dr Iain Maoileoin; +Cc: tuhs

On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 03:29:18PM +0000, Dr Iain Maoileoin wrote:
> >Probably boomer doing math wrong.
> 
> I might get flamed for this comment, but is a number divided by a number not
> arithmetic.?? I cant see any maths in there.

That's just a language thing, lots of people in the US call arithmetic
math.  I'm 100% positive that that is not just me.

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 15:29         ` [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic Dr Iain Maoileoin
  2021-12-23 16:00           ` Larry McVoy
@ 2021-12-23 16:02           ` Warner Losh
  2021-12-23 16:19             ` Larry McVoy
  1 sibling, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Warner Losh @ 2021-12-23 16:02 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Dr Iain Maoileoin; +Cc: TUHS main list

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On Thu, Dec 23, 2021, 8:54 AM Dr Iain Maoileoin <iain@csp-partnership.co.uk>
wrote:

> On 12/23/21 2:19 PM, Larry McVoy wrote:
>
> On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 01:05:55PM +0000, Michael Kj??rling wrote:
>
> On 22 Dec 2021 18:18 -0800, from lm@mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy):
>
> The CP/M machines bring back different memories, using that and BDS
> C because an 11/780 with 4MB of ram and 40 users meant each user was
> getting 1KB so it swapped and swapped and swapped.
>
> 4 MB RAM and 40 users works out to 100 KB of RAM per user for me. Even
> accounting for a large at the time OS it should be several tens of
> kilobytes per user on average for actual useful data. So, because
> there's probably some detail here that means you're right and I'm
> wrong, how do you arrive at the figure 1 KB of RAM per user in that
> scenario?
>
> Probably boomer doing math wrong.
>
> I might get flamed for this comment, but is a number divided by a number
> not arithmetic.  I cant see any maths in there.
>
> In my support I point out that the "dc" manual page says
>
>  dc  is a reverse-polish desk calculator which supports unlimited precision arithmetic.
>
>
> In Scotland - at least years ago - arithmetic was an examinable subject at
> the lower grades (you also get a mathematics exam at the same grade).
>
> Arithmetic could not be taken past the basic level, mathematics could.
>
> Nowadays they have lumped arithmetic into maths (pronounced "maffs").
>
> Do other countries have this change in language?
>
> Sorry for the intrusion. It is Christmas with me (or is it "happy holiday"
> to be politically correct).
>
>  You are right, I'm wrong.  Though I
> will say that 100K/student was _painful_.  Not enough to run make/cc in
> any reasonable time.  About the only thing that worked was ^t (I think
> that was it) that showed you some basic info about performance.
>
> I had forgotten about control-t - does anything modern still do that
>

FreeBSD does. It's my biggest annoyance with Linux that it doesn't.

100k for a process that likely needed 500k to 1MB would indeed be swapping
its brains out. So while tha vax could do I/O 10 times faster than a Z80 of
the era and run maybe 5 times faster, all that was lost when you started
thrashing because you can't keep your working set in memory.

Warner

>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 16:02           ` Warner Losh
@ 2021-12-23 16:19             ` Larry McVoy
  2021-12-23 22:13               ` Steve Nickolas
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Larry McVoy @ 2021-12-23 16:19 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Warner Losh; +Cc: TUHS main list

On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 10:02:40AM -0600, Warner Losh wrote:
> > I had forgotten about control-t - does anything modern still do that
> 
> FreeBSD does. It's my biggest annoyance with Linux that it doesn't.

Seems like a patch might be nice.  

> 100k for a process that likely needed 500k to 1MB would indeed be swapping
> its brains out. So while tha vax could do I/O 10 times faster than a Z80 of
> the era and run maybe 5 times faster, all that was lost when you started
> thrashing because you can't keep your working set in memory.

Yeah, exactly.  A z80 with floppies seems slower, and was much slower
than a VAX to yourself, but I very rarely experienced that.  40 students
at 4am and the load average was through the roof?  No thanks, I'll take
the predictable speed of my CP/M machine over the VAX any day.  It wasn't
that slow, I got a lot of work done on it.

