Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Chuck Guzis via cctalk]

On 09/08/2018 03:57 PM, Warner Losh wrote:

> My first TTY was the DECwriter II. My first terminal was a Beehive
> BH100. I hacked together some TECO to support it on a local
> vi/emacs/EDT-like visual mode editor... IIRC, the escape sequences were
> put into specific numbered registers as TECO macros. A poor man's curses
> in the mid 70's I thought it was super cool until I discovered emacs
> at school on our 11/750...
>

Before I got real disks on my MITS box, I used a Techtran dual-deck
paper tape simulator as storage (one deck read-only, the other
read/write and block searchable) and the Beehive as a rudimentary word
processor.  Read up a page, edit offline, and then hit "Transmit".

Early CPT word processors worked in a similar manner.

IIRC, the Super Bee used an 8008 and a whole mess of shift registers for
storage.

--Chuck

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Warner Losh via cctalk]

On Sat, Sep 8, 2018, 12:06 PM Chuck Guzis via cctalk 
wrote:

> On 09/08/2018 10:07 AM, John Many Jars via cctalk wrote:
> > I miss my old Televideo 910.  I wonder if Steve Albany stole it?
> >
> > At ASU, when I was a kid pulling DECwriter printers out the bin to check
> > for printouts in half-duplex, they had something called an Infoton.  It
> was
> > uppercase only and had the worst keyboard, ever.  It felt like typing on
> a
> > wet sponge.
>
> Heck, I miss my Beehive Super Bees.
>

My first TTY was the DECwriter II. My first terminal was a Beehive BH100. I
hacked together some TECO to support it on a local vi/emacs/EDT-like visual
mode editor... IIRC, the escape sequences were put into specific numbered
registers as TECO macros. A poor man's curses in the mid 70's I thought
it was super cool until I discovered emacs at school on our 11/750...

Warner

>

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Chuck Guzis via cctalk]

On 09/08/2018 10:07 AM, John Many Jars via cctalk wrote:
> I miss my old Televideo 910.  I wonder if Steve Albany stole it?
> 
> At ASU, when I was a kid pulling DECwriter printers out the bin to check
> for printouts in half-duplex, they had something called an Infoton.  It was
> uppercase only and had the worst keyboard, ever.  It felt like typing on a
> wet sponge.

Heck, I miss my Beehive Super Bees.

--Chuck

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Ed Sharpe via cctalk]

Infotrons!   and the old  UPPER  CASE ONLY  BEEHIVES!


I  remember those and also  the old  TEC terminals
 
A recent  TEC   endowment to the museum was  of all these multi colored  books  
TEC  put out on all their  terminal lines.   I need  to see   where  they  may 
already  be  scanned.. in   not  can  go on the someday to be scanned   stack.
 
checking bitsavers http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/tec/   I  see  there are    
some  listed so maybe  not all that  unusual...  will see  what   we have  they 
  don't.
 
We  had a  TEC  terminal  in the  computer  room  at  Computer Exchange at  one 
 time wish I had  kept it.
 
there   is  one  model upper  case beehive  I  need  for a   display if anyone  
still has  some   drop me  a  line email offlist  thx  ed#  www.smecc.org
 
In a message dated 9/8/2018 10:07:26 AM US Mountain Standard Time, 
cctalk@classiccmp.org writes:

 
I miss my old Televideo 910. I wonder if Steve Albany stole it?


At ASU, when I was a kid pulling DECwriter printers out the bin to check
for printouts in half-duplex, they had something called an Infoton. It was
uppercase only and had the worst keyboard, ever. It felt like typing on a
wet sponge.

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[John Many Jars via cctalk]

I miss my old Televideo 910.  I wonder if Steve Albany stole it?

At ASU, when I was a kid pulling DECwriter printers out the bin to check
for printouts in half-duplex, they had something called an Infoton.  It was
uppercase only and had the worst keyboard, ever.  It felt like typing on a
wet sponge.

