|
twistedmentat posted:
Reminds me of when I went to historic mission control at JSC a few years ago. In addition to all the "no, those aren't computers" comments the lady said, the one that stuck with me the most was "those things you've put your cell phones in on the chairs weren't made for holding a cell phone. Those are actually ash trays for cigarettes." It was crazy to think that public smoking has almost completely disappeared in the last few years.
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 14:30
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 24, 2024 19:44 |
|
|
Cojawfee posted:Reminds me of when I went to historic mission control at JSC a few years ago. In addition to all the "no, those aren't computers" comments the lady said, the one that stuck with me the most was "those things you've put your cell phones in on the chairs weren't made for holding a cell phone. Those are actually ash trays for cigarettes." It was crazy to think that public smoking has almost completely disappeared in the last few years.  Launch control for the 9 megaton Titan II nuclear missile, complete with ashtray on the left. I guess if you're in that job, concerns about your long term health isn't top of your priorities.
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 14:39
|
|
|
Mister Kingdom posted:Techmoan takes a look at a laser thingy without a laser. He was dismissive about this but I think it's pretty impressive, to be honest. The light beam is surprisingly focused, and the persistence of vision makes it look like there are multiple beams of different colors. It's hard to tell the brightness from a video but it didn't seem too bad when he showed it in the light. I'm kind of surprised there wasn't a focus adjustment like a projector would have though. My dad picked up something similar at a thrift store that had an actual red laser in it. It was mic input only and the movement/brightness wasn't as impressive as this one. It also reminds me of when I was a kid, I would take a small piece of mirror (or a shattered CD or something) and set it directly on the cone of a speaker laying on its back. Then shine a handheld laser at it and watch the light dance on the ceiling.
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 16:46
|
|
|
Cojawfee posted:Reminds me of when I went to historic mission control at JSC a few years ago. In addition to all the "no, those aren't computers" comments the lady said, the one that stuck with me the most was "those things you've put your cell phones in on the chairs weren't made for holding a cell phone. Those are actually ash trays for cigarettes." It was crazy to think that public smoking has almost completely disappeared in the last few years. my dad's a retired air traffic controller, they didn't do systems replacement in the US until ~2000- I remember being a kid and visiting him at work, it was dark and smoky and there were ashtrays hanging off the edge of every workstation- you can't see them here, but it looked something like this:  now they look more like this:  ...complete with the aged workers, since the salary and benefits aren't as good if you're not grandfathered into the initial union deal what I remember the most, though, is that they had a Double Dragon arcade machine set to free play in the cafeteria e: my dream office is a hulking midcentury steel workstation crammed with like twenty modern computers Peanut Butler has a new favorite as of 17:14 on Oct 6, 2019 |
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 17:10
|
|
|
wa27 posted:He was dismissive about this but I think it's pretty impressive, to be honest. The light beam is surprisingly focused, and the persistence of vision makes it look like there are multiple beams of different colors. It's hard to tell the brightness from a video but it didn't seem too bad when he showed it in the light. I'm kind of surprised there wasn't a focus adjustment like a projector would have though. I don't think it was $200 impressive, though.
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 17:28
|
|
|
Personally my dream setup is one of those solid metal monster desks that were made for like 4 typewriters, stacked with the most power computers I can and one enormous 5' wide screen
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 18:25
|
|
|
T-man posted:Personally my dream setup is one of those solid metal monster desks that were made for like 4 typewriters, stacked with the most power computers I can and one enormous 5' wide screen Settle for a 5" screen and you'd be describing one of those computer workstations from the 60s.
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 18:39
|
|
|
Fountain pens are nice, but they either leak with too much use or dry out with too little. The disposable cartridges appear to work well though. It’s not as fun as dipping your pen into a bespoked bottle of ink, but it also works when you want it to.
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 18:40
|
|
|
Krispy Wafer posted:Fountain pens are nice, but they either leak with too much use or dry out with too little. For anyone interested in all this, there's an entire fountain pen megathread in Ask/Tell. https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3531265
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 19:43
|
|
|
Shrieking Muppet posted:I've been told that for some subjects like chemistry or math they had special typewriters just could make up math equations or even chemical structures haven't really looked into though. This is what they used for music notation: 
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 20:47
|
|
|
spookygonk posted:This is what they used for music notation: Wow, I've never seen anything like that. That is cool as hell. Here's one in use: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uctqHxzkNYI
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 21:12
|
|
|
Unperson_47 posted:Wow, I've never seen anything like that. That is cool as hell. It is really cool. Years ago when I first used Sibelius software I remember thinking 'I wonder if they ever had a typewriter for this in the old days....?' then, thinking about it for a bit decided it would be impossibly complicated because of all the variables (which symbol, which line or space, where's the next symbol going to go, how do you choose whether to progress to the next space or put another note on a different line at the same point and so on). Good to know that I wouldn't have hacked it as an old-time typewriter entrepreneur!
