Category Archives: History

Always mount a scratch monkey: the real story

Posted on May 7, 2007 by Eric

There’s an old computing maxim that one should “always mount a scratch monkey”. The most commonly found explanation is that of the Jargon File (and thus the New Hacker’s Dictionary), and while the story is amusing, it is also fairly … Continue reading →

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Archivists delete their own archives!

Posted on March 13, 2007 by Eric

From the Too Surreal to be Fiction Department: The Society of American Archivists has decided to delete the archive of their own mailing list! [via BoingBoing] I hadn’t even heard of the SAA, or I’d have joined many years ago, … Continue reading →

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NASA response to my FOIA request

Posted on June 29, 2006 by Eric

I was pleasantly surprised today to receive email from NASA regarding my FOIA request. They sent me PDF files of recent editions (November 2005) of the manuals I requested on the HAL/S programming languages and compilers, which are used for … Continue reading →

Posted in History, Software, Space | 6 Comments

FOIA request to NASA regarding HAL/S programming language

Posted on May 22, 2006 by Eric

I’ve been trying to get a copy of the HAL/S Language Specification for some time. HAL/S is the programming language used for the on-board software of the Space Shuttle. A contact at NASA was able to provide me with a … Continue reading →

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USS Pampanito tour; torpedo data computer; cipher machine

Posted on April 24, 2004 by Eric

This morning a group of Computer History Museum volunteers went on a tour of the USS Pampanito, a WWII-era Balao class Fleet submarine moored in San Franciso. The normal tour is very interesting, and I’d definitely encourage anyone interested in … Continue reading →

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360 Revolution

Posted on April 8, 2004 by Eric

This evening I went to 360 Revolution, the celebration of the 40th Anniversary of IBM System/360 held at the Computer History Museum. There were very good talks by Bob Evans and Dr. Fredrick P. Brooks, Jr..

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