SciFi history?

[sabredog]

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

Programming with punch cards wasn't bad (except the time I dropped a whole box down the stairs!) ... but have you ever had to get a lace card out of a cardreader? With tweezers?

I sneezed once and cards went everywhere...Joy

[HamsterRage]

I'm just old enough to remember slide rules, and doing a little bit of school work with them. I've still got my father's fairly expensive one tucked away in a drawer. My dad was a big convert to calculators, and I remember the first one we had in the house. It cost over $100 back in the late 70's and really didn't do much.

I remember my dad telling me that they were calling some of the scientific calculators "Electronic Sliderules" in order not to scare the engineers too much.

Now, sitting on the desk in front of me is my HP-41CV. The pinnacle of programmable calculators. There's a whole 'nother technology that's come and gone in less than a lifetime. I still use my 41 as a calculator on a daily basis, but I can't remember the last time I programmed it. RPN rules!

[sabredog]

I have a HP48G and my older HP 11C. My 48G, I use every day (Engineer)

[mbovenka]

Originally Posted by HamsterRage

Now, sitting on the desk in front of me is my HP-41CV. The pinnacle of programmable calculators. There's a whole 'nother technology that's come and gone in less than a lifetime. I still use my 41 as a calculator on a daily basis, but I can't remember the last time I programmed it. RPN rules!

HP calculators rule indeed. RPN...not so much . I still own and occasionally use my HP-20S. Indestructible bit of kit.

[Worldwalker]

If I recall correctly, you could even get a tiny printer to plug into the high-end HP's.

RPN is the notation of evil. I know it's easier to process -- just push your operands on the stack and all -- but I want my computing devices to work to make things easier for me, not for me to have to work to make things easier for them.

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by HamsterRage

RPN rules!

I'd go even further: RPN rules!

[kacir]

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

RPN is the notation of evil. I know it's easier to process -- just push your operands on the stack and all -- but I want my computing devices to work to make things easier for me, not for me to have to work to make things easier for them.

I LOVED my Russian-made RPN calculator, Elektronika MK54.
And it was programmable! I was programming before the first personal computers appeared here.

Back in my day in grammar school a calculator was relatively rare, very valuable and quite expensive item. Often pupils from the next class (7.B., I was 7.A.) rushed into our class (and vice versa) "quick, I need to borrow a calculator, we are going to have Math, (or Physics) test". I hated lending my precious calculator. So when somebody came, I just asked them to perform a 5 x 3 calculation. Then I proceed to explain how registers work "Press 5, putting it into X register, press Up arrow, moving the number to Y register and insert 3 onto X. Now press * to multiply registers X and Y ... Wait, do not run away, there is also register Z and T ..." I haven't met anybody who wouldn't run away ;-)

And I loved using my slide rule (called Logarithmic ruler here).
My math teacher used to turn her eyes up in quite exasperated way when I pulled out my slide rule (and she thought I do not see her). I loved "annoying" her that way ;-) . But I could afford to pull her leg, because I was able to solve mathematical and physics tasks using my slide and my favorite set of mathematical tables faster than anybody else, even with the use of fancy calculator.

I wanted to get circular slide rule. I even tried to make one repeatedly. Now, that I think about it, it might be fun weekend project using an A3 laser printer.

By the way, look at my avatar. One of my favorite slide rules is on the top of the MicroVax supercomputer.

[HamsterRage]

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

If I recall correctly, you could even get a tiny printer to plug into the high-end HP's.

RPN is the notation of evil. I know it's easier to process -- just push your operands on the stack and all -- but I want my computing devices to work to make things easier for me, not for me to have to work to make things easier for them.

I'm afraid I think in RPN now. It's like any other worthwhile skill, like driving a manual transmission, it takes a little work to learn but once you've truly mastered it you see it in a different light.

I have a great deal of difficulty using AES (that's what the entry system for "normal" calculators is called) calculators. I'm constantly loosing the previous operation's results as I mentally expect it to be replicated up the stack as I punch in the next operand.

And as Kacir pointed out, I never have to worry about anyone wanting to borrow my vintage HP41.

[Worldwalker]

As a matter of fact, I drive a manual transmission. I'm still not going near RPN.

Kacir, if you don't mind me asking, where did you go to school that you had Russian calculators?

