Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
On 10/1/19 5:22 PM, Paul Koning via cctalk wrote: >> Both better have backups. Paper tape doesn't do well in fires and floods. > > I remember Mylar punched tape. That stuff is amazingly strong and > waterproof. I've seen it for paper tapes that were intended to be read > thousands of times -- OS boot tapes for example, or the correction data tape > for an instrument in my father's lab. > > DECtape is pretty waterproof; there have been reports of reels accidentally > being run through the laundry and coming out perfectly readable afterwards. > 1/2" Magnetic tape is quite resilient, even when stored improperly (e.g. full of mold). --Chuck
Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
> On Oct 1, 2019, at 8:15 PM, Toby Thain via cctalk > wrote: > > On 2019-10-01 6:28 p.m., ben via cctalk wrote: >> Strange Paper tape lasts forver,Digial media is lost after the latest >> server crash > > Both better have backups. Paper tape doesn't do well in fires and floods. I remember Mylar punched tape. That stuff is amazingly strong and waterproof. I've seen it for paper tapes that were intended to be read thousands of times -- OS boot tapes for example, or the correction data tape for an instrument in my father's lab. DECtape is pretty waterproof; there have been reports of reels accidentally being run through the laundry and coming out perfectly readable afterwards. paul
Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
On 2019-10-01 6:28 p.m., ben via cctalk wrote: > Strange Paper tape lasts forver,Digial media is lost after the latest > server crash Both better have backups. Paper tape doesn't do well in fires and floods. --T
Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
On 10/1/2019 1:38 AM, Christian Corti via cctalk wrote: On Mon, 30 Sep 2019, ben wrote: A quick look, nothing is said about Algol, did you mean Assembler? what I see is interesting is that LISP is on a 11. I allways thought LISP only ran on BIGGER machines. I have the source and binary for KLISP-11 V2 on papertape; available on our FTP server. Christian Strange Paper tape lasts forver,Digial media is lost after the latest server crash. Thank god for the the bitsaver's people and Internet Archive Ben.
Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
> From: Josh Dersch > Any idea what ultimately happened to that 11/45? MIT offered it to me as a gift, but I was a total idiot (and also didn't have future vision), and as I was so busy with the IETF/IESG at the time (which might have been the right call, given how the Internet - note the correct capitalization - has changed the world) I didn't have time to arrange the shipping, and it was given to FTP Software. I recently tried to track it down, to find all the software on it (before I discovered a couple of sets of dump tapes I had made BITD in my basement), and they gave it to one of their employees and it was apparently scrapped. > Are the Algol and LISP available anywhere? Not up yet, but if anyone wants either, I can try and find time to get them up. For the Algol interpreter, all I have is the binary (runs under the MIT-hacked PWB1 - not sure if it would run until vanilla V6) and the manual; the source was unfortunately not saved when the drives were moved from DSSR/RTS (the DELPHI group) to my group, CSR. (Although there may at one point have been a copy retained on a now long-lost pack, along with a lot of other 6.031 stuff, like problem sets sources; I do have a file which is a listing of the disk contents.) For the LISP interpreter, we do have the source (in MACRO) too. Alas, to build it, one needs the 'bind' binder (which groks .REL files, which are based on DEC's relocatable binary format), which was i) written in BCPL, and ii) the current binary can't rebuild itself (I forget the details, whether it's the BCPL compiler, the MACRO assembler, or 'bind' which can't be re-built; it was a couple of years back I was playing with all that). Luckily, we do have some older binaries which can probably be used to work around the issue. Of course, if one just wants to use the existing interpreter binary, one can avoid all that. Noel
Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
On Mon, 30 Sep 2019, ben wrote: A quick look, nothing is said about Algol, did you mean Assembler? what I see is interesting is that LISP is on a 11. I allways thought LISP only ran on BIGGER machines. I have the source and binary for KLISP-11 V2 on papertape; available on our FTP server. Christian
Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
On 9/30/2019 2:43 PM, Josh Dersch via cctalk wrote: See Chapter 3, pg. 249 in the PDF. - Josh I only read THE TABLE OF CONTENTS... I was not expecting a bunch of files all in one big PDF. I view all my PDFs on my tablet, the screen size fits better than the WIDE SCREEN CinemaScope* format of todays PC's. I'll download it and view it later. Ben. *Well heading in that direction,
Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
On Mon, Sep 30, 2019 at 2:29 PM Noel Chiappa via cctalk < cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote: > > From: Josh Dersch > > > descriptions of the PDP-11/45 DELPHI system > > ... > > moves on to Algol and LISP > > I later became the 'owner' of that PDP-11/45 (our group at LCS traded an > -11/40, which EECS wanted for their DECSystem-20, for it). > > That Algol and LISP were later moved to Unix V6 when the group that had > done > DELPHI converted to Unix. I have both - alas, the source for the Algol has > been lost. :-( > Very cool. Any idea what ultimately happened to that 11/45? Are the Algol and LISP available anywhere? Thanks! Josh > > Noel >
Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
> On Sep 30, 2019, at 4:39 PM, ben via cctalk wrote: > > A quick look, nothing is said about Algol, did you mean Assembler? > what I see is interesting is that LISP is on a 11. I allways thought > LISP only ran on BIGGER machines. > Ben. From what I heard fairly recently, some early LISP implementations were on quite small machines. One was the PDP-8 (see http://www.softwarepreservation.org/projects/LISP/other/) and that same page also mentions LISP for the ZEBRA -- a Dutch machine, with 33 bit words. I think another was the Electrologica X1, another Dutch machine, like the ZEBRA from 1958, with 27 bit words and a base configuration of 4k words of core memory. I may be off; if it wasn't the X1, it would be the X8, from 1968, also 27 bits but more likely to be seen with 32 k or so of memory. A lot of things can be done in small amounts of memory if you work at it, though admittedly most who have that skill probably also have white hair. :-) For example, the world's first ALGOL compiler -- a full language compiler, not a subset -- ran on an EL-X1 with 4k words of memory. And it was built by 2 people, in 6 months. Now admittedly one of those two was E.W.Dijkstra... paul
Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
> From: Josh Dersch > descriptions of the PDP-11/45 DELPHI system > ... > moves on to Algol and LISP I later became the 'owner' of that PDP-11/45 (our group at LCS traded an -11/40, which EECS wanted for their DECSystem-20, for it). That Algol and LISP were later moved to Unix V6 when the group that had done DELPHI converted to Unix. I have both - alas, the source for the Algol has been lost. :-( Noel
Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
On Mon, Sep 30, 2019 at 1:39 PM ben via cctalk wrote: > On 9/30/2019 12:50 PM, Josh Dersch via cctalk wrote: > > Thought someone here might find this interesting; I have a binder of > > materials describing the entire course (descriptions of the PDP-11/45 > > DELPHI system, readings, coursework, quizzes, exams (with answers)) for > MIT > > 6.031 "Structure and Interpretation of Computer Languages", 1974. > > > > > http://yahozna.dyndns.org/scratch/scans/mit/MIT%206.031%20Structure%20And%20Interpretation%20Of%20Computer%20Languages%201974.pdf > > > > > > It starts with PDP-11 assembly language, moves on to Algol and LISP and > is > > over a thousand pages of material. Get studying! > > > > - Josh > > > > A quick look, nothing is said about Algol, did you mean Assembler? > what I see is interesting is that LISP is on a 11. I allways thought > LISP only ran on BIGGER machines. > Ben. > See Chapter 3, pg. 249 in the PDF. - Josh
Re: Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
On 9/30/2019 12:50 PM, Josh Dersch via cctalk wrote: Thought someone here might find this interesting; I have a binder of materials describing the entire course (descriptions of the PDP-11/45 DELPHI system, readings, coursework, quizzes, exams (with answers)) for MIT 6.031 "Structure and Interpretation of Computer Languages", 1974. http://yahozna.dyndns.org/scratch/scans/mit/MIT%206.031%20Structure%20And%20Interpretation%20Of%20Computer%20Languages%201974.pdf It starts with PDP-11 assembly language, moves on to Algol and LISP and is over a thousand pages of material. Get studying! - Josh A quick look, nothing is said about Algol, did you mean Assembler? what I see is interesting is that LISP is on a 11. I allways thought LISP only ran on BIGGER machines. Ben.
Course materials for MIT 6.031 (c. 1974) scanned
Thought someone here might find this interesting; I have a binder of materials describing the entire course (descriptions of the PDP-11/45 DELPHI system, readings, coursework, quizzes, exams (with answers)) for MIT 6.031 "Structure and Interpretation of Computer Languages", 1974. http://yahozna.dyndns.org/scratch/scans/mit/MIT%206.031%20Structure%20And%20Interpretation%20Of%20Computer%20Languages%201974.pdf It starts with PDP-11 assembly language, moves on to Algol and LISP and is over a thousand pages of material. Get studying! - Josh