--lm

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 16:00           ` Larry McVoy
@ 2021-12-23 16:28             ` Dr Iain Maoileoin
  2021-12-23 16:35               ` Larry McVoy
                                 ` (2 more replies)
  0 siblings, 3 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Dr Iain Maoileoin @ 2021-12-23 16:28 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Larry McVoy; +Cc: tuhs

On 12/23/21 4:00 PM, Larry McVoy wrote:
> On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 03:29:18PM +0000, Dr Iain Maoileoin wrote:
>>> Probably boomer doing math wrong.
>> I might get flamed for this comment, but is a number divided by a number not
>> arithmetic.?? I cant see any maths in there.
> That's just a language thing, lots of people in the US call arithmetic
> math.  I'm 100% positive that that is not just me.

Interesting - have you always done that?  Or is it a more recent use of 
the word?

50 years ago our (Scottish) schooling used only Arithmetic for the basic 
number manipulation.  About 10-15 years ago maffs became the name.  I 
dont know how the transition occured with us. Schools?  or Media??  
Perhaps we have just imported the name from the good old US of A ;-)


^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 16:28             ` Dr Iain Maoileoin
@ 2021-12-23 16:35               ` Larry McVoy
  2021-12-23 16:47                 ` Dr Iain Maoileoin
  2021-12-23 22:15               ` Steve Nickolas
  2021-12-24 20:57               ` Derek Fawcus
  2 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Larry McVoy @ 2021-12-23 16:35 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Dr Iain Maoileoin; +Cc: tuhs

On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 04:28:26PM +0000, Dr Iain Maoileoin wrote:
> On 12/23/21 4:00 PM, Larry McVoy wrote:
> >On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 03:29:18PM +0000, Dr Iain Maoileoin wrote:
> >>>Probably boomer doing math wrong.
> >>I might get flamed for this comment, but is a number divided by a number not
> >>arithmetic.?? I cant see any maths in there.
> >That's just a language thing, lots of people in the US call arithmetic
> >math.  I'm 100% positive that that is not just me.
> 
> Interesting - have you always done that??? Or is it a more recent use of the
> word?

It's always been that way, arithmetic is a mouthful so people use math
to mean arithmetic.  You are correct, arithmetic is a distinct subset
of math.  But it's pedantic to call that out, math is a superset of
arithmetic so it is perfectly reasonable to call doing some arithmetic
"math".  If we started nit picking about those types of differences,
we'd never get anything meaningful done.

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 16:35               ` Larry McVoy
@ 2021-12-23 16:47                 ` Dr Iain Maoileoin
  0 siblings, 0 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Dr Iain Maoileoin @ 2021-12-23 16:47 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Larry McVoy; +Cc: tuhs

On 12/23/21 4:35 PM, Larry McVoy wrote:
> On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 04:28:26PM +0000, Dr Iain Maoileoin wrote:
>> On 12/23/21 4:00 PM, Larry McVoy wrote:
>>> On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 03:29:18PM +0000, Dr Iain Maoileoin wrote:
>>>>> Probably boomer doing math wrong.
>>>> I might get flamed for this comment, but is a number divided by a number not
>>>> arithmetic.?? I cant see any maths in there.
>>> That's just a language thing, lots of people in the US call arithmetic
>>> math.  I'm 100% positive that that is not just me.
>> Interesting - have you always done that??? Or is it a more recent use of the
>> word?
> It's always been that way, arithmetic is a mouthful so people use math
> to mean arithmetic.  You are correct, arithmetic is a distinct subset
> of math.  But it's pedantic to call that out, math is a superset of
> arithmetic so it is perfectly reasonable to call doing some arithmetic
> "math".  If we started nit picking about those types of differences,
> we'd never get anything meaningful done.

I totally agree.  My question is about language use (or drift) - nothing 
else.  In Scotland - amongst the young -  "Arithmetic" is now referred 
to as "Maths".   I am aware of the transition but cant understand what 
caused it to happen!  I dont know if other countries had/have the same 
slide from a specific to a general - hence the questions - nothing deeper.

In lower secondary school we would go to both Arithmetic AND also to 
Maths classes.  I suspect that no longer happens in the schools.  I 
guess I will need to go speak to some teachers.

I am not nit-picking, this is just the first time I have picked up the 
use of maths in the context amongst eh how do I phrase it "the older 
generation" oops....


