"Karl Townsend" wrote in message
...
...
Thanks for the tips, Don. FWIW, Fortran is what I learned in college.
Actually, I took a course, but never really learned it, because we had
exactly two computers on campus, both of which were IBM 360s. I think it
was Tuesdays that I had to turn in my punch cards at the computer
center.
On Monday, I'd get my output -- which almost always had an error or two.
g

You could go a month or more getting one program to run right. That
meant
four tries. It's a wonder we learned anything then, huh?

--
Ed Huntress
I remember those days. I took it again many years later and was able to
use
a compiler that ran on a PC.

I may have been one of the first computer hackers. I noticed a
Doctoral candidate submit a stack of punch cards, two full boxes, to
the computer operator for the IBM 360. I was punching up a large stack
for my GPSS (general purpose simulation system) class. That person
came back in only two hours!

Next day, I struck up a conversation and asked to see her header
cards, I must have something wrong. Anyway, started using those
mysterious codes and getting my runs back in two hours. I aced that
class and was even recognized by the prof. as writing some of the best
code he'd seen.

Karl

Heh, heh....I wasn't devious enough to do things like that. At least, not
then. d8-)

That whole experience turned me off about programming. It wasn't until I got
my first Apple II+ and started programming in BASIC that I regained any
interest.

Then I got a RS M100 laptop and really started to have fun. I wrote a
merchandise-distribution program for my wife -- she was a fashion buyer for
26 retail stores -- in assembly, which saved her and her staff 30 hours or
so per week. So the company's IT department asked if they could convert it
for use on their minicomputers. I said sure, and gave it to them.

But I had written it for the 80C85, using all of the commands, and they
couldn't make head nor tail out of it. My wife continued to run it on the RS
M100. g

--
Ed Huntress