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Liam Proven via cctalk]

On Fri, 7 Sep 2018 at 21:08, Al Kossow via cctalk  wrote:
>
> I just put up some pictures of the vt02, 05, 20, and 71t
> under http://bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal

Oddly, since others are commenting, this whole site is inaccessible
for me in Prague, both yesterday and today.

«
This site can’t be reached

bitsavers.org took too long to respond.

Search Google for bitsavers org pdf dec terminal

ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT
»

I wanna see the piccies! :'(


-- 
Liam Proven - Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk - Google Mail/Hangouts/Plus: lpro...@gmail.com
Twitter/Facebook/Flickr: lproven - Skype/LinkedIn: liamproven
UK: +44 7939-087884 - ČR (+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal): +420 702 829 053

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Ed Sharpe via cctalk]

had a  tectronix   terminal like this  also  had a  slide out  drawer  with 
many  small gold  plated  cards  looked  like the  earliest    tecx  made  
terminal  for graphics I had  ever  seen.   was  heavy  very heavy and very 
long  with  I still had  it...  it  was   back in the mid  80s  I  sold  it.

 
ed #  
 
 
In a message dated 9/7/2018 6:52:54 PM US Mountain Standard Time, 
cctalk@classiccmp.org writes:

 
On 09/07/2018 02:55 PM, Mark J. Blair via cctalk wrote:

> That’s it! The terminal I had was definitely the one in this picture:
>
> http://bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal/vt02/vt02_1.jpg
>
>
The display is actually a Tektronix 611 direct-view storage 
tube.

Jon

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Jon Elson via cctalk]

On 09/07/2018 02:55 PM, Mark J. Blair via cctalk wrote:

That’s it! The terminal I had was definitely the one in this picture:

http://bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal/vt02/vt02_1.jpg


The display is actually a Tektronix 611 direct-view storage 
tube.


Jon

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Guy Sotomayor Jr via cctalk]

> On Sep 7, 2018, at 4:35 PM, Warner Losh  wrote:
> 
> 
> 
> On Fri, Sep 7, 2018 at 5:33 PM Guy Sotomayor Jr via cctalk 
> mailto:cctalk@classiccmp.org>> wrote:
> I also looked at the keyboards on my Symbolics machines, and where I’d like 
> to have the control key is the “rubout” key.  But given that there are no 
> fewer than 5 “shift” keys on the Symbolics keyboard (hyper, super, meta, 
> control, shift…I can’t recall at the moment if symbol is also a “shift” key), 
> it makes a bit of sense to have them all near each other.  ;-)
> 
> I think you forgot the "coke bottle" key :)
> 
> http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/S/space-cadet-keyboard.html 
> 

Yea, I don’t have a space cadet keyboard.  I have new and old Symbolics 
keyboards.  The “new” one is the one pictured on the referenced link.

TTFN - Guy

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Warner Losh via cctalk]

On Fri, Sep 7, 2018 at 5:33 PM Guy Sotomayor Jr via cctalk <
cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote:

> I also looked at the keyboards on my Symbolics machines, and where I’d
> like to have the control key is the “rubout” key.  But given that there are
> no fewer than 5 “shift” keys on the Symbolics keyboard (hyper, super, meta,
> control, shift…I can’t recall at the moment if symbol is also a “shift”
> key), it makes a bit of sense to have them all near each other.  ;-)
>

I think you forgot the "coke bottle" key :)

http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/S/space-cadet-keyboard.html

Warner

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Guy Sotomayor Jr via cctalk]

> On Sep 7, 2018, at 4:15 PM, Frank McConnell via cctalk 
>  wrote:
> 
> On Sep 7, 2018, at 12:00, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote:
>> interesting.. the vt71t has inverted-T cursor keys
> 
> And CAPS LOCK in the home row to the left of the A key.  The VT220 made it 
> w-i-d-e.  Can we now fix the blame for the two of the three worst ideas in 
> computer keyboard design on d|i|g|i|t|a|l?  (#3 would be sending CONTROL to 
> live in the spacebar row and I think maybe we need to blame IBM for that.)
> 

No, there were terminals that had a (small) control key down near the space bar 
long before IBM did it with the PC.  I can’t recall which at the moment (but I 
recall having to deal with them in the mid-to-late 70’s).