^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 16:19             ` Larry McVoy
@ 2021-12-23 22:13               ` Steve Nickolas
  2021-12-24  3:48                 ` Theodore Ts'o
  2022-01-09 19:04                 ` Stuart Remphrey
  0 siblings, 2 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Steve Nickolas @ 2021-12-23 22:13 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: TUHS main list

On Thu, 23 Dec 2021, Larry McVoy wrote:

> On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 10:02:40AM -0600, Warner Losh wrote:
>>> I had forgotten about control-t - does anything modern still do that
>>
>> FreeBSD does. It's my biggest annoyance with Linux that it doesn't.
>
> Seems like a patch might be nice.

Yeah, I miss SIGINFO when I'm on Linux.

-uso.

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 16:28             ` Dr Iain Maoileoin
  2021-12-23 16:35               ` Larry McVoy
@ 2021-12-23 22:15               ` Steve Nickolas
  2021-12-24 20:57               ` Derek Fawcus
  2 siblings, 0 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Steve Nickolas @ 2021-12-23 22:15 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 517 bytes --]

On Thu, 23 Dec 2021, Dr Iain Maoileoin wrote:

> Interesting - have you always done that?  Or is it a more recent use of the 
> word?
>
> 50 years ago our (Scottish) schooling used only Arithmetic for the basic 
> number manipulation.  About 10-15 years ago maffs became the name.  I dont 
> know how the transition occured with us. Schools?  or Media??  Perhaps we 
> have just imported the name from the good old US of A ;-)

It was the norm in the US at least around 1985ish.  Can't speak for 
earlier.

-uso.

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 22:13               ` Steve Nickolas
@ 2021-12-24  3:48                 ` Theodore Ts'o
  2021-12-28 21:45                   ` Greg A. Woods
  2022-01-09 19:04                 ` Stuart Remphrey
  1 sibling, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Theodore Ts'o @ 2021-12-24  3:48 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Steve Nickolas; +Cc: TUHS main list

On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 05:13:39PM -0500, Steve Nickolas wrote:
> On Thu, 23 Dec 2021, Larry McVoy wrote:
> 
> > On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 10:02:40AM -0600, Warner Losh wrote:
> > > > I had forgotten about control-t - does anything modern still do that
> > > 
> > > FreeBSD does. It's my biggest annoyance with Linux that it doesn't.
> > 
> > Seems like a patch might be nice.
> 
> Yeah, I miss SIGINFO when I'm on Linux.

There have been patches proposed, but it turns out the sticky wicket
is that we're out of signal numbers on most architectures.  There are
code points that potentially could be repurposed, since they aren't
actually signaled from the kernel:

    SIGLOST        -        Term    File lock lost (unused)
    SIGSTKFLT      -        Term    Stack fault on coprocessor (unused)

Howveer, the current behavior if no signal handler is installed is to
terminate the process --- and it's unclear whether there might be some
user space libraries that might be using these signals for their own
nefarious purposes.  So someone would have to deprecate one of these
signals, and then try to do a code search across the internet to see
if there's any evidence that SIGLOST or SIGSTKFLT is being used (at
least in open source software).

It's not impossible to deal with this, but no one has cared enough to
really try to push this through as a new feature.

Cheers,

						- Ted

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 16:28             ` Dr Iain Maoileoin
  2021-12-23 16:35               ` Larry McVoy
  2021-12-23 22:15               ` Steve Nickolas
@ 2021-12-24 20:57               ` Derek Fawcus
  2 siblings, 0 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Derek Fawcus @ 2021-12-24 20:57 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: tuhs

On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 04:28:26PM +0000, Dr Iain Maoileoin wrote:
> 
> 50 years ago our (Scottish) schooling used only Arithmetic for the basic 
> number manipulation.  About 10-15 years ago maffs became the name.  I 
> dont know how the transition occured with us. Schools?  or Media??  
> Perhaps we have just imported the name from the good old US of A ;-)

Or more likely from England?

I can recall my parents and grandparents referring to the "Three R's",
so at some point we would have called it Arithmetic.

I don't recall what we called it in Primary School, when simply doing
addition, subtraction, multiplication, division and handing of fractions
(i.e. rationals) including 'vulgar fractions'.  However once at Middle
School, the lessons were definitly called maths, and covered other fields
(e.g. logariths).