[kacir]

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

Kacir, if you don't mind me asking, where did you go to school that you had Russian calculators?

It was (at that time) a socialistic country. My calculator was purchased directly in Soviet Union and brought here. It had keyboard marked in Azbuka (Cyrillic alphabet) which added to the uniqueness (and geekines ;-) ) of the calculator.
Later, (in second half of 1980s) it was possible to purchase Cassio and Texas instruments calculators here, for hefty sums, but I would not change my trusty RPN calculator for those "ordinary and boring" ones ;-).
Unfortunately, my calculator practically ATE batteries and most of the time I had to operate it from a small transformer from the mains. So during the tests I had to sit close to the power outlet ;-)

Our Math and Physics teacher was a dragoon. Much, much tougher and demanding than other teachers. When calculators became a bit more widespread she has put ban on the use of calculators. She caught one of my classmates as he was using his newfangled device for multiplying by 100.
She insisted that we solve all the tasks in a symbolic algebra, filling in numbers only as the very last step. She (rightly) thought that the use of the calculator makes pupils much more lazy in thinking about what should the result look like.

Much later, at the university, I almost brought tears to the eyes of one of my teachers when I was performing multiplication 17 x 25 from my head during lab work.
I was looking at the magnification number of my microscope and then I stood looking into distance. "What are you doing?"
"Multiplying magnification - 17 x 25 in my head"
"17 x 25 ?!? Your classmates are willing to use a calculator to multiply by 10."
"Easy. Look. Half of 17 is 8.5, half of that is 4.25, times 100 is 425"
;-)
I was cheating a little bit. I was always fascinated by mathematics, matematic tables, algebra, solving equations in symbolic form, use of slide rule and suchlike. So while I was in grammar school I have borrowed a book called The Trachtenberg Speed System of Basic Mathematics by Jakow Trachtenberg (in original language!) and I tried hard to learn various tricks like this one to compute results in my head ;-)

Look at the page of the "younger brother" of my calculator. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elektronika_MK-52

The MK-52 was used as a backup to the onboard computers of the Soyuz spacecraft on the Soyuz TM-7 mission to the Mir space station.

[nyrath]

Originally Posted by Roger Parkinson

Talking of slide rules I have an old Astounding mag and on the cover is a piratical figure climbing over the gunwhales with, not a dagger, a sliderule between his teeth. The title story is something like Space Pirates.

The Pirates of Ersatz
Astounding Feb 1959
cover here:
http://www.collectorshowcase.fr/astounding_1959.htm
epub here
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/24035

[nyrath]

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

RPN is the notation of evil. I know it's easier to process -- just push your operands on the stack and all -- but I want my computing devices to work to make things easier for me, not for me to have to work to make things easier for them.

Yes, this is true.
However, RPN does mean you do not need to use any parenthesis to alter the order of operation.
The compute language Forth uses RPN.

[nyrath]

Originally Posted by kacir

I wanted to get circular slide rule. I even tried to make one repeatedly. Now, that I think about it, it might be fun weekend project using an A3 laser printer.

There are circular slide rules for sale here
http://www.sphere.bc.ca/test/circular.html
However, I'm trying to make an astrolabe using a laser printer
http://www.flickr.com/photos/nyrath/...7624308442574/
I've written a python program that draws the scales for me.

[Penforhire]

Nostalgic. I had some slide rules but never used them in anger. Circular were cooler but I preferred straight shooters.

My 41CV's chassis started to flex and ruined the display. So sad, for it was awesome when I was in college. Then again, there was this physics professor that made us do EVERYTHING by hand one semester because "kids these days" were getting calculator-induced brain rot. Yeah, not a popular guy.

I loved RPN and the tactile response of HP buttons. But I haven't broken out my 48-series monster in years. Advanced calculator apps, first for Palm OS and now for iOS, take over all tasks nicely. But I still miss those buttons...

[theducks]

Originally Posted by Jellby

I'd go even further: RPN rules!

I am with you.

RPN was easy. Never could get consistent answers on a Algebraic.
Stack Arithmetic RULES
(I bought my dad's HP35 (1st batch) off of him so he could upgrade to a HP45. 2 battery packs later, someone stole it. I still use my 11C)