Re: atex system in Houston
As an fyi to collecting, many old newspapers might be a source for old iron. They invested in computer Technology and when that technology was replaced/upgraded, they usually just moved the systems into the basement and they sit there collecting dust. Many systems were still on the books when they were being replaced so they couldn't get rid of them so they were forgotten about. At my old place of work I scrounged around in the basement a few years ago and found some brand new rl02 packs and a new side cover for a PDP 11/34. Still in the original shipping boxes. The building was sold so they had to clean it out before the new owners took over so everything was getting cleared out. There were 8 Alpha "Sable" systems that were used as post script Rips that i could have had too, but didn't have space for them. A never installed Auspex was there too as well as IBM POWER systems and lots of other goodies, newspaper page size scanners, Sun E10k, IBM SNA stuff. Oh well... Sent from my iPhone > On Mar 14, 2019, at 11:21, Paul Koning via cctalk > wrote: > > > >>> On Mar 14, 2019, at 2:02 PM, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk >>> wrote: >>> >>> ... >> >> Personally, I think it would be really neat if some of these >> computer museums could collect complete end-product systems >> and make them run. Can you imagine showing a bunch of students >> how a newspaper was produced using a PDP-11 and one of these >> Tek terminals feeding a real printing press. >> >> bill > > I agree it would be really neat. The odds of pulling it off are slim, > unfortunately. Consider the Typeset-11 system. There were under 100 sold > world-wide, I think. Each was a custom turnkey system, set up to talk to a > particular model phototypesetter with the specific fonts that the customer > ordered. The terminals are application-specific too. I'm not sure if a > VT-61/t can be used as a VT52, it wouldn't surprise me if the answer were > "no". And a VT-71 won't do anything unless it's first loaded with operating > firmware from the host, which came packaged with Typeset-11 (or a later VMS > typesetting product whose name escapes me). > > That said, if anyone were to come across bits & pieces of Typeset-11 (TMS-11) > I'd be quite interested in dusting off old brain cells to help bring it back > to life. > > Phototypesetters of that era were often quite big machines. At DEC we had an > Autologic APS-4, which is a gray box about 6 feet on the sides. A fair > number of customers had its successor the APS-5, which is somewhat smaller > but not a whole lot. The smallest machines I remember were the Mergenthaler > Linotron 202, about the size of a large high speed copier. Later models of > that one supported PostScript, I think, but the Typeset-11 I worked on > predates all that. Half a generation earlier and also fairly small would be > optical disk based machines, where the letter shapes are kept as shapes on a > spinning glass disks, with a flash bulb to expose the chosen letter onto the > film via a set of lenses that produces one of a number of font sizes. And I > still remember the very early model CRT based phototypesetter at the San > Diego Tribune, from III if memory serves -- it was basically a small room > that you'd walk into in order to unload the film. > > And yes, those machines produce output on photographic "film" (paper rolls, > actually) which has to be developed and fixed, then cut, coated on the back > with sticky wax, and pasted onto layout boards. > > The whole production process, from film to layout to press, is quite complex > and comes in a bunch of variations. I understand it slightly, but all that > was the province of skilled union tradesmen whose trade has long ago vanished > into history. > > And never mind an actual printing press. Newspaper presses of course are > still around, and probably not changed a whole lot. They are big, loud, and > scary. Watching them switch from a used-up roll of paper to a new full roll, > on the fly without stopping, is quite a spectacle. Especially because it > *usually* works -- but if it doesn't it's rather a mess. > >paul >
Re: atex system in Houston