I also looked at the keyboards on my Symbolics machines, and where I’d like to 
have the control key is the “rubout” key.  But given that there are no fewer 
than 5 “shift” keys on the Symbolics keyboard (hyper, super, meta, control, 
shift…I can’t recall at the moment if symbol is also a “shift” key), it makes a 
bit of sense to have them all near each other.  ;-)

TTFN - Guy

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Warner Losh via cctalk]

On Fri, Sep 7, 2018 at 5:16 PM Frank McConnell via cctalk <
cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote:

> On Sep 7, 2018, at 12:00, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote:
> > interesting.. the vt71t has inverted-T cursor keys
>
> And CAPS LOCK in the home row to the left of the A key.  The VT220 made it
> w-i-d-e.  Can we now fix the blame for the two of the three worst ideas in
> computer keyboard design on d|i|g|i|t|a|l?  (#3 would be sending CONTROL to
> live in the spacebar row and I think maybe we need to blame IBM for that.)
>

Yes. I had an old DEC Rainbow... For years I used it as a terminal, but I
hacked things to swap the CAPS LOCK and CONTROL keys. But the control key
was still to the left of the CAPS LOCK key. It was the IBM PC keyboard that
moved the control key below the Shift key. Most other terminals before then
didn't do that :(

Warner

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Frank McConnell via cctalk]

On Sep 7, 2018, at 12:00, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote:
> interesting.. the vt71t has inverted-T cursor keys

And CAPS LOCK in the home row to the left of the A key.  The VT220 made it 
w-i-d-e.  Can we now fix the blame for the two of the three worst ideas in 
computer keyboard design on d|i|g|i|t|a|l?  (#3 would be sending CONTROL to 
live in the spacebar row and I think maybe we need to blame IBM for that.)

-Frank McConnell

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Mark J. Blair via cctalk]

That’s it! The terminal I had was definitely the one in this picture:

http://bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal/vt02/vt02_1.jpg

--
Mark J. Blair 
http://www.nf6x.net

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Paul Koning via cctalk]

> On Sep 7, 2018, at 2:57 PM, Al Kossow via cctalk  
> wrote:
> 
> I just put up some pictures of the vt02, 05, 20, and 71t
> under http://bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal

Nice, working photos of a VT20.  I'd forgotten the oddball keys on the side.

In the VT71 picture, you can see the UDKs -- the blank keycaps in the top row.  
Above them are handwritten labels on that piece of cardboard, indicating what 
each one does (regular and shifted, two macros per key).  There are some 
obvious newspaper specific functions, like "Wire dir sports" or "head fit" 
(i.e., take the current story headline and report how wide it is, to see if it 
fits in the columns allowed for it).

The VT72 document has a description of the display controller, so if VT71/72 
software ever materializes that can be used to teach SIMH how to emulate the 
terminal.

paul

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Noel Chiappa via cctalk]

> From: Al Kossow

> I just put up some pictures of the vt02, 05

Those useable for the CHWiki (with credit, of course)?

Oddly enough, I just did the article on the VT05 about a week ago!

Noel

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Al Kossow via cctalk]

interesting.. the vt71t has inverted-T cursor keys

On 9/7/18 11:57 AM, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote:
> I just put up some pictures of the vt02, 05, 20, and 71t
> under http://bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal
> 

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Al Kossow via cctalk]

I just put up some pictures of the vt02, 05, 20, and 71t
under http://bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal


On 9/7/18 10:45 AM, Mark J. Blair via cctalk wrote:
> Thanks for digging that up! I had never managed to google up any details 
> before. 
> 
> --
> Mark J. Blair 
> http://www.nf6x.net
> 

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Mark J. Blair via cctalk]

Thanks for digging that up! I had never managed to google up any details 
before. 

