On 3/11/2012 9:21 PM, Doug Winterburn wrote:

My first comp (it wasn't really mine as I had just signed on with Big
Blue) was an IBM 360/30 in 1966. A mainframe with 8K of core memory and
a card reader/punch, a chain printer and a huge 3MB removable disc.

The software was a card assembler. That sucker was proudly displayed in
the IBM building in Seattle behind glass walls on the ground floor for
all to marvel. It did have a console with lots of switches and little
blinky lights (not leds).




That was the machine I first learned Fortran on (1972).

One fellow, struggling to put himself through college had created a
generic set of cards which he would rearrange to create new programs.

I thought that was pretty cool.