On 2019-03-14 2:21 PM, Paul Koning via cctalk wrote: > > >> On Mar 14, 2019, at 2:02 PM, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk >> wrote: >> >>> ... >> >> Personally, I think it would be really neat if some of these >> computer museums could collect complete end-product systems >> and make them run. Can you imagine showing a bunch of students >> how a newspaper was produced using a PDP-11 and one of these >> Tek terminals feeding a real printing press. >> >> bill > > I agree it would be really neat. The odds of pulling it off are slim, > unfortunately. ... > > Phototypesetters of that era were often quite big machines. At DEC we had an > Autologic APS-4, which is a gray box about 6 feet on the sides. A fair > number of customers had its successor the APS-5, which is somewhat smaller > but not a whole lot. The smallest machines I remember were the Mergenthaler > Linotron 202, about the size of a large high speed copier. Later models of > that one supported PostScript, I think, ...snip... > > And yes, those machines produce output on photographic "film" (paper rolls, > actually) which has to be developed and fixed, then cut, coated on the back > with sticky wax, and pasted onto layout boards. Out of high school I worked on a (tiny) family newspaper where we did that using LaserWriter printouts. Later we bought a Linotronic 100 which fits your description above: A capstan based laser imagesetter up to 1270dpi which was the first such device to run PostScript, and could be run over AppleTalk by the Macintosh applications and print manager. I typeset galleys with it (as it happens, with TeX, using all Adobe fonts), which were then pasted up into full pages. The L100 machine itself now needs a forever home. It is stored in Sydney NSW, Australia, so if anyone _does_ want to preserve some digital typesetting history, please get in touch. > > The whole production process, from film to layout to press, is quite complex > and comes in a bunch of variations. I understand it slightly, but all that > was the province of skilled union tradesmen whose trade has long ago vanished > into history. Yes; my 2nd job was at one of the last old-school graphic repro houses: Process cameras, manual colour separation and "combining" by the last generation trained in it. They had a very expensive (pre-PostScript) Crosfield digital workflow involving drum scanners and high resolution film recorders which was already obsolete when I started (1992). They had installed the first PostScript drum imagesetter in Australia (I'm told) -- a beautifully engineered Scangraphic -- that was my job to run. --Toby > > And never mind an actual printing press. Newspaper presses of course are > still around, and probably not changed a whole lot. They are big, loud, and > scary. Watching them switch from a used-up roll of paper to a new full roll, > on the fly without stopping, is quite a spectacle. Especially because it > *usually* works -- but if it doesn't it's rather a mess. > > paul > >
Re: atex system in Houston
> On Mar 13, 2019, at 8:40 PM, Paul Koning wrote: > > > >> On Mar 13, 2019, at 8:07 PM, Rick Bensene wrote: >> >> Paul K. wrote: >>> TMS-11 did support some specialized devices that could do more. There >> was the classified page layout system using a Tek 4010 style display >> (4015? A BIG tube). >> >> The big-tube Tektronix DVST (Direct View Storage Terminal) terminal was >> the 4014. The tube used in that terminal was the largest production >> DVST tube that Tektronix made. >> It was also used in the 4054 computer. > > An article about those terminals also turns up the 4016 (25 inch tube -- 4014 > is 19 inches). I'm not sure any more which of the two it was. > > paul I found the answer. My Spanish is nearly non-existent, but I can puzzle out just enough of this https://ddd.uab.cat/pub/tesis/2002/tdx-0218103-190320/ccs12de16.pdf . On page 17-18 it describes the system used at the Eugene Register-Guard". It's a three-node 11/70 system, running TMS-11, EMS-11, CMS-11, with 120 VT-72 terminals and an unstated number of VT61 terminals. EMS-11 is a refinement of TMS-11 that came out around 1979 or 1980 (also known as TMS-11 V5, I think). It put a thin database on top of the file based document handling that was there before, so instead of seeing 9.3 RSX-style file names the customer would see articles named by freeform text phrases. The Denver Post was the beta site for that product; I got to babysit the initial deployment which was fun because it didn't involve real work (nothing went wrong). The document also mentions CPMS-11, which is "Classified page makeup system" (i.e., page layout) and refers to the Tektronix 4016 it used. I also see the CHM has a few TMS-11 documents, presumably not yet scanned. paul
Re: atex system in Houston
