Yes! I learned to program on that thing. It was $99 as I recall but my parents bought it. The keyboard it came with was really weird, sort of like a cheap calculator but you could upgrade to the "chiclet" keyboard for about $20. And you didn't really have to type much because if you pressed "P" while programming it would expand that to "PRINT".
I've been enjoying this thread but my fondest memories are of programming some of these things. First the Timex (to do a prime number sieve), then an Apple IIe at school. (That would be high school.) In those days you had to know where in memory your program went and how much it needed; once I wrote too large a program that cleared the graphic screen and in the process erased part of itself. Then there were the original PCs and PC/XT's (with hard drives). At the time, IBM published a technical manual so you could go in (with a little assembly code) and disable hardware interrupts. Useful if you were reading a 9600 baud input (blazing fast at that time), because the computer couldn't handle that and keyboard input at the same time. It was also possible to read your hard drive sector by sector, for example to retrieve the contents of a disk whose file allocation table had gone bad. I remember when C was the hot new language, and there were four different commercial C compilers available. At the time you had to compile your program differently if it was going to take more than 64K of code or data space. And space was sufficiently limited that one kind of memory allocation could overwrite another. I'd be willing to bet the bug I found in MicroSoft C's memory allocation function is still there, but not as critical since we can just use up more memory these days. As for calculators, after I went through a couple of TI-30s, I bought an HP-11C for about $65, which seemed like a lot. But I have only had to replace the batteries once, and it still works and does everything I need it to do. And because it uses RPN notation, I find it easy to discourage students from asking to borrow it. :) Charlotte > >Did any of you geezers buy the little Timex computer. It was about >8" X 10" and, like the Atari, had to be connected to a TV. It >came with BASIC built in and about 4K of RAM, but you could buy a >16K plug in. You had to store programs on audio cassettes and run >them into the computer with a cassette recorder/player; that instead >of a disk drive. I think the computer was something like $79 and >the 16K RAM module about $30 more. One of my colleagues bought one >first, and when I saw that it actually WORKED, I got one too. > >Oh yeah, and I still have and use an Apple IIe at home for the >item analysis program I wrote years ago. And I drive a 1974 TR6, >have a 1971 Kenwood stereo system in my office, and listen >to a late 60s vintage Teac reel-to-reel at home sometimes. Uh oh, >I think I'm becoming my father! Time to shut up. > >Tim > >P.S. That Timex computer was a Sinclair/Timex I think. > >-- > >**************************************************************** > Tim Gaines [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Professor of Psychology phone: 864-833-8349 > Presbyterian College fax: 864-833-8481 > Clinton, SC 29325 >**************************************************************** > >--- >You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- ====================================================== Charlotte F. Manly, Ph.D. | Psychological & Brain Sciences Assistant Professor | 317 Life Sciences Bldg ph: (502) 852-8162 | University of Louisville fax: (502) 852-8904 | Louisville, KY 40292 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.louisville.edu/a-s/psychology/ http://www.louisville.edu/~cfmanl01 --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
