From: bill_h Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: Sat, 31 Oct 1998 06:56:51 -0800 Organization: http://www.supernews.com, The World's Usenet: Discussions Start Here Lines: 76 Message-ID: <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> References: <7188v7$iij$1@saturn.bton.ac.uk> <3646cad2.560941425@206.210.64.12> Reply-To: bill_h@azstarnet.com NNTP-Posting-Host: 169.197.34.177 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: 909842463 W4NEQTDLS22B1A9C5C usenet57.supernews.com X-Complaints-To: newsabuse@supernews.com X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.04Gold (Win16; I) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!feeder.qis.net!newsfeed-east.supernews.com!supernews.com!Supernews69!not-for-mail Joseph M. Newcomer wrote: > > Every once in a while, I find a post by some young programmers > lamenting the existence of Windows and talking about the Good Old Days > when Programmers were Programmers, and could poke the memory of their > (TRS-80, Apple I, SOL, Atari). Guys, you don't know what you're > talking about! ..... ...... > What is amusing is that when the microprocessor was introduced, there > was a lot of lamenting by all the folks who missed the "golden age" of > mainframe computing. "Introduced"? Like, 1972-4? Even up into the early 80's, those I worked with who had main frame access plotted and schemed ways of hooking their 'micros' into the massive databases available on the mainframes, or uploaded a program or two for calculation at speeds that took seconds, then downloading the results back to their 'micros', which would have been chugging away for weeks to come up with the same answers if they had been tasked for the job instead.... Not many mainframe jobs even FIT on micros for quite a few years after their introduction. The fact that a 16k 8080 computed ANYTHING was pretty marvelous. Don't know ANYBODY who gave up mainframes for THAT....... ...... > Comments abound about the glories of being able to poke about in the > memory dealing with raw hex values, as if this is an activity that has > any meaning. Been there, done that. Don't ever need to do it again. > And there is NO value in groveling over hex dumps. By hex dumps, I > don't mean some interactive thingy that lets you look in memory and > see what is there, or examine a post-mortem crash dump like a 'core' > file. I mean the sort of listing that is about 2" thick, line after > line of hex numbers, and which represents your only output for that > day. .... Folks, this is exactly the kind of arrogance that allows shipping a product with THOUSANDS of known bugs! Those nasty little ones_and_zeros can KILL! If SOMEBODY doesn't take the time and trouble to ferret them out, they will not go away by themselves, and sooner or later some customer's program will crash. > .........Try debugging a FORTRAN program that has taken a numeric > underflow and the only evidence is a program counter, a link map, and > 200 pages of hex characters. Do you know how to decode a hexadecimal > floating point number? Can you do it without a hex calculator? That's > what the Good Old Days were, and I'm VERY glad to be rid of them! Ever heard of BREAKPOINTS? Talk about mixed metaphors! hex dumping a FORTRAN PROGRAM???????? FORTRAN happens to be a COMPILED LANGUAGE. You can't even begin to trace the results of a hex dump without one hell of a lot of knowledge about the COMPILER. There IS NO TRACEABILITY from a hex dump to FORTRAN SOURCE without considering and studying and debugging the COMPILER! I think we're being trolled. > But computers are still a passion with me. I just don't see how > passion for understanding computers is equated with misery in using > them. Lack of understanding may come pretty naturally for this person. > Joseph M. Newcomer > newcomer@flounder.com > http://www3.pgh.net/~newcomer BINGO! ###### From: "George R. Gonzalez" Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: Sat, 31 Oct 1998 10:37:56 -0600 Organization: SkyPoint Communications, Inc. Lines: 85 Message-ID: <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net> References: <7188v7$iij$1@saturn.bton.ac.uk> <3646cad2.560941425@206.210.64.12> <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: dial007.skypoint.net Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newsgate.cistron.nl!het.net!news-feed.inet.tele.dk!bofh.vszbr.cz!howland.erols.net!news.pagesat.net!skypoint.com!not-for-mail bill_h wrote in message <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com>... >Ever heard of BREAKPOINTS? This was batch processing.. You could insert "CALL DUMP" statements to dump out memory, but you were not around to inspect/modify the data in real time. So no breakpoints. >Talk about mixed metaphors! hex dumping a FORTRAN PROGRAM???????? > >FORTRAN happens to be a COMPILED LANGUAGE. Soooo? Let's go back to 1970, at a certain university computer center help desk. A student comes in with a dump from their FORTRAN program. Oh oh, point him to Don, the dump expert. Don looks at the heading "MODE 1 ERROR at 01744". MODE 1 on a Cyber means address out of range. A look at address 01744 and a quick peek at the pocket reference card shows a SA2 B2. We look at the address registers, hmmm, A2 has 777743 octal in it. That's a negative address, impossible on this machine that has a whopping 131K. B2 is where the first subroutine parameter gets passed. Must be a bad first parameter. A peek at X0 shows 00155 octal. This