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On 28/10/2015 07:04 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Wed, 28 Oct 2015 18:17:38 +0000, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
>> HTTP 418: I'm a teapot.
>> Seriously. There is a defined HTTP status code for interacting with an
>> IoT teapot.
>
> It's funny, yeah - but the history of that error code isn't really IoT,
> more like RFC 1149. 418 was defined in the HTCPCP/1.0 protcool, defined
> in the referenced RFC as an April Fool's day joke in 1998.
>
> It's a fun read. (Did I mention that I work with a product that secures
> websites, and HTTP geek stuff is what I currently work with daily? ;) )
Wasn't the world's first "webcam" a camera in some university ward so
they could watch the coffee pot?
>>> The idea of on-demand programming was something I was first introduced
>>> to by someone who worked at NBC back in the mid 90's as well. He
>>> described pretty much what we see now with Netflix and other
>>> streaming/on-demand video services.
>>
>> Some day, maybe I'll try that.
>
> Definitely worth it, IMHO.
Even for somebody who doesn't watch TV?
>> (I'm still puzzled as to why YouTube can actually exist. But that's
>> another story.)
>
> People want to publish videos. Youtube gives them a platform to do that.
>
> And gives Google another platform to push advertising on.
>
> It's about that simple, really. :)
No, I mean... why is it possible for one company to ever buy enough
harddisks to store even 0.01% of the data that YouTube holds? It seems
like there shouldn't be enough mass storage devices on Earth to hold
this much data...
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On 28/10/2015 06:51 PM, Stephen wrote:
> On 10/28/2015 6:08 PM, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
>
>>
>> I often wonder... like, how much did [famous obsolete computer] actually
>> cost? What did it physically look like? What were its technical
>> capabilities? It's very hard to gather a general overview of this type
>> of data.
>>
> PDP-8 1965 $18,500 12 ~50,000 The smallest and least expensive PDP
Interesting. Now how about the Cray 2, the VAX, UNIAC and all the other
legendary systems?
To be clear, I'm sure all the data is out there. It's just rather a lot
of effort to collate it all into a short summary.
>> PostScript. And it wasn't *once*. ;-)
Did I tell you about the time I wrote a text to PostScript converter as
an MS-DOS batch script?
Actually, the script just concatenates the text file with some
hand-written PostScript code; the text file itself becomes a giant text
string in a PostScript program. The program itself is a semi-complete
formatting engine, which adds a filename, page number and date of
printing to each page, and scans the characters looking for line breaks.
It even line-wraps the text and adds little arrows when it does so. (I
think there *might* be a bug if it line-wraps on the last line on a page
though...)
Damn, my talents are completely unappreciated! :-(
>> Actually, I did start trying to write a PostScript *interpreter*, to
>> make debugging this stuff easier! It turns out the language has a lot
>> more edge-cases than you'd think though...
>
> One edge-case is more than I ken.
> I would ask what an edge-case is but then you would say that I can't
> Google. :-)
It's simple. An edge-case is where a function is supposed to do XYZ,
*except* in this one really obscure case where if A, B and C happen
simultaneously, it does something totally different. Like when you
configure how many pages you want to print, but if you put in -1 it
prints *all* the pages. Not -1 pages.
PostScript does some slightly strange things with token parsing. You can
take a text string and ask the PostScript interpreter to parse out the
first token, giving you back the token and the remainder of the string.
But the specification gives some really inconsistent rules for whether
it should or shouldn't skip spaces...
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On Wed, 28 Oct 2015 21:27:17 +0000, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
> Wasn't the world's first "webcam" a camera in some university ward so
> they could watch the coffee pot?
That sounds familiar. Whether it's true or not, though, I've no idea
offhand.
>> Definitely worth it, IMHO.
>
> Even for somebody who doesn't watch TV?
Do you watch movies? I hear they have those available as well. ;)
>>> (I'm still puzzled as to why YouTube can actually exist. But that's
>>> another story.)
>>
>> People want to publish videos. Youtube gives them a platform to do
>> that.
>>
>> And gives Google another platform to push advertising on.
>>
>> It's about that simple, really. :)
>
> No, I mean... why is it possible for one company to ever buy enough
> harddisks to store even 0.01% of the data that YouTube holds? It seems
> like there shouldn't be enough mass storage devices on Earth to hold
> this much data...
