The Warm Glow of the Computer
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
Not sure about computers, but I remember my first impressions of programming, right around 9th or 10th grade. I thought programmers basically modified vertical lines of binary (like The Matrix). It seemed like such an intriguing challenge at the time. Most of the stuff I work on now, though, is just putting different components together (add a button to a form, attach an event that calls some other functions, etc.). Would be neat to work for a think tank or somewhere that involved cutting edge algorithms. I guess algorithms are my new "vertical lines of binary", as the rest of programming just doesn't hold the same intrigue anymore.
Visual Studio is an excellent GUIIDE.
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I changed schools for year 9, and they had Apple ][s. I was instantly hooked. My parents bought me one, and I basically failed school because I spent all my time playing games and coding. I just found them so fascinating. I especially loved the text based adventure games, it was like a book, but you could control it !!! That was huge, back then.
Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
My first thought was "How cool - a machine that will do whatever I tell it to!" 25 years later and they still never listen to me.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
Enraptured, empowered, entertained. I borrowed my first computer from the computer lab at college an Altair 8800. Toggle switches and lights, I would program it to get the lights to blink rythmatically and I would get my two kids and turn out the lights and watch it in the dark. When it was done my kids would say make it do it again and so we would do till we all got tired. Then after graduating I bought an old PC and would build boards and program them to power a remote control car on an umbilical cord in pre-programmed routes. Ah the days of yore! Fond memories, Mike
"It doesn't matter how big a ranch ya' own, or how many cows ya' brand, the size of your funeral is still gonna depend on the weather." -Harry Truman.
Semper Fi http://www.hq4thmarinescomm.com[^] My Site
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Well, cool. Thanks. I finished Hitch hikers guide and leather godesses of phobos, but I played anything infocom came out with.
Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
I thought they were the best thing to come into my life. :) I remember playing some Atari games redone for MS-DOS. Man that was fun. Booting into Win 3.1. When Windows 95 showed up, I fell in love. I can still remember playing with Encarta '95...oh man, the interactive stuff blew me away. Of course, it was all pretty slow on our 486 machine...it wasn't until we got our first Pentium 133 mhz computer -- holy cow did that thing fly! We could play any computer game on the shelf! I remember distinctly coming up with the idea of themes before Windows had them. We needed multiple users on our machine, but each person wanted their own sounds, pictures, colors, etc. I thought Windows should come up with a way for this. My brother and I had fun creating our own themes...we'd hack video game data to extract images and sounds, then create windows themes. So we'd steal some sound files from Lords of the Realm II...Windows would boot with "Ready, my lord?" Obnoxious, but fun for us as kids.
Religiously blogging on the intarwebs since the early 21st century: Kineti L'Tziyon Judah Himango
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
That darn cassette took so long to load my basic programs. I have got to learn 6502 assembly.
John
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
One of the first things I remember doing on a PC was programming ;P Don't remember the language but it was the very basic kind of programming, and was at school. Something with making a "car" (k just a red triangle ;P ) do what you wanted. We did manage to make one of the pc's burst into flames :) Then I got my first computer at home (think was a pentium I already) and from there on out it was my mission (for the next 2 years) to break the pc (well k the OS ) and fix it again, really thought me a lot.
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One of the first things I remember doing on a PC was programming ;P Don't remember the language but it was the very basic kind of programming, and was at school. Something with making a "car" (k just a red triangle ;P ) do what you wanted. We did manage to make one of the pc's burst into flames :) Then I got my first computer at home (think was a pentium I already) and from there on out it was my mission (for the next 2 years) to break the pc (well k the OS ) and fix it again, really thought me a lot.
I believe that the language you're referring to was LOGO (not to be confused with the current cable TV channel of the same name -- it was a lot about "turtle graphics" and making the turtle do things. It was supposed to empower kids and in general make the world a warmer, fuzzier place to be. You see how well it succeeded in that direction. Ah, for the days of Zork I, II, and III! :-D
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My first thought was "How cool - a machine that will do whatever I tell it to!" 25 years later and they still never listen to me.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
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I believe that the language you're referring to was LOGO (not to be confused with the current cable TV channel of the same name -- it was a lot about "turtle graphics" and making the turtle do things. It was supposed to empower kids and in general make the world a warmer, fuzzier place to be. You see how well it succeeded in that direction. Ah, for the days of Zork I, II, and III! :-D
JD Eveland wrote:
I believe that the language you're referring to was LOGO
Doesn't ring a bell but could be.
JD Eveland wrote:
make the world a warmer, fuzzier place to be. You see how well it succeeded in that direction
:laugh:
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
I started on this actual machine[^] in 1965! Core memory of 16K (yes that is 16,384) 32 bit words of memory. It had a really clever register in the ALU (the radix register) which allowed you to do calculations in £sd (the pre-decimal currency in the UK). Input output devices were paper tape or punched cards with magnetic tape used for permanent storage; printers were mechanical style with drum and hammers, a bit like a typewriter. Programs had to be loaded from a magnetic tape, and if they needed overlays (e.g. compilers) then the overlays would be read in from tape as the program was running; no such thing as virtual memory then! A great machine which gave me my grounding in computing - writing machine code programs which had to be entered by hand using buttons on the CPU control panel.