> On Mar 14, 2019, at 2:02 PM, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk > wrote: > >> ... > > Personally, I think it would be really neat if some of these > computer museums could collect complete end-product systems > and make them run. Can you imagine showing a bunch of students > how a newspaper was produced using a PDP-11 and one of these > Tek terminals feeding a real printing press. > > bill I agree it would be really neat. The odds of pulling it off are slim, unfortunately. Consider the Typeset-11 system. There were under 100 sold world-wide, I think. Each was a custom turnkey system, set up to talk to a particular model phototypesetter with the specific fonts that the customer ordered. The terminals are application-specific too. I'm not sure if a VT-61/t can be used as a VT52, it wouldn't surprise me if the answer were "no". And a VT-71 won't do anything unless it's first loaded with operating firmware from the host, which came packaged with Typeset-11 (or a later VMS typesetting product whose name escapes me). That said, if anyone were to come across bits & pieces of Typeset-11 (TMS-11) I'd be quite interested in dusting off old brain cells to help bring it back to life. Phototypesetters of that era were often quite big machines. At DEC we had an Autologic APS-4, which is a gray box about 6 feet on the sides. A fair number of customers had its successor the APS-5, which is somewhat smaller but not a whole lot. The smallest machines I remember were the Mergenthaler Linotron 202, about the size of a large high speed copier. Later models of that one supported PostScript, I think, but the Typeset-11 I worked on predates all that. Half a generation earlier and also fairly small would be optical disk based machines, where the letter shapes are kept as shapes on a spinning glass disks, with a flash bulb to expose the chosen letter onto the film via a set of lenses that produces one of a number of font sizes. And I still remember the very early model CRT based phototypesetter at the San Diego Tribune, from III if memory serves -- it was basically a small room that you'd walk into in order to unload the film. And yes, those machines produce output on photographic "film" (paper rolls, actually) which has to be developed and fixed, then cut, coated on the back with sticky wax, and pasted onto layout boards. The whole production process, from film to layout to press, is quite complex and comes in a bunch of variations. I understand it slightly, but all that was the province of skilled union tradesmen whose trade has long ago vanished into history. And never mind an actual printing press. Newspaper presses of course are still around, and probably not changed a whole lot. They are big, loud, and scary. Watching them switch from a used-up roll of paper to a new full roll, on the fly without stopping, is quite a spectacle. Especially because it *usually* works -- but if it doesn't it's rather a mess. paul
Re: atex system in Houston
On 3/14/19 1:51 PM, Rick Bensene via cctalk wrote: > In an earlier posting, I stated that the 4014 (with its 19" DVST tube) > was the largest DVST display that Tektronix made, to which > Paul K. responded: > >> An article about those terminals also turns up the 4016 (25 inch tube > -- 4014 is 19 inches). I'm not sure any more which of the two it >> was. > > I stand corrected. > > I never saw one of these during the 13 years (1977-1990) that I worked > at Tektronix. But, after looking around online, indeed, they exist, > and there are a number of them still around, including a beautiful, > working example at the local Tektronix museum, VintageTek.org. This is > probably the article that Paul referred to: > > https://vintagetek.org/dvst-graphic-terminals/ > > Funny, last time I was at the museum (which was probably two+ years > ago), I didn't see it...perhaps it's a newer acquisition. Had I seen > it, I would have been surprised, since it was always my impression that > the 19" tube was the largest. > > The 25" tube had to have some pretty crazy geometry correction circuitry > in the deflection system to correct for the curvature of the tube face > in X and Y dimensions, as well as probably some beam power correction to > account for the curvature. A pretty amazing accomplishment, for sure. > Tektronix had some really amazing CRT engineering folks, as well as > fabulous CRT fab facilities back in the day. > > Thank you, Paul, for pointing out my error. Definitely an example of > learning something new every day :-) > Personally, I think it would be really neat if some of these computer museums could collect complete end-product systems and make them run. Can you imagine showing a bunch of students how a newspaper was produced using a PDP-11 and one of these Tek terminals feeding a real printing press. bill