And yet there are, so maybe you're not aware either of the totality of
mass storage available in the world, or the way in which the content is
stored in order to account for the amount of data involved.
But that's just a guess. ;)
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On 10/28/2015 8:13 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Wed, 28 Oct 2015 19:43:08 +0000, Stephen wrote:
>
>>> Only if it's good. Then again, you said "musak", so it probably isn't.
>>> :P
>>>
>>>
>> Elevator music is another name for musak. Which is often heard when on
>> hold. Or in a hotel foyer.
>
> So "elevator musak" is redundant. ;)
>
No it is an emphasiser like saying hot hot.
>> More a walkie talkie than a phone that everyone uses. I think.
>
> Well, from a design standpoint, though, that's what inspired Motorola, I
> hear.
>
Yes yes.
>>>> I was talking about Edinburgh Rock. The best thing to come out of
>>>> Edinburgh, the road to Glasgow, excluded. ;-)
>>>
>>> I'll have to remember that one the next time I'm talking with friends
>>> who live in Scotland. Especially the ones who live in Edinburgh. ;)
>>>
>>>
>> It is a steal from Dr Johnson.
>
> Oh, sure, try and defer the credit. ;)
>
Just trying to save you embarrassment. The phrase is very well known, by
the educated. :P
--
Regards
Stephen
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On 10/28/2015 9:34 PM, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
> On 28/10/2015 06:51 PM, Stephen wrote:
>
> Interesting. Now how about the Cray 2, the VAX, UNIAC and all the other
> legendary systems?
>
What did your last slave die of?
> To be clear, I'm sure all the data is out there. It's just rather a lot
> of effort to collate it all into a short summary.
>
Dinkums! Too important to do a bit of work, are we? :P
>>> PostScript. And it wasn't *once*. ;-)
>
> Did I tell you about the time I wrote a text to PostScript converter as
> an MS-DOS batch script?
>
No but I am sure you will. ;)
> Actually, the script just concatenates the text file with some
> hand-written PostScript code; the text file itself becomes a giant text
> string in a PostScript program. The program itself is a semi-complete
> formatting engine, which adds a filename, page number and date of
> printing to each page, and scans the characters looking for line breaks.
> It even line-wraps the text and adds little arrows when it does so. (I
> think there *might* be a bug if it line-wraps on the last line on a page
> though...)
>
> Damn, my talents are completely unappreciated! :-(
>
Not completely, I'm sure.
Your mother loves you and your boss hasn't sacked you. :)
>>> Actually, I did start trying to write a PostScript *interpreter*, to
>>> make debugging this stuff easier! It turns out the language has a lot
>>> more edge-cases than you'd think though...
>>
>> One edge-case is more than I ken.
>> I would ask what an edge-case is but then you would say that I can't
>> Google. :-)
>
> It's simple. An edge-case is where a function is supposed to do XYZ,
> *except* in this one really obscure case where if A, B and C happen
> simultaneously, it does something totally different.
Are you sure about that?
Do all the cases (A,B & C) have to happen simultaneously?
My reading is when one of them is on the edge of the design parameters.
Like when you
> configure how many pages you want to print, but if you put in -1 it
> prints *all* the pages. Not -1 pages.
>
> PostScript does some slightly strange things with token parsing. You can
> take a text string and ask the PostScript interpreter to parse out the
> first token, giving you back the token and the remainder of the string.
> But the specification gives some really inconsistent rules for whether
> it should or shouldn't skip spaces...
Hit it with a shifting spanner then.
I can't stand uppity software. ;)
--
Regards
Stephen
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On Wed, 28 Oct 2015 21:52:48 +0000, Stephen wrote:
>>> Elevator music is another name for musak. Which is often heard when on
>>> hold. Or in a hotel foyer.
>>
>> So "elevator musak" is redundant. ;)
>>
> No it is an emphasiser like saying hot hot.
If you say so - it sounds more like "PIN Number" or "ATM Machine" to
me. ;)
>>>>> I was talking about Edinburgh Rock. The best thing to come out of
>>>>> Edinburgh, the road to Glasgow, excluded. ;-)
>>>>
>>>> I'll have to remember that one the next time I'm talking with friends
>>>> who live in Scotland. Especially the ones who live in Edinburgh. ;)
>>>>
>>>>
>>> It is a steal from Dr Johnson.
