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From: amigo2@ihuxq.UUCP (John Hobson)
Newsgroups: net.misc
Subject: Re: Nearly Prehistoric Computers
Message-ID: <584@ihuxq.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 2-Feb-84 16:45:32 EST
Article-I.D.: ihuxq.584
Posted: Thu Feb  2 16:45:32 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 8-Feb-84 01:37:34 EST
References: <588@seismo.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Naperville, IL
Lines: 20

I wrote my very first program in September, 1966 at Stevens
Institute of Technology (Hoboken, NJ) in a restricted version of
FORTRAN II called FORGO (leading to obvious jokes about how one
would gladly forgo fortran) to run on a machine called an IBM 1620. 
This fully transisterized computer had, as I recall, about 4K of
memory, card input and output (you took the cards to an accounting
machine nearby--plugboard programming--to get a listing) and did
arithmetic by table look-up.  

I once had a program overflow memory, so I took it to the main
computer, which was a UNIVAC 1105.  The 1105 was a vacuum tube
monster that ran hot, slow, and about 5-10% of the time would just
lose your program somewhere.  When they replaced the 1105 with an
IBM 360, they quite literally couldn't give the 1105 away.

				John Hobson
				AT&T Bell Labs
				Naperville, IL
				(312) 979-0193
				ihnp4!ihuxq!amigo2