another true story. IBM really knows emulation. At E.I. Dupont, where as
a teenager I was a computer operator, we had (as of 1975) the last
vacuum tube computer in the US. It was a 705 (NOT 704). It ran payroll.
Oops, vacuum tubes were getting hard to get. So Dupont got a 7080 (NOT
7090). It emulated a 705.
Oops, 7080 was expensive to maintain. So Dupont got a 360, emulates
7080, emulating 705.
Oh, heck, 360 went off support. So, on our 370/158, we emulated 360,
emulating 7080, emulating 705. This was really emulation! virtual card
punches, virtual card readers!
Then they rewrote the payroll system to run native. "I'm sure there are
some bugs in there, but I can't find them," the programmer told me, on
saturday at about 2 am. "We're going live next week".
2 weeks later, all us weekend dudes got a 4x-larger paycheck than we
were supposed to.
Geez, I hope nobody from Dupont comes after me for telling this story!
ron