>>
>> Oh, sure, try and defer the credit. ;)
>>
>>
> Just trying to save you embarrassment. The phrase is very well known, by
> the educated. :P
Oooh, them's fightin' words! ;)
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On 10/28/2015 10:26 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Wed, 28 Oct 2015 21:52:48 +0000, Stephen wrote:
>
>>>> Elevator music is another name for musak. Which is often heard when on
>>>> hold. Or in a hotel foyer.
>>>
>>> So "elevator musak" is redundant. ;)
>>>
>> No it is an emphasiser like saying hot hot.
>
> If you say so - it sounds more like "PIN Number" or "ATM Machine" to
> me. ;)
>
Quite right. But the question, now is: Why did he do it?
Elevator Musak is not in common usage. I made it up especially for you.
>>>>>> I was talking about Edinburgh Rock. The best thing to come out of
>>>>>> Edinburgh, the road to Glasgow, excluded. ;-)
>>>>>
>>>>> I'll have to remember that one the next time I'm talking with friends
>>>>> who live in Scotland. Especially the ones who live in Edinburgh. ;)
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> It is a steal from Dr Johnson.
>>>
>>> Oh, sure, try and defer the credit. ;)
>>>
>>>
>> Just trying to save you embarrassment. The phrase is very well known, by
>> the educated. :P
>
> Oooh, them's fightin' words! ;)
>
Only amongst people who are not friends.
--
Regards
Stephen
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On Wed, 28 Oct 2015 22:44:47 +0000, Stephen wrote:
>>>> So "elevator musak" is redundant. ;)
>>>>
>>> No it is an emphasiser like saying hot hot.
>>
>> If you say so - it sounds more like "PIN Number" or "ATM Machine" to
>> me. ;)
>>
> Quite right. But the question, now is: Why did he do it?
> Elevator Musak is not in common usage. I made it up especially for you.
So many questions. I think you did it for the points. ;)
>>> Just trying to save you embarrassment. The phrase is very well known,
>>> by the educated. :P
>>
>> Oooh, them's fightin' words! ;)
>>
>>
> Only amongst people who are not friends.
;)
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On 10/28/2015 11:25 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> So many questions.
Are we there yet?
> I think you did it for the points.;)
And points mean...?
--
Regards
Stephen
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On 26/10/2015 07:01 PM, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
> Don't get me wrong, I think it's *way* easier to learn system-level
> programming on obsolete hardware. (It's how *I* did it!) But I doubt
> many kids these days would get out of bed to see some blocky 8-bit
> graphics.
https://hackaday.com/2015/10/19/diy-computer-1968-style/
"You can argue that times change and that the paperclip computer is a
relic. Maybe. But I can’t help think if you built one of
these–especially as a kid–you’d get a lot more insight into how a
computer actually works than by only slinging some Javascript, or
setting up a Web server on a Raspberry Pi."
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> On the Pi, until you poke the GPU, the CPU isn't even *turned on*...
Did you look here:
https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/projects/raspberrypi/tutorials/os/index.html
The benefit of the pi over IBM-compatible is that (IMHO) the assembler
is much easier to learn and use.
I think if children could see their simple first creations running on
their smartphone or tablet that would encourage them a lot. However you
need a massive chunk of experience and knowledge to even *install* the
Android SDK, let alone start writing a new app.
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On Thu, 29 Oct 2015 06:35:54 +0000, Stephen wrote:
> On 10/28/2015 11:25 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> So many questions.
>
> Are we there yet?
On first. :)
>> I think you did it for the points.;)
>
> And points mean...?
Junctions on railroad lines, naturally. ;)
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On 10/29/2015 5:15 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> And points mean...?
> Junctions on railroad lines, naturally.;)
Oh! I thought it was 1⁄72 of an inch.
Thanks for that. :-P
--
Regards
Stephen
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On 29/10/2015 11:37 AM, scott wrote:
> The benefit of the pi over IBM-compatible is that (IMHO) the assembler
> is much easier to learn and use.
Yeah, I haven't done a lot with x86 assembly, but with 40 years of
backwards-compatibility, it's pretty complicated. And ugly to start
with, it seems! (Well, it was originally designed for low-cost pocket
calculators, not supercomputers!)