RE: atex system in Houston
In an earlier posting, I stated that the 4014 (with its 19" DVST tube) was the largest DVST display that Tektronix made, to which Paul K. responded: > An article about those terminals also turns up the 4016 (25 inch tube -- 4014 is 19 inches). I'm not sure any more which of the two it > was. I stand corrected. I never saw one of these during the 13 years (1977-1990) that I worked at Tektronix. But, after looking around online, indeed, they exist, and there are a number of them still around, including a beautiful, working example at the local Tektronix museum, VintageTek.org. This is probably the article that Paul referred to: https://vintagetek.org/dvst-graphic-terminals/ Funny, last time I was at the museum (which was probably two+ years ago), I didn't see it...perhaps it's a newer acquisition. Had I seen it, I would have been surprised, since it was always my impression that the 19" tube was the largest. The 25" tube had to have some pretty crazy geometry correction circuitry in the deflection system to correct for the curvature of the tube face in X and Y dimensions, as well as probably some beam power correction to account for the curvature. A pretty amazing accomplishment, for sure. Tektronix had some really amazing CRT engineering folks, as well as fabulous CRT fab facilities back in the day. Thank you, Paul, for pointing out my error. Definitely an example of learning something new every day :-) -Rick
Re: atex system in Houston
> This happened to us. when the CSE system was replaced with one from Ctext > using pc's and OS/2 starting about 1097. Just after the Norman Conquest: now THAT is a historic system! Kevin
Re: atex system in Houston
Btw... The inhouse system wasn't WYSIWYG, it used a standard font with markup to specify attributes. The back end system translated that to the proper fonts. The fonts were custom designed. Sent from my iPhone > On Mar 13, 2019, at 11:49, Paul Koning wrote: > > Early 1979. I worked on TMS-11 from summer 1978 to summer 1980, as > "firefighter" -- traveling on-site support and software repair. I was > scheduled for CMS-11 training early 1979, but instead the Valley News > developed a serious bug so I was sent there to learn on the spot. :-) > > Supposedly the Valley News was one of the biggest classified systems in the > country, 50+ pages of ads on the peak day. DEC also had a system in > Melbourne, Australia (I think) at News Corp, which was somewhat bigger still. > Or perhaps that was a bid that didn't turn into a sale? Not sure. Still, > those systems didn't have 300 terminals, the likely limit was 100 or so I > think. So if you had 330 I can see why that would be custom. TMS-11 used > 11/70 systems running IAS (trimmed down to look like RSX-11/D, the > timesharing part yanked out), with either VT61/t and/or VT71 terminals. The > latter have an LSI-11 inside to do full file local editing. > > There was Typeset-10, I'm not sure how many customers that had but they were > big. Chicago Tribune, I think? > > It was interesting to do field work for customers who need their system to be > very reliable because they have to produce "product" every single day. > Pretty amazing to get a job like that fresh out of college. > >paul > > >> On Mar 13, 2019, at 2:37 PM, Wayne S wrote: >> >> Paul, what was the timeframe when you worked on the system in Van Nuys? >> >> I worked for a large newspaper starting in 1978 and they made their own 330 >> seat Classified Sales Entry system because there wasn't anything out there >> that was big enough. >> It used Zentec ZMS-90 programmable terminals feeding Series /1 mini's that >> then fed IBM 3032 mainframe. >> >> I was wondering if DEC had that system available during that time. >> >> Sent from my iPhone >
Re: atex system in Houston
