[dba-Tech] What got you interested in technology?IT'srichandfamous share their memories

Jim Lawrence accessd at shaw.ca
Sun Nov 20 12:34:26 CST 2011


Wow, that is cheap... a basement room with a bathroom rents $750 here.

Only worked on punch cards for a two-month period...it was hell but I did
discover that holes could be re-filled using wood-glue very effectively.
Then a terminal version appeared and people would wait in a line up for 2 or
3 hours just to key in a 50 line piece of code or wait outside the office
from 5 AM in the morning and the old key-punch would sit idle waiting for
the few that could actually type, mostly women...typing fast with two to
four fingers doesn't count. (That was one of the perks of my wife...she
could actually keyboard!!)

The college had to have a monitors constantly on site to break up fights and
stop people hogging the terminal and finally they opened the office 24x7. It
was the one place on campus that was always open and busy. The next year a
dozen terminals were brought in.

Jim

-----Original Message-----
From: dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
[mailto:dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Rocky Smolin
Sent: Saturday, November 19, 2011 10:05 AM
To: 'Discussion of Hardware and Software issues'
Subject: Re: [dba-Tech] What got you interested in
technology?IT'srichandfamous share their memories

Well, actually about $240 today.  Still if you could sell a couple of dozen
a semester that would cover a multitude of sins.

Editor?  Hahahahahah...punched cards.  No monitors, no word processors.
Just cards. Well, actually about $2140

You might write out your program by hand to start with - get an idea of how
you want it to look.  Then, once the first draft was on the cards, you could
print the cards and use the listing to mark up.  

-----Original Message-----
From: dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
[mailto:dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Jim Lawrence
Sent: Saturday, November 19, 2011 9:42 AM
To: 'Discussion of Hardware and Software issues'
Subject: Re: [dba-Tech] What got you interested in
technology?IT'srichandfamous share their memories

I love that story... you were on the way to becoming the next Zuckerberg.

So what editor did you use? Some one line thing?

The price is relative...$40 then is equal to $750 today.

Trust me, you will never quit working, in theory I have retired but for the
last month and a half, 16 hour days...but with the appropriate naps of
course, after all I am not 19 anymore.
  
Jim
Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com




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