I often wished more stuff could be like the Motorola 68000. That seemed
like a really nice architecture to work with.
> I think if children could see their simple first creations running on
> their smartphone or tablet that would encourage them a lot.
Agree.
> However you
> need a massive chunk of experience and knowledge to even *install* the
> Android SDK, let alone start writing a new app.
Also agree!
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On Thu, 29 Oct 2015 18:50:51 +0000, Stephen wrote:
> On 10/29/2015 5:15 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>>> And points mean...?
>> Junctions on railroad lines, naturally.;)
>
> Oh! I thought it was 1⁄72 of an inch. Thanks for that. :-P
Always glad to be of service. :)
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On 10/30/2015 12:05 AM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> Always glad to be of service.:)
:-)
--
Regards
Stephen
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> Yeah, I haven't done a lot with x86 assembly, but with 40 years of
> backwards-compatibility, it's pretty complicated. And ugly to start
> with, it seems! (Well, it was originally designed for low-cost pocket
> calculators, not supercomputers!)
You could probably explain the vast majority of ARM assembler in a
single newsgroup post. The syntax is very simple, and the mnemonics are
mostly obvious or very easy to remember. You're free to use any register
for source or either of the destinations, and all registers are the same
bit-width.
>> However you
>> need a massive chunk of experience and knowledge to even *install* the
>> Android SDK, let alone start writing a new app.
>
> Also agree!
Someone needs to write a wrapper to go on top of the Android SDK that is
a) easy to install and b) uses an easy language that allows you to just
start writing commands to draw stuff without tons of boiler-plate code.
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On 30/10/2015 08:48 AM, scott wrote:
>> Yeah, I haven't done a lot with x86 assembly, but with 40 years of
>> backwards-compatibility, it's pretty complicated. And ugly to start
>> with, it seems! (Well, it was originally designed for low-cost pocket
>> calculators, not supercomputers!)
>
> You could probably explain the vast majority of ARM assembler in a
> single newsgroup post. The syntax is very simple, and the mnemonics are
> mostly obvious or very easy to remember. You're free to use any register
> for source or either of the destinations, and all registers are the same
> bit-width.
The M68k has 8 "data registers" and 8 "address registers", which you can
freely use for any purpose (although the address registers are somewhat
optimised for holding addresses).
x86 has... what... FOUR main registers? And the FPU register stack...
which is also the MMX registers... but then a separate set of XMM
registers added for the SSE instruction set?... but then SSE2 made them
wider, so there's XMMX... WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?!?!
I gather ARM is quite a popular architecture. I don't know whether
that's because there's readily available chips and IP-cores, because
it's low-power, or because it's really easy to program...
> Someone needs to write a wrapper to go on top of the Android SDK that is
> a) easy to install and b) uses an easy language that allows you to just
> start writing commands to draw stuff without tons of boiler-plate code.
Meh. Just use Haskell. ;-)
(Seriously, people occasionally ask about cross-compiling to ARM. I
can't think of any other reason why somebody would do that. Apparently
it even *works*, vaguely...)
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> x86 has... what... FOUR main registers? And the FPU register stack...
> which is also the MMX registers... but then a separate set of XMM
> registers added for the SSE instruction set?... but then SSE2 made them
> wider, so there's XMMX... WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?!?!
Backwards compatibility is what's going on.
> I gather ARM is quite a popular architecture. I don't know whether
> that's because there's readily available chips and IP-cores, because
> it's low-power, or because it's really easy to program...
Low power.
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On 02/11/2015 08:25 AM, scott wrote:
>> x86 has... what... FOUR main registers? And the FPU register stack...
>> which is also the MMX registers... but then a separate set of XMM
>> registers added for the SSE instruction set?... but then SSE2 made them
>> wider, so there's XMMX... WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?!?!
>
> Backwards compatibility is what's going on.
The root of all evil, right there.
But hey, Intel invented the Itanium to get away from all that... and
nobody bought it.
>> I gather ARM is quite a popular architecture. I don't know whether
>> that's because there's readily available chips and IP-cores, because
>> it's low-power, or because it's really easy to program...
>
> Low power.
Why is that? It is because there's something particular about this
instruction set which makes it especially suitable for low power? Or is
it merely that a lot of people have spent R&D on making low-power
implementations of it?