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
My first computer was a TI-99-4, when I was 10, and I would spend whole weekends coding in TI-BASIC. But, the 'warm, fuzzy, computers taking over the world' feeling you are talking about came when the computer moved to my room... I wrote the simplest infinite loop, changing from black to a color to black, etc...yes, a strobe light! I would change the color, some worked better than others, and would spend lots of hours listening to music in a multi-colored strobe light filled room. I guess that explains a few things... :laugh:
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
Dad "borrowed" a computer from work, which I used mostly for games. My first 'programming' experience was writing a menu system in a batch file to load my games, and prompt for CD etc. I love the fact that I can make a computer do almost anything I can conceive. Couldn't imagine myself doing anything other than development. Edit: It was an IBM PS2 machine, running DOS 6.22
You don't have to be mad to live here [UK], but it helps.
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
I was intimidated and quickly bored. After several years I gave got my own machine, the 386, then started I to appreciate computers.
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
First experience was on a room full of Apple ][ GS' at middle school (6th grade). I used a program called PaintShop Pro (I think, maybe some variant of that name) to create pixel-perfect copies of some video game characters I was into then, like Mario, Kirby, Mega Man, Yoshi, Samus, a few Mario enemies, and even a pixel-perfect copy of Bowser's clown-ship from SMW! Anyway, I digress...I used the graphics to make an animation that took 5 semesters and upwards of 25 floppy disks. To this day, some 15 years later, the teacher of that class still uses my animation as an example of what kids can do if they really try. (Naturally the teacher let me record it to VHS by swapping every...single...floppy...disk...and...waiting...for...them...to...load...and...play...all during one lunch time. It took the whole lunch time for me, but that way he was able to use it at a parent-teacher exhibit as well back then. Of course, he let me copy the VHS for me to be able to keep a copy too! ^_^ After that, I convinced my parents to get me a computer at home...it was an IBM PS/1. Actually we got two, because I blew away the system.ini file on the first one and couldn't yet fix it...so...no more Windows 3.1! Thankfully Wal-Mart took it back and we got a slightly newer one with 4MB(!) of RAM! I started programming with batch files. My autoexec.bat and config.sys were both > 20K (IIRC), because I had extensive, colored menus whereby I could start DOS games with specific settings directly from that boot menu. I toyed with the sample QuickBasic programs, but they seemed so arcane to me. I spent hours going through the help file and printing relevant parts. I got into ANSI coding to make my command prompts cool looking too (I miss that ANSI support Microsoft!! Why did you scrap it!?). I wanted to know how everything worked and how I could make programs too. I became intimately familiar with all of the system settings, even the infantile registry from 3.1. Then, I found VB4 at a nearby college book store (uh-oh...VB...let the flame war begin). I begged and begged and my folks bought it for me! I haven't looked back since. As a matter of fact, it's the VB that got me my current job. Anyway, that's my crash-course down memory lane. Thanks for listening!
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I started on this actual machine[^] in 1965! Core memory of 16K (yes that is 16,384) 32 bit words of memory. It had a really clever register in the ALU (the radix register) which allowed you to do calculations in £sd (the pre-decimal currency in the UK). Input output devices were paper tape or punched cards with magnetic tape used for permanent storage; printers were mechanical style with drum and hammers, a bit like a typewriter. Programs had to be loaded from a magnetic tape, and if they needed overlays (e.g. compilers) then the overlays would be read in from tape as the program was running; no such thing as virtual memory then! A great machine which gave me my grounding in computing - writing machine code programs which had to be entered by hand using buttons on the CPU control panel.
Utterly embarrassing; here is a scan of my handwritten notes from 1984, teching myself BASIC on a TRS-80, which would have been while I was in 6th grade. Geek from birth, please enjoy a massive LOL at my expense. 6thGradeLOLprogramming.JPG Regards, -Mouse :-\
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
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Utterly embarrassing; here is a scan of my handwritten notes from 1984, teching myself BASIC on a TRS-80, which would have been while I was in 6th grade. Geek from birth, please enjoy a massive LOL at my expense. 6thGradeLOLprogramming.JPG Regards, -Mouse :-\
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I remember back when I was a kid, I thought computers were the greatest invention in the world. Life suddenly becomes more interesting because of the thorough complexities and capabilities; all working to entertain, educate, and empower. It was like an entirely new world where your imagination is the only boundary and where anyone can build and control the world inside their computers. What were your impressions of computers when you first starting using and working with them?
Way back when, in 1972, I was in high school math class. The teacher was showing us how to perform some knid of math operation (I din't remember what) which involved multipling very large numbers using scientific notation. Not one to take anyones word for accuracy, I was hand multiplying two 20 digit numbers. I wanted to see how accurate the approximation method was. The teacher saw me doing this and said "just take that down to the computer room". I thought to myself, what the heck is a computer room. I went down and handed the equation to the guy sitting in front of a TTY terminal (paper tape and all). He entered in a few lines of code and instantly the answer typed out. I was amazed and have been hooked on computers ever since. From 75 buad TTY to 6502 assembler, 68HC11, QBASIC, VB, C, C# .Net I love this stuff.
