In article ,
Eric R Snow wrote:
On 29 Jul 2005 18:04:46 -0400, (DoN. Nichols)
wrote:

In article ,

[ ... ]

I'm pretty sure Usenet was around WAY before FIDO.

I'm not positive about that -- but they were totally distinct
worlds at that time. Fidonet ran on home computers (probably CP/M ones
at first, followed by IBM-PCs, while usenet was pretty much entirely
based on unix systems -- at first running on shell scripts, before
moving to compiled code.

The first CBBS that I ever experienced was built on a
wire-wrapped 6800 system run by AMRAD (the local ham organization), and
it was also connected to the local 2-meter repeater. I'm pretty sure
that this was before the first usenet messages.

[ ... ]


My Dad's first company built machines for testing integrated circuits
before on the wafer before the wafer was cut into individual "dice".
These machines had large cabinets full of electronics. And there must
have been thousands of feet of wire as many of the components were
connected with wire wrap. The wire wrapped boards were buried behind a
veritable nest of tiny wires. I asked my Dad what they did for trouble
shooting. He said it was very time consuming and expensive. After the
electronics were assembled and tested they were put into an oven for
running at elevated temperature looking for component failures. Then
they would have to delve into the wire wrap nest and replace any
devices that failed. Sheesh!

Yep -- wire wrap was cheaper than custom PC boards in the
onesy-twosey world -- but was a lot of fun to debug. I've done enough
of that on my own hand-built boards.

The board in question was a prototype kit sold by one of the
local electronics supply houses (Avnet, IIRC), and the fellow who built
it added the needed chips to allow serial ports for talking to the
modem, and to the repeater (as well as a local one for maintenance).

Enjoy,
DoN.

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