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>>> I gather ARM is quite a popular architecture. I don't know whether
>>> that's because there's readily available chips and IP-cores, because
>>> it's low-power, or because it's really easy to program...
>>
>> Low power.
>
> Why is that? It is because there's something particular about this
> instruction set which makes it especially suitable for low power? Or is
> it merely that a lot of people have spent R&D on making low-power
> implementations of it?
The former I would guess, as even the first versions used in the Acorn
desktop machines were very low power when they probably didn't have any
budget, time or real incentive to reduce it. I'm sure since then though
there has been huge pressure and R&D expenditure to reduce it further.
This list is quite interesting:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transistor_count
At each point in time the ARM CPU seems to have about 10x fewer
transistors than its x86 equivalent. As a very rough I guess I'd say
that means it used 10x less power. In thermal terms that is probably
enough to make the difference between needing a heatsink and fan and
working with just the bare chip.
What's also interesting is that the ARM2 had 25k transistors, yet
further down the page it claims 21k transistors are needed for a 32-bit
multiplier. Figure that one out. I think the answer is that on the ARM2
the MUL instruction was the only one (apart from the load/store multiple
register instruction) that took more than one clock cycle. As such it
probably used a much smaller circuit to do it in chunks.
It also interesting to note that even on the earliest cores you could do
an arbitrary bit-shift for free with every instruction on one of the
source registers. So if you wanted to multiply by 320 (commonly needed
in graphics algorithms of the day) you could do it with a single move
and add instruction:
result = y << 8
result = result + y << 6
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On Mon, 02 Nov 2015 13:01:37 +0000, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
> But hey, Intel invented the Itanium to get away from all that... and
> nobody bought it.
Heh, yeah, it turns out that people want to be able to use the software
they've purchased.
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On 02/11/2015 05:16 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Mon, 02 Nov 2015 13:01:37 +0000, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
>
>> But hey, Intel invented the Itanium to get away from all that... and
>> nobody bought it.
>
> Heh, yeah, it turns out that people want to be able to use the software
> they've purchased.
But all you need to do is run the source code through the other compiler...
...oh, wait. Somebody in marketing just realised we can charge the
customer money to buy the software again. *sigh*
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On Mon, 02 Nov 2015 18:09:37 +0000, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
> On 02/11/2015 05:16 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> On Mon, 02 Nov 2015 13:01:37 +0000, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
>>
>>> But hey, Intel invented the Itanium to get away from all that... and
>>> nobody bought it.
>>
>> Heh, yeah, it turns out that people want to be able to use the software
>> they've purchased.
>
> But all you need to do is run the source code through the other
> compiler...
>
> ...oh, wait. Somebody in marketing just realised we can charge the
> customer money to buy the software again. *sigh*
Like most software companies do.
And most software that people purchase doesn't come with source code.
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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•On Tue, 27 Oct 2015 00:43:59 +0200, Orchid Win7 v1 <voi### [at] dev nu
ll> wrote:
> On 26/10/2015 09:06 PM, Le_Forgeron wrote:
>> Only 2 colours per 8x8 pixels was the main drawback of the display.
>
> Oh yeah... I forgot about that! One time I wrote a program to draw
> randomly positioned circles in random colours. After a few minutes of
> drawing, most of the pixels were in the "on" state, but there were wei
rd
> squares of colour that changed every time a new circle was started.
>
> I also remember saving several test patterns to tape, and eventually
> discovering which colour provoked which tone from the speaker... Jesus
,
> I was bored as a child!
>
> I've always wanted to know... why is the framebuffer arranged so
> weirdly? Like, as you load a picture file, rather than filling from to
p
> to bottom, it seems to fill every Nth line...
I remember
•Upgrading my 16K to a 48K
•Doing string-art type designs just to see the interesting desig
ns that
aliasing resulted in.
•Designing my own fonts.
•Printing a school project on thermal paper. Bad idea.
•Making a 3d wireframe modeler that could only take 100 edges. T
he
wireframe "render" could then further be coloured and textured with my
custom paint program. Since I didn't have a joystick, I controlled the
brush with 2 different systems: Angular (L & R arrows altered the angle
of
movement) an Normal.
•Dumping my Speccy in the bin because it died and you couldn't g
et parts
anymore.
Now if I could just find the time to learn proper programming and contin
ue
the 3d project on my pc.
--
-Nekar Xenos-
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