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 21:29
|
|
|
Unperson_47 posted:Wow, I've never seen anything like that. That is cool as hell. I ride up to my local coffee shop, park my 3 story bike, pull out my music typewriter, and proceed to type out sheet music for my Noise Music DJ sets until I'm asked to leave (I refuse to leave).
|
|
#
?
Oct 6, 2019 21:54
|
|
|
LifeSunDeath posted:I ride up to my local coffee shop, park my 3 story bike, pull out my music typewriter, and proceed to type out sheet music for my Noise Music DJ sets until I'm asked to leave (I refuse to leave). (it's a very good album)
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2019 00:51
|
|
|
wa27 posted:I'm kind of surprised there wasn't a focus adjustment like a projector would have though. There was a focus wheel on the side with the image size and line level adjustments. I think the point he was trying to make was that when there was no audio input, it was focused and you could make out the bulb's filament on the projector screen, but once the music starts playing and the mirror starts moving, it's no longer in focus. Maybe you could try to set the focus for the average displacement of the mirror or something? 
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2019 01:50
|
|
|
Dr. Garbanzo posted:I teach graphics to high school kids in Australia and while a majority of the course is CAD based there's a section that's entirely manual drafting which I kind of like cause it makes the first steps into CAD far easier. I have a stack of stencils floating around mostly to do with ISO bolts and architechtural items. The sets of elipse templates are the most used though because with the time I have to teach manual drafting teaching kids how to drawing an elipse by hand isn't feasable. I'm glad that manual drafting is still taught. I did graphics in my first year of high school and while I enjoyed it, I didn't stick with it as the teacher said that after the first year you'd do almost no technical drawing (manual or CAD) as it was more about design from then on. The whole reason I even did graphics in the first place was to learn technical drawing, and the ones you do in the first year were pretty basic.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2019 02:20
|
|
|
I was in the last cohort of hand drafting in school and started tech school the year after it was removed from the curriculum. I feel really lucky to have had that initial training because it teaches you a lot about being economical in your drawing when everything is that little bit more effort to draw. Although it's about a million times less productive, it's also just a lot more fun to draft by hand, because you're properly working with your hands instead of just inputting numbers or clicking a mouse. In my final year at school, (2004) we had the option of getting some bonus marks by CAD drafting. However there was only a single computer with AutoCAD LT 95 on it and the teacher knew nothing about how to operate it so no one took it up in the end, though some of us had a go, eventually being defeated by the AutoCAD printer interface.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2019 22:49
|
|
|
Obsolete drawing tech I posted about in the traffic engineering threadJaguars! posted:lol now I'm considering pulling the fire alarm and sending everyone into the rain so I can search the office for our one. (A Planimeter is a device for measuring an area on a piece of paper, there's more about them in the thread) Jaguars! posted:Planimeter A. Ott Kempten
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2019 23:01
|
|
|
That book is 1980s as gently caress.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2019 23:19
|
|
|
Shut up Meg posted:
This gorgeous SAGE station has not only an ashtray but the socket for a lighter.  It's hard to get across just how pervasive smoking was in the sixties and seventies. I feel like I spent much of my childhood sucking down endless clouds of second-hand smoke at home, restaurants, airplanes, it was just everywhere. I mean, your pediatrician might be puffing away during your exam.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2019 23:33
|
|
|
Dick Trauma posted:This gorgeous SAGE station has not only an ashtray but the socket for a lighter. I got to smoke on a bullet train only 4 years ago, it felt like a total throw back but also cyberpunk as hell.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2019 23:44
|
|
|
The world’s first computer game used a telephone dial for move input.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2019 23:45
|
|
|
Makes sense. They probably set it up to move every time it got a move signal, and a rotary phone would be perfect to send the desired number of pulses.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2019 23:52
|
|
|
The game is OXO. The grid was numbered right to left, top to bottom. The player dialled in the grid square in which they wanted to place a piece. The dial was an ordinary feature of the computer EDSAC; it wasn’t a game‐specific peripheral.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2019 23:56
|
|
|
Platystemon posted:The world’s first computer game used a telephone dial for move input.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHQ4WCU1WQc
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2019 00:11
|
|
|
Cojawfee posted:That book is 1980s as gently caress. Having been a rodman on a survey crew, the bent road sign in that illustration was almost certainly in the line of sight from where the surveyor set up the instrument and they just ... persuaded it to the side a bit.
