Quote:
Originally Posted by pholy
Actually, that looks to be the new model 035 Keypunch... In my day, we had to use the IBM model 026... what a clunker!
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Paper tape. I always bring up paper tape when people mention punch cards. I did use punch cards, but one of the machines I worked on (in fact the first one that I could claim some actual professional association with) used paper tape. Ghastly stuff.
The other story, which is much later, was about the Internet, although not the Internet we know today. I worked for Digital in the '80s and they had a private network connecting their offices using DECnet (gone now...). Our office in New Zealand were delighted when we got to connect to it via the Sydney, Australia office for just a few hours a day. Back then anything like this was a scarce resource. Soon after we got connected a colleague flew over from Sydney with a magtape (remember those?) of stuff to show us. But he forgot something and had to pull more stuff over from Sydney via the new network. He's sitting there tapping his fingers waiting, waiting, looking impatient. I said something like 'hey, this is actually really fast. Just last week this would have meant flying back to Sydney and fetching a new tape.' That would have been 2 days. This was under 10 minutes.
Sometimes I gripe about a slow connection, but then I remember that day.