--
Mark J. Blair 
http://www.nf6x.net

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Al Kossow via cctalk]

On 9/7/18 10:00 AM, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote:

> The VT02 was apparently a PDP-8 device
> 
> https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1185657/m2/1/high_res_d/6649931.pdf
> 

This was hard to find, because web searches turn up hundreds of hits from some 
dufus that mistyped VT02 instead of VT52
in a linux terminal emulation package.

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Al Kossow via cctalk]

On 9/7/18 9:09 AM, Mark J. Blair via cctalk wrote:

> The display was a fully enclosed standalone unit, not a bare chassis. It sat 
> on top of the bottom chassis of the terminal and then had another cover 
> fitted over it.
> 
> It had screen burn which indicated its use as part of a text terminal, but I 
> don't know if the character generation was originally performed in the bottom 
> chassis or by external equipment. The small DEC wire wrap backplane in the 
> bottom chassis didn't seem big enough to implement all of that with flip 
> chips. Maybe the backplane was just used for keyboard interface, and 
> character generation was done by equipment external to the terminal?
> 

The VT02 was apparently a PDP-8 device

https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1185657/m2/1/high_res_d/6649931.pdf

Thus the  FY  1969 equipment  increment  was procured  from  DEC
and consisted  of one  KAIO Processor, one PDP-8 Computer  (4K memory),
4 VT02 Terminals, plus controllers, teleprinters, and  cables for  a total of
$167,042.  For  FY  1970, the  plan  called  for  additional  memory  
capability,
disk packs, and additional inputting terminals for a total  of $189,000.

The only thing we have in the archive apparently are four proof negatives, 
unless the
controller had a different name.

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Mark J. Blair via cctalk]

> On Sep 7, 2018, at 8:41 AM, Bob Rosenbloom via cctalk  
> wrote:
> 
> The display was most likely a Tektronix 611. DEC used them with their point 
> plot display systems like the VC8E.

I am pretty sure that the display was a 611 in its vertical configuration:

http://w140.com/tekwiki/wiki/611

The display was a fully enclosed standalone unit, not a bare chassis. It sat on 
top of the bottom chassis of the terminal and then had another cover fitted 
over it.

It had screen burn which indicated its use as part of a text terminal, but I 
don't know if the character generation was originally performed in the bottom 
chassis or by external equipment. The small DEC wire wrap backplane in the 
bottom chassis didn't seem big enough to implement all of that with flip chips. 
Maybe the backplane was just used for keyboard interface, and character 
generation was done by equipment external to the terminal?

-- 
Mark J. Blair 
http://www.nf6x.net/

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Norman Jaffe via cctalk]

Speaking of oddball terminals, does anyone have details on Cybernex APL-100 
terminals? 
I acquired one a couple of years ago and have had no luck locating 
documentation for them. 

From: "cctalk"  
To: "cctalk"  
Sent: Friday, September 7, 2018 8:41:23 AM 
Subject: Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's) 

On 9/6/2018 10:38 PM, Mark J. Blair via cctalk wrote: 
> A long time ago, I had the incomplete remnants of an oddball terminal which I 
> retrieved from a junk pile at a small, obscure school in Pasadena. I'll try 
> to describe it as best I can, based on old memory. I could have sworn that it 
> had a dataplate label identifying it as a DEC VT02, but that could be way off 
> the mark. 
> 
> It was built around a Tektronix vector storage display, oriented in portrait 
> mode. It had quite a bit of screen burn from its long life displaying text. I 
> don't recall the model number of the display, but I might recognize one if I 
> saw it. It was quite long, making the whole terminal quite long. It had X, Y 
> and Z BNC inputs, and it had a neat test mode that drew a spiral on the 
> screen. 
> 
> The display sat on top of a long chassis with a keyboard at one end, a small 
> Flip Chip backplane around the middle, and a power supply (probably linear, 
> IIRC) at the rear end. I don't think that the Flip Chip boards were still in 
> it when I got it, but it came along with a small box of spare Flip Chips. 
> 
> After setting the big Tektronix display on top of the lower chassis, there 
> was a long U-shaped sheet metal cover that sat over the top and covered the 
> display, making it look somewhat like a single device rather than a stack of 
> two things. The lower chassis and the top cover were painted approximately 
> white as I recall. 
> 
> I never did anything interesting with the display other than occasionally 
> driving it with signal generators, and I got rid of the whole pile a long, 
> long time ago. 
> 
> Does that old beast sound remotely familiar to anybody here? How hard should 
> I kick myself for not keeping it? 
> 
The display was most likely a Tektronix 611. DEC used them with their 
point plot display systems like the VC8E. 