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2019 00:17
|
|
|
These days with many signs being in a socket you just pull the retaining peg out and lay the sign on the ground while you take your shots 
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2019 00:52
|
|
|
1000 Brown M and Ms posted:I'm glad that manual drafting is still taught. I did graphics in my first year of high school and while I enjoyed it, I didn't stick with it as the teacher said that after the first year you'd do almost no technical drawing (manual or CAD) as it was more about design from then on. The whole reason I even did graphics in the first place was to learn technical drawing, and the ones you do in the first year were pretty basic. Jaguars! posted:I was in the last cohort of hand drafting in school and started tech school the year after it was removed from the curriculum. I feel really lucky to have had that initial training because it teaches you a lot about being economical in your drawing when everything is that little bit more effort to draw. Although it's about a million times less productive, it's also just a lot more fun to draft by hand, because you're properly working with your hands instead of just inputting numbers or clicking a mouse. When I did graphics back in 2001 there was a breif moment of computer based CAD but the large majority of the year was manual drafting so we got to do a bunch of stuff that I wouldn't get the kids to do these days. I find that teaching manual drafting for a term helps the kids understand what is going on when they get to computer based CAD as they understand what an ortho and iso drawing are and how they should be laid out and dimensioned to convey information to the viewer. This terms project is drawing and assembling lego bricks which is kinda fun and theres quite a few things baked into lego's design that help with assembling and designing bricks. Everything has the same stud spacing and the bricks all work on ratios for their depth.
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2019 01:10
|
|
|
Dick Trauma posted:It's hard to get across just how pervasive smoking was in the sixties and seventies. I feel like I spent much of my childhood sucking down endless clouds of second-hand smoke at home, restaurants, airplanes, it was just everywhere. I mean, your pediatrician might be puffing away during your exam. A colleague at work (who's a Scottish man in his 50s) said that the doctor who delivered him was smoking during the delivery. That just blows my mind. LifeSunDeath posted:I got to smoke on a bullet train only 4 years ago, it felt like a total throw back but also cyberpunk as hell. Still normal in Japan even now. As advanced as they are in a lot of ways, they're stuck in the past in many other ways.
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2019 01:47
|
|
|
an actual frog posted:Hey you can't just post that and not share the full, hour-long ahoy video This thread should all love (Retro) Ahoy. His content is loving quality. The essays very well put together, and his arguments are very well reasoned.
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2019 02:09
|
|
|
Jaguars! posted:Obsolete drawing tech I posted about in the traffic engineering thread I picked up this kit at a thrift store:  I put it up on eBay with a Buy it Now for $400, and it was gone in 10 minutes.
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2019 12:02
|
|
|
My new partner works for the university I went to over a 15 years ago and searched my records. Turns out a paper I wrote is still being used as as a source and distributed to students as an example of how to do poo poo properly. The best 25 pages I ever spewed out the night before it was due! Granted I DID secure an interview with Ralph H Baer all the way from here in Australia while he was in a bad way with Leukemia (I think). He was super accommodating and sent all sorts of technical documentation about the Brown Box and some evidence showing Nolan Bushnell is a sneaky loving thief stealing the idea of Pong. I'll check tomorrow and see if she can bring up a copy of the whole paper. Humphreys has a new favorite as of 13:50 on Oct 8, 2019 |
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2019 13:25
|
|
|
an actual frog posted:Hey you can't just post that and not share the full, hour-long ahoy video Another way to look at the issue is as analogous to biological taxonomy. “Video games” comprise a clade. What is the common ancestor to today’s video games? It’s Spacewar!, which happens to be a far more interesting specimen than the re‐implemented boardgames that predate it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 9, 2019 01:17
|
|
|
You drat kids with your CADs and your CAMs and those accursed computer things. Behold the Mergenthaler Diagrammer: https://vimeo.com/75532300
|
|
#
?
Oct 9, 2019 12:32
|
|
|
Ah, a "sleeves up" approach. How refreshing. The keyboard does look like the grandfather of the optimus, the one with the oled displays in each key.
|
|
#
?
Oct 9, 2019 14:04
|
|
|
Sweevo posted:You drat kids with your CADs and your CAMs and those accursed computer things. Behold the Mergenthaler Diagrammer: Dang, this is neat
|
|
#
?
Oct 9, 2019 15:19
|
|
|
Platystemon posted:Another way to look at the issue is as analogous to biological taxonomy. The video refutes this assertion.
|
|
#
?
Oct 9, 2019 15:28
|
|
|
Guy Axlerod posted:Ah, a "sleeves up" approach. How refreshing. The keyboard does look like the grandfather of the optimus, the one with the oled displays in each key. For a hot minute it was cool and then I realized I didn't really need 10 widgets on my keyboard aside from like a volume control.
|
|
#
?
Oct 9, 2019 16:00
|
|
|
FilthyImp posted:Did that ever come out? I think they made a few. At least I remember seeing it be on sale. Though it was too rich for my blood.
|
|
#
?
Oct 9, 2019 16:05
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 24, 2024 19:44 |
|
|
Wasabi the J posted:The video refutes this assertion. Not to mention there are computer video games whose lineage can be meaningfully traced back to computer non-video games. For any reasonable definition of video game, at least.
|
|
#
?
Oct 9, 2019 16:35
|
|