The O-level and A-level papers in High School were all in maths. At
O-level Mathematics, at A-level Pure Mathematics & Applied Mathematics
(the latter at the time with distinct Statistics and/or Mechanics
lessons / papers).  So that is at least the mid 70s.

(For folks outwith the UK, the Scottish and English school systems
 are distict, and always have been)

DF

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-22 15:11 [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
                   ` (2 preceding siblings ...)
  2021-12-23  1:30 ` Adam Sampson
@ 2021-12-25  0:00 ` Mike Markowski
  2021-12-29  2:44   ` Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
  3 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Mike Markowski @ 2021-12-25  0:00 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: TUHS main list

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On Wed, Dec 22, 2021 at 10:12 AM Alexander Jacocks via TUHS <
tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org> wrote:

> ...I’m looking for photographs of university computer labs from 1985 until
> 1995, particularly labs full of unix workstations, of course. Does anyone
> here have photos like that in their collection?...
>

These are from University of Delaware, a little earlier than you hope for
and no workstations, mid to late 1970s:

    https://udel.edu/~mm/udComputers/

Maybe not helpful to you but sharing just in case!
Mike Markowski

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-24  3:48                 ` Theodore Ts'o
@ 2021-12-28 21:45                   ` Greg A. Woods
  2021-12-29 16:58                     ` Theodore Ts'o
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 29+ messages in thread
From: Greg A. Woods @ 2021-12-28 21:45 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: The Unix Heritage Society mailing list

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At Thu, 23 Dec 2021 22:48:30 -0500, "Theodore Ts'o" <tytso@mit.edu> wrote:
Subject: Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
>
> There have been patches proposed, but it turns out the sticky wicket
> is that we're out of signal numbers on most architectures.

Huh.  What an interesting "excuse"!  (Not that I know anything useful
about the implementation in Linux....)

>    There are
> code points that potentially could be repurposed, since they aren't
> actually signaled from the kernel:
>
>     SIGLOST        -        Term    File lock lost (unused)
>     SIGSTKFLT      -        Term    Stack fault on coprocessor (unused)

If SIGLOST were used/needed it would seem like a very bad system design.

> It's not impossible to deal with this, but no one has cared enough to
> really try to push this through as a new feature.

I personally can't stand using Linux, even casually for a very short
sys-admin task, because of this missing feature.  I think I would find
it nearly impossible to go back to SysVr4 without SIGINFO too.  It's
just too damn convenient and useful, especially with ever more tools and
utilities gaining interesting support for it.

--
					Greg A. Woods <gwoods@acm.org>

Kelowna, BC     +1 250 762-7675           RoboHack <woods@robohack.ca>
Planix, Inc. <woods@planix.com>     Avoncote Farms <woods@avoncote.ca>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs
  2021-12-25  0:00 ` [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs Mike Markowski
@ 2021-12-29  2:44   ` Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
  0 siblings, 0 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Alexander Jacocks via TUHS @ 2021-12-29  2:44 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Mike Markowski; +Cc: The Unix Heritage Society

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 848 bytes --]


> On Dec 24, 2021, at 7:00 PM, Mike Markowski <mike.ab3ap@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> On Wed, Dec 22, 2021 at 10:12 AM Alexander Jacocks via TUHS <tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org <mailto:tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org>> wrote:
> ...I’m looking for photographs of university computer labs from 1985 until 1995, particularly labs full of unix workstations, of course. Does anyone here have photos like that in their collection?...
> 
> These are from University of Delaware, a little earlier than you hope for and no workstations, mid to late 1970s:
> 
>     https://udel.edu/~mm/udComputers/ <https://udel.edu/~mm/udComputers/>
> 
> Maybe not helpful to you but sharing just in case!

These are definitely helpful! Thanks so much to you, and to the others who have sent photos.

I’m still interested in more, if anyone else has them to share.

- Alex


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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-28 21:45                   ` Greg A. Woods
@ 2021-12-29 16:58                     ` Theodore Ts'o
  0 siblings, 0 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Theodore Ts'o @ 2021-12-29 16:58 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: COFF

(Moving to COFF, tuhs on bcc.)