I echo the reliability requirement. Classified ad sales was the biggest revenue generator back then so Newpapers would throw a lot of development money at them to make them reliable. A classified sales rep would be on the phone to a customer, taking the text of the ad and typing it directly into the system so you couldn't afford the system to suddenly crash. This happened to us. when the CSE system was replaced with one from Ctext using pc's and OS/2 starting about 1097. After a while, the sales reps started jotting down of the text on notepads because they knew the system might fail at any time. Anyway you did have a very fun and cool job. Sent from my iPhone > On Mar 13, 2019, at 11:49, Paul Koning wrote: > > Early 1979. I worked on TMS-11 from summer 1978 to summer 1980, as > "firefighter" -- traveling on-site support and software repair. I was > scheduled for CMS-11 training early 1979, but instead the Valley News > developed a serious bug so I was sent there to learn on the spot. :-) > > Supposedly the Valley News was one of the biggest classified systems in the > country, 50+ pages of ads on the peak day. DEC also had a system in > Melbourne, Australia (I think) at News Corp, which was somewhat bigger still. > Or perhaps that was a bid that didn't turn into a sale? Not sure. Still, > those systems didn't have 300 terminals, the likely limit was 100 or so I > think. So if you had 330 I can see why that would be custom. TMS-11 used > 11/70 systems running IAS (trimmed down to look like RSX-11/D, the > timesharing part yanked out), with either VT61/t and/or VT71 terminals. The > latter have an LSI-11 inside to do full file local editing. > > There was Typeset-10, I'm not sure how many customers that had but they were > big. Chicago Tribune, I think? > > It was interesting to do field work for customers who need their system to be > very reliable because they have to produce "product" every single day. > Pretty amazing to get a job like that fresh out of college. > >paul > > >> On Mar 13, 2019, at 2:37 PM, Wayne S wrote: >> >> Paul, what was the timeframe when you worked on the system in Van Nuys? >> >> I worked for a large newspaper starting in 1978 and they made their own 330 >> seat Classified Sales Entry system because there wasn't anything out there >> that was big enough. >> It used Zentec ZMS-90 programmable terminals feeding Series /1 mini's that >> then fed IBM 3032 mainframe. >> >> I was wondering if DEC had that system available during that time. >> >> Sent from my iPhone >
Re: atex system in Houston
Paul, what was the timeframe when you worked on the system in Van Nuys? I worked for a large newspaper starting in 1978 and they made their own 330 seat Classified Sales Entry system because there wasn't anything out there that was big enough. It used Zentec ZMS-90 programmable terminals feeding Series /1 mini's that then fed IBM 3032 mainframe. I was wondering if DEC had that system available during that time. Sent from my iPhone > On Mar 13, 2019, at 10:05, Paul Koning wrote: > > > >> On Mar 13, 2019, at 12:56 PM, Wayne S wrote: >> >> Atex, now Newscycle, also had a Classified Advertising system out at that >> time. I remember reading a article somewhere saying that Atex was going to >> use the J11 for that system. > > So did DEC, the "classified management system" (CMS) was part of TMS-11. I > spent some interesting times bug fixing it on site in Van Nuys. > On Mar 13, 2019, at 06:41, Toby Thain via cctalk wrote: On 2019-03-13 9:31 AM, Paul Koning via cctalk wrote: > On Mar 12, 2019, at 10:10 PM, Fritz Mueller via cctalk > wrote: > > Hmmm, are these the atex racks seen lurking in the background of that > recent storage space trawl down near Houston? > > https://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-DEC-PDP-11-34-Minicomputer-With-Kennedy-Tape-Drive-J11-CPU-2-Terminals/123688125244 Interesting. Atex is, or was at one time anyway, a manufacturer of typesetting systems for newspapers. DEC was also in that business with Typeset-11 (TMS-11) but Atex was more successful, certainly for smaller newspapers because it used less expensive PDP11 models. >>> >>> Funny, I always associated it with big papers (I think the NYT used it?) > > Could be. Your second reference mentions a max of 200 terminals; I'm pretty > sure TMS-11 couldn't go that high even on a four node cluster (the largest I > remember, not sure if in theory it could go higher). > The "multi-processor bus" thing is curious. And I wonder what the terminals are like. If they are typesetting terminals, I think they support some sort of WYSIWYG editing setup -- that too was a competitive advantage vs. the "mark-up" approach (sort of like Runoff on steroids) that Typeset-11 offered. Looking at the keyboards would give a clue. >>> >>> Pretty sure Atex was pre-wysiwyg. This article may provide some context >>> on that: >>> >>> >>> https://www.nytimes.com/1991/03/17/business/can-atex-keep-its-proprietary-place-in-the-newsroom.html >>> >>> & >>> https://books.google.ca/books?id=IAGotP-IDocC=PA1827=jEwR7s7dWM=atex%20customers%201970s=PA1827#v=onepage=atex%20customers%201970s=false > > That talks about direct to plate, text and graphics. I meant just the text. > On the DEC product, you'd see a typical VT100 style typewriter font display, > with line breaks and hyphenation shown only after you did "send to J" to > have the line breaks calculated in a batch process. It wouldn't give you > line breaks, or article length which is important to editors, in real time. > I think Atex did provide J in real time. It might still have been > typewriter font, so it wouldn't be a display showing the actual text with the > letter shapes as printed, but for a newspaper editor that's not particularly > important. > > TMS-11 did support some specialized devices that could do more. There was > the classified page layout system using a Tek 4010 style display (4015? A > BIG tube). And there was some experimental work to extend that to news page > layout though there wasn't much interest in that apparently. And it could > drive Harris 2200 terminals which were display ad creation devices (full > graphics WYSIWIG displays) using the ugliest network protocol I've ever > encountered. But the way the system was usually used (1978-1980 when I > worked on it) was that output was generated in single column wide strips of > film, which would then be pasted to page layout boards to produce the > finished page layouts. > >paul >
Re: atex system in Houston
> On Mar 13, 2019, at 8:07 PM, Rick Bensene wrote: > > Paul K. wrote: >> TMS-11 did support some specialized devices that could do more. There > was the classified page layout system using a Tek 4010 style display > (4015? A BIG tube). > > The big-tube Tektronix DVST (Direct View Storage Terminal) terminal was > the 4014. The tube used in that terminal was the largest production > DVST tube that Tektronix made. > It was also used in the 4054 computer. An article about those terminals also turns up the 4016 (25 inch tube -- 4014 is 19 inches). I'm not sure any more which of the two it was. paul
RE: atex system in Houston
Paul K. wrote: > TMS-11 did support some specialized devices that could do more. There was the classified page layout system using a Tek 4010 style display (4015? A BIG tube). The big-tube Tektronix DVST (Direct View Storage Terminal) terminal was the 4014. The tube used in that terminal was the largest production DVST tube that Tektronix made. It was also used in the 4054 computer. -Rick -- Rick Bensene The Old Calculator Museum http://oldcalculatormuseum.com
Re: atex system in Houston
Early 1979. I worked on TMS-11 from summer 1978 to summer 1980, as "firefighter" -- traveling on-site support and software repair. I was scheduled for CMS-11 training early 1979, but instead the Valley News developed a serious bug so I was sent there to learn on the spot. :-) Supposedly the Valley News was one of the biggest classified systems in the country, 50+ pages of ads on the peak day. DEC also had a system in Melbourne, Australia (I think) at News Corp, which was somewhat bigger still. Or perhaps that was a bid that didn't turn into a sale? Not sure. Still, those systems didn't have 300 terminals, the likely limit was 100 or so I think. So if you had 330 I can see why that would be custom. TMS-11 used 11/70 systems running IAS (trimmed down to look like RSX-11/D, the timesharing part yanked out), with either VT61/t and/or VT71 terminals. The latter have an LSI-11 inside to do full file local editing. There was Typeset-10, I'm not sure how many customers that had but they were big. Chicago Tribune, I think? It was interesting to do field work for customers who need their system to be very reliable because they have to produce "product" every single day. Pretty amazing to get a job like that fresh out of college. paul > On Mar 13, 2019, at 2:37 PM, Wayne S wrote: > > Paul, what was the timeframe when you worked on the system in Van Nuys? > > I worked for a large newspaper starting in 1978 and they made their own 330 > seat Classified Sales Entry system because there wasn't anything out there > that was big enough. > It used Zentec ZMS-90 programmable terminals feeding Series /1 mini's that > then fed IBM 3032 mainframe. > > I was wondering if DEC had that system available during that time. > > Sent from my iPhone
Re: atex system in Houston
Do those happen to have the fonts that DEC used in-house?
