On Sun, 2026-03-01 at 14:18 -0600, Steve Lewis via cctalk wrote:
> I've seen OS's loaded from vinyl records and reel-to-reel, just never
> imaged one being loaded from any kind of paper. :)

IMSAI and ALTAIR S-100 computer enthusiasts loaded code from audio tape
in "Kansas City" format. Computer magazines published programs in bar
code that you could scan into your computer with a light-pen bar-code
reader and a ruler.

> But as far as I can
> tell, CTSS and Atlas Supervisor were probably "single digit
> installations".  The first widely-deployed OS possibly was possibly
> CDC's
> scope (meaning, more than a few hundred installations).  Even MULTICS
> had a
> fairly limited install base (as far as I can determine).

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