Bob 

-- 
Vintage computers and electronics 
www.dvq.com 
www.tekmuseum.com 
www.decmuseum.org 

Re: Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Bob Rosenbloom via cctalk]

On 9/6/2018 10:38 PM, Mark J. Blair via cctalk wrote:

A long time ago, I had the incomplete remnants of an oddball terminal which I 
retrieved from a junk pile at a small, obscure school in Pasadena. I'll try to 
describe it as best I can, based on old memory. I could have sworn that it had 
a dataplate label identifying it as a DEC VT02, but that could be way off the 
mark.

It was built around a Tektronix vector storage display, oriented in portrait 
mode. It had quite a bit of screen burn from its long life displaying text. I 
don't recall the model number of the display, but I might recognize one if I 
saw it. It was quite long, making the whole terminal quite long. It had X, Y 
and Z BNC inputs, and it had a neat test mode that drew a spiral on the screen.

The display sat on top of a long chassis with a keyboard at one end, a small 
Flip Chip backplane around the middle, and a power supply (probably linear, 
IIRC) at the rear end. I don't think that the Flip Chip boards were still in it 
when I got it, but it came along with a small box of spare Flip Chips.

After setting the big Tektronix display on top of the lower chassis, there was 
a long U-shaped sheet metal cover that sat over the top and covered the 
display, making it look somewhat like a single device rather than a stack of 
two things. The lower chassis and the top cover were painted approximately 
white as I recall.

I never did anything interesting with the display other than occasionally 
driving it with signal generators, and I got rid of the whole pile a long, long 
time ago.

Does that old beast sound remotely familiar to anybody here? How hard should I 
kick myself for not keeping it?

The display was most likely a Tektronix 611. DEC used them with their 
point plot display systems like the VC8E.



Bob

--
Vintage computers and electronics
www.dvq.com
www.tekmuseum.com
www.decmuseum.org

Oddball Terminals (Was: Re: VT100's)

[Mark J. Blair via cctalk]

A long time ago, I had the incomplete remnants of an oddball terminal which I 
retrieved from a junk pile at a small, obscure school in Pasadena. I'll try to 
describe it as best I can, based on old memory. I could have sworn that it had 
a dataplate label identifying it as a DEC VT02, but that could be way off the 
mark.

It was built around a Tektronix vector storage display, oriented in portrait 
mode. It had quite a bit of screen burn from its long life displaying text. I 
don't recall the model number of the display, but I might recognize one if I 
saw it. It was quite long, making the whole terminal quite long. It had X, Y 
and Z BNC inputs, and it had a neat test mode that drew a spiral on the screen.

The display sat on top of a long chassis with a keyboard at one end, a small 
Flip Chip backplane around the middle, and a power supply (probably linear, 
IIRC) at the rear end. I don't think that the Flip Chip boards were still in it 
when I got it, but it came along with a small box of spare Flip Chips.

After setting the big Tektronix display on top of the lower chassis, there was 
a long U-shaped sheet metal cover that sat over the top and covered the 
display, making it look somewhat like a single device rather than a stack of 
two things. The lower chassis and the top cover were painted approximately 
white as I recall.

I never did anything interesting with the display other than occasionally 
driving it with signal generators, and I got rid of the whole pile a long, long 
time ago.

Does that old beast sound remotely familiar to anybody here? How hard should I 
kick myself for not keeping it?

-- 
Mark J. Blair, NF6X 
http://www.nf6x.net/