Re: atex system in Houston
Atex, now Newscycle, also had a Classified Advertising system out at that time. I remember reading a article somewhere saying that Atex was going to use the J11 for that system. Sent from my iPhone > On Mar 13, 2019, at 06:41, Toby Thain via cctalk > wrote: > >> On 2019-03-13 9:31 AM, Paul Koning via cctalk wrote: >> >> >>> On Mar 12, 2019, at 10:10 PM, Fritz Mueller via cctalk >>> wrote: >>> >>> Hmmm, are these the atex racks seen lurking in the background of that >>> recent storage space trawl down near Houston? >>> >>> https://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-DEC-PDP-11-34-Minicomputer-With-Kennedy-Tape-Drive-J11-CPU-2-Terminals/123688125244 >> >> Interesting. Atex is, or was at one time anyway, a manufacturer of >> typesetting systems for newspapers. DEC was also in that business with >> Typeset-11 (TMS-11) but Atex was more successful, certainly for smaller >> newspapers because it used less expensive PDP11 models. >> > > Funny, I always associated it with big papers (I think the NYT used it?) > > > >> The "multi-processor bus" thing is curious. And I wonder what the terminals >> are like. If they are typesetting terminals, I think they support some sort >> of WYSIWYG editing setup -- that too was a competitive advantage vs. the >> "mark-up" approach (sort of like Runoff on steroids) that Typeset-11 >> offered. Looking at the keyboards would give a clue. > > Pretty sure Atex was pre-wysiwyg. This article may provide some context > on that: > > > https://www.nytimes.com/1991/03/17/business/can-atex-keep-its-proprietary-place-in-the-newsroom.html > > & > https://books.google.ca/books?id=IAGotP-IDocC=PA1827=jEwR7s7dWM=atex%20customers%201970s=PA1827#v=onepage=atex%20customers%201970s=false > > > > --Toby > > >> >> The "11-34 minicomputer... J-11 CPU" description is a bit strange. Possibly >> a dual CPU setup with one of each? But that seems strange because those two >> are from different generations, and interfacing them together would be >> tricky and not all that useful. >> >>paul >> >> >
Re: atex system in Houston
> On Mar 13, 2019, at 12:56 PM, Wayne S wrote: > > Atex, now Newscycle, also had a Classified Advertising system out at that > time. I remember reading a article somewhere saying that Atex was going to > use the J11 for that system. So did DEC, the "classified management system" (CMS) was part of TMS-11. I spent some interesting times bug fixing it on site in Van Nuys. >> On Mar 13, 2019, at 06:41, Toby Thain via cctalk >> wrote: >> >>> On 2019-03-13 9:31 AM, Paul Koning via cctalk wrote: >>> >>> On Mar 12, 2019, at 10:10 PM, Fritz Mueller via cctalk wrote: Hmmm, are these the atex racks seen lurking in the background of that recent storage space trawl down near Houston? https://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-DEC-PDP-11-34-Minicomputer-With-Kennedy-Tape-Drive-J11-CPU-2-Terminals/123688125244 >>> >>> Interesting. Atex is, or was at one time anyway, a manufacturer of >>> typesetting systems for newspapers. DEC was also in that business with >>> Typeset-11 (TMS-11) but Atex was more successful, certainly for smaller >>> newspapers because it used less expensive PDP11 models. >>> >> >> Funny, I always associated it with big papers (I think the NYT used it?) Could be. Your second reference mentions a max of 200 terminals; I'm pretty sure TMS-11 couldn't go that high even on a four node cluster (the largest I remember, not sure if in theory it could go higher). >>> The "multi-processor bus" thing is curious. And I wonder what the >>> terminals are like. If they are typesetting terminals, I think they >>> support some sort of WYSIWYG editing setup -- that too was a competitive >>> advantage vs. the "mark-up" approach (sort of like Runoff on steroids) that >>> Typeset-11 offered. Looking at the keyboards would give a clue. >> >> Pretty sure Atex was pre-wysiwyg. This article may provide some context >> on that: >> >> >> https://www.nytimes.com/1991/03/17/business/can-atex-keep-its-proprietary-place-in-the-newsroom.html >> >> & >> https://books.google.ca/books?id=IAGotP-IDocC=PA1827=jEwR7s7dWM=atex%20customers%201970s=PA1827#v=onepage=atex%20customers%201970s=false That talks about direct to plate, text and graphics. I meant just the text. On the DEC product, you'd see a typical VT100 style typewriter font display, with line breaks