> On Nov 4, 2025, at 12:24 PM, Paul Koning via cctalk <[email protected]>
> wrote:
>
> I was just looking at some Friden Flexowriter documentation, specifically the
> later 2300 series. They look somewhat more modern than the well known
> Flexowriters but seem to be comparable otherwise. I remember seeing a mix in
> the TU Eindhoven computer center, around 1970.
>
> The documentation mentions an optional feature, the ability to read and punch
> "edge punched cards". Those look like conventional Hollerith cards, but
> instead of the 12 row punching with rectangular holes, they are punched along
> the bottom edge in exactly the same manner as an 8 channel punched tape. In
> other words, imagine running a blank card through the tape path of a paper
> tape punch, and that's what you would see.
>
> I never ran into this before. Has anyone ever seen these in the wild?
>
> Paul
At least one of my Flexowriters was set up this way, though I never used it as
such. I think it was much more popular on the Friden-built accounting machines
that used a Flexo for the console. It’s been a few years, but I remember a film
in the public domain showing this setup in use for department store inventory
management; the edge card was perf’d and separated after punching. The punched
section was attached to the garment and an inventory copy was made on the aux
punch for the master file at time of origination. Then at time of sale, a
portion of that tag was removed by the cashier and used to reconcile the
inventory at COB. -C