On Tue, Dec 28, 2021 at 01:45:14PM -0800, Greg A. Woods wrote:
> > There have been patches proposed, but it turns out the sticky wicket
> > is that we're out of signal numbers on most architectures.
> 
> Huh.  What an interesting "excuse"!  (Not that I know anything useful
> about the implementation in Linux....)

If recall correctly, the last time someone tried to submit patches,
they overloaded some signal that was in use, and it was NACK'ed on
that basis.  I personally didn't care, because on my systems, I'll use
GUI program like xload, or if I need something more detailed, GKrellM.
(And GKreelM can be used to remotely monitor servers as well.)

> >     SIGLOST        -        Term    File lock lost (unused)
> >     SIGSTKFLT      -        Term    Stack fault on coprocessor (unused)
> 
> If SIGLOST were used/needed it would seem like a very bad system design.

It's used in Solaris to report that the client NFSv4 code could not
recover a file lock on recovery.  So that means one of the first
places to look would be to see if Ganesha (an open-source NFSv4
user-space client) isn't using SIGLOST (or might have plans to use
SIGLOST in the feature).

For a remote / distributed file system, Brewer's Theorem applies
---  Consistency, Availability, Partition tolerance --- chose any
two, but you're not always going to be able to get all three.

Cheers,

					- Ted

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

* Re: [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic
  2021-12-23 22:13               ` Steve Nickolas
  2021-12-24  3:48                 ` Theodore Ts'o
@ 2022-01-09 19:04                 ` Stuart Remphrey
  1 sibling, 0 replies; 29+ messages in thread
From: Stuart Remphrey @ 2022-01-09 19:04 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: Steve Nickolas; +Cc: TUHS main list

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 450 bytes --]

On Fri, 24 Dec 2021, 06:14 Steve Nickolas, <usotsuki@buric.co> wrote:

> On Thu, 23 Dec 2021, Larry McVoy wrote:
>
> > On Thu, Dec 23, 2021 at 10:02:40AM -0600, Warner Losh wrote:
> >>> I had forgotten about control-t - does anything modern still do that
> >>
> >> FreeBSD does. It's my biggest annoyance with Linux that it doesn't.
>

Mac OSX also has ^T

> Seems like a patch might be nice.
>
> Yeah, I miss SIGINFO when I'm on Linux.
>

Ditto.

>

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 29+ messages in thread

end of thread, other threads:[~2022-01-09 19:05 UTC | newest]

Thread overview: 29+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed)
-- links below jump to the message on this page --
2021-12-22 15:11 [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
2021-12-22 20:31 ` josh
2021-12-22 21:07   ` Rob Pike
2021-12-22 21:15     ` Rob Pike
2021-12-23  4:28       ` Warren Toomey
2021-12-23  4:31         ` Alexander Jacocks via TUHS
2021-12-23  4:45         ` Rob Pike
2021-12-22 21:14 ` Win Treese
2021-12-23  0:48   ` Adam Thornton
2021-12-23  1:30 ` Adam Sampson
2021-12-23  2:18   ` Larry McVoy
2021-12-23 13:05     ` Michael Kjörling
2021-12-23 14:19       ` Larry McVoy
2021-12-23 15:29         ` [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs - now off topic Dr Iain Maoileoin
2021-12-23 16:00           ` Larry McVoy
2021-12-23 16:28             ` Dr Iain Maoileoin
2021-12-23 16:35               ` Larry McVoy
2021-12-23 16:47                 ` Dr Iain Maoileoin
2021-12-23 22:15               ` Steve Nickolas
2021-12-24 20:57               ` Derek Fawcus
2021-12-23 16:02           ` Warner Losh
2021-12-23 16:19             ` Larry McVoy
2021-12-23 22:13               ` Steve Nickolas
2021-12-24  3:48                 ` Theodore Ts'o
2021-12-28 21:45                   ` Greg A. Woods
2021-12-29 16:58                     ` Theodore Ts'o
2022-01-09 19:04                 ` Stuart Remphrey
2021-12-25  0:00 ` [TUHS] Photos of University Computer Labs Mike Markowski
2021-12-29  2:44   ` Alexander Jacocks via TUHS

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