and hyphenation shown only after you did "send to J" to have the line breaks calculated in a batch process. It wouldn't give you line breaks, or article length which is important to editors, in real time. I think Atex did provide J in real time. It might still have been typewriter font, so it wouldn't be a display showing the actual text with the letter shapes as printed, but for a newspaper editor that's not particularly important. TMS-11 did support some specialized devices that could do more. There was the classified page layout system using a Tek 4010 style display (4015? A BIG tube). And there was some experimental work to extend that to news page layout though there wasn't much interest in that apparently. And it could drive Harris 2200 terminals which were display ad creation devices (full graphics WYSIWIG displays) using the ugliest network protocol I've ever encountered. But the way the system was usually used (1978-1980 when I worked on it) was that output was generated in single column wide strips of film, which would then be pasted to page layout boards to produce the finished page layouts. paul
Re: atex system in Houston
On 2019-03-13 9:31 AM, Paul Koning via cctalk wrote: > > >> On Mar 12, 2019, at 10:10 PM, Fritz Mueller via cctalk >> wrote: >> >> Hmmm, are these the atex racks seen lurking in the background of that recent >> storage space trawl down near Houston? >> >> https://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-DEC-PDP-11-34-Minicomputer-With-Kennedy-Tape-Drive-J11-CPU-2-Terminals/123688125244 > > Interesting. Atex is, or was at one time anyway, a manufacturer of > typesetting systems for newspapers. DEC was also in that business with > Typeset-11 (TMS-11) but Atex was more successful, certainly for smaller > newspapers because it used less expensive PDP11 models. > Funny, I always associated it with big papers (I think the NYT used it?) > The "multi-processor bus" thing is curious. And I wonder what the terminals > are like. If they are typesetting terminals, I think they support some sort > of WYSIWYG editing setup -- that too was a competitive advantage vs. the > "mark-up" approach (sort of like Runoff on steroids) that Typeset-11 offered. > Looking at the keyboards would give a clue. Pretty sure Atex was pre-wysiwyg. This article may provide some context on that: https://www.nytimes.com/1991/03/17/business/can-atex-keep-its-proprietary-place-in-the-newsroom.html & https://books.google.ca/books?id=IAGotP-IDocC=PA1827=jEwR7s7dWM=atex%20customers%201970s=PA1827#v=onepage=atex%20customers%201970s=false --Toby > > The "11-34 minicomputer... J-11 CPU" description is a bit strange. Possibly > a dual CPU setup with one of each? But that seems strange because those two > are from different generations, and interfacing them together would be tricky > and not all that useful. > > paul > >
Re: atex system in Houston
> On Mar 12, 2019, at 10:10 PM, Fritz Mueller via cctalk > wrote: > > Hmmm, are these the atex racks seen lurking in the background of that recent > storage space trawl down near Houston? > > https://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-DEC-PDP-11-34-Minicomputer-With-Kennedy-Tape-Drive-J11-CPU-2-Terminals/123688125244 Interesting. Atex is, or was at one time anyway, a manufacturer of typesetting systems for newspapers. DEC was also in that business with Typeset-11 (TMS-11) but Atex was more successful, certainly for smaller newspapers because it used less expensive PDP11 models. The "multi-processor bus" thing is curious. And I wonder what the terminals are like. If they are typesetting terminals, I think they support some sort of WYSIWYG editing setup -- that too was a competitive advantage vs. the "mark-up" approach (sort of like Runoff on steroids) that Typeset-11 offered. Looking at the keyboards would give a clue. The "11-34 minicomputer... J-11 CPU" description is a bit strange. Possibly a dual CPU setup with one of each? But that seems strange because those two are from different generations, and interfacing them together would be tricky and not all that useful. paul
atex system in Houston
Hmmm, are these the atex racks seen lurking in the background of that recent storage space trawl down near Houston? https://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-DEC-PDP-11-34-Minicomputer-With-Kennedy-Tape-Drive-J11-CPU-2-Terminals/123688125244
