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>> So the concept of a filesystem storing named files already existed at
>> this time?
>
> Generally, yes. But you usually wound up pre-allocating files, and they
> were contiguous on disk.
OK.
Files only on disk? Or on tape too? (From what I've seen, punch cards
didn't have this level of abstraction. It wouldn't be terribly necessary
I guess...)
>> Interesting. So the system actually "knows" where each field of a
>> record is then?
>
> Records were fixed size, so it was trivial to calculate.
OK. But does the system know where the *fields* in a record are? Or just
what size the records are?
>> Really? I didn't think anybody had mainframes any more... just big
>> server farms.
>
> The people who want to do lots of I/O have machines where instead of
> GPUs they have IOPs. A 800,000 line phone switch, for example, is
> pretty much all IOP, with something like a 68000 running the actual
> switching part.
>
> Of course, what one might call a "PC" nowadays has a terabyte of RAM and
> 96 quad-core processor chips, so the lines blur.
Yeah, I think the term "mainframe" is probably obsolete now. There are
probably more exact ways to describe what type of computer you mean.
--
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*
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