compiler puts the line number of the current statement in register X0 bfore executing the statement, so we know the program died at line 109 due to a bad first parameter. A quick look at the program listing shows the guy is using an unset variable as a subscript, resulting in the negative address getting passed. Voila, we've figured out the problem from a memory and register dump. We didnt have to know a *great* deal about the compiler's code generation, just that X0 holds the line number, paramaters are passed in B registers, and a negative A register is a major boo-boo. Another cute thing you could do with dumps is to look at the first 100 words. There the system wold put the names of each open file, and octal pointers into the I/O buffers. You could follow these pointers and see exactly what input and output the program had attempted to do before the crash. It was very helpful to see what WRITE statement the program had last made it to. This took even less special knowledge, regular users quickly caught on to this trick. Around 1974 better symbolic debugging tools became available, so dump reading became more of an obscure art. But it was still necessary when the crash was inside the compiler, linker, or run-time routines. --------- As a side note, IMHO we've made huge reverse progress, in 1974 we could get a call traceback: SUBROUTINE XXX WAS CALLED FROM LINE YYY OF SUBROUTINE ZZZ CALLED FROM LINE QQQ OF ..... There's plenty of modern languages that don't even give us that. You can't even begin >to trace the results of a hex dump without one hell of a lot >of knowledge about the COMPILER. There IS NO TRACEABILITY from >a hex dump to FORTRAN SOURCE without considering and studying >and debugging the COMPILER! > >I think we're being trolled. > >> But computers are still a passion with me. I just don't see how >> passion for understanding computers is equated with misery in using >> them. > >Lack of understanding may come pretty naturally for this person. > >> Joseph M. Newcomer >> newcomer@flounder.com >> http://www3.pgh.net/~newcomer > >BINGO! > ###### From: jmfbahciv@aol.com Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: Sat, 31 Oct 98 14:02:40 GMT Organization: UltraNet Communications, Inc. Lines: 27 Message-ID: <71f69f$v9c$2@strato.ultra.net> References: <7188v7$iij$1@saturn.bton.ac.uk> <3646cad2.560941425@206.210.64.12> <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: d14.dial-16.mbo.ma.ultra.net X-Complaints-To: abuse@ultra.net X-Ultra-Time: 31 Oct 1998 14:19:27 GMT X-Newsreader: News Xpress Version 1.0 Beta #4 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.xcom.net!news.ultranet.com!d14 In article <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com>, bill_h wrote: >Joseph M. Newcomer wrote: >> .........Try debugging a FORTRAN program that has taken a numeric >> underflow and the only evidence is a program counter, a link map, and >> 200 pages of hex characters. Do you know how to decode a hexadecimal >> floating point number? Can you do it without a hex calculator? That's >> what the Good Old Days were, and I'm VERY glad to be rid of them! > >Ever heard of BREAKPOINTS? > >Talk about mixed metaphors! hex dumping a FORTRAN PROGRAM???????? I feel sorry for him...he's obviously an IBMer and never got to do real debugging on a timesharing system.... /BAH Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail. ###### From: ab528@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Heinz W. Wiggeshoff) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: 31 Oct 1998 17:02:53 GMT Organization: The National Capital FreeNet Lines: 16 Message-ID: <71ffrt$juh@freenet-news.carleton.ca> References: <7188v7$iij$1@saturn.bton.ac.uk> <3646cad2.560941425@206.210.64.12> <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net> Reply-To: ab528@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Heinz W. Wiggeshoff) NNTP-Posting-Host: freenet5.carleton.ca X-Given-Sender: ab528@freenet5.carleton.ca (Heinz W. Wiggeshoff) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-lond.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!news-feed.inet.tele.dk!bofh.vszbr.cz!newspeer.monmouth.com!news.new-york.net!nntp.frontiernet.net!node17.frontiernet.net!xcski.com!freenet-news.carleton.ca!FreeNet.Carleton.CA!ab528 "George R. Gonzalez" (grg@foundsys.com) writes: > > Soooo? Let's go back to 1970, at a certain university computer center > help desk. > A student comes in with a dump from their FORTRAN program. Oh oh, point > him to Don, the dump expert. Don looks at the heading "MODE 1 ERROR at > 01744". MODE 1 on a Cyber means address out of range. ^^^^^ I see the source of your dilemma. In Ye Old Days, I NEVER compiled a Fortran IV program without running it through Watfor (on Queen's 360/50) or Watfiv (on SDL's 360/85 and later 370s). Sad that anyone would consider running on anything else. B-) ###### Message-ID: <363CDAC3.114A@gazonk.del> Date: Sun, 01 Nov 1998 17:03:47 -0500 From: "Foobar T. Clown" Organization: Blurp X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.01 (WinNT; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? References: <7188v7$iij$1@saturn.bton.ac.uk> <3646cad2.560941425@206.210.64.12> <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit NNTP-Posting-Host: 198.133.110.49 X-Trace: 1 Nov 1998 17:04:21 -0500, 198.133.110.49 Lines: 42 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!ix.netcom.com!zeus.nomos.com!198.133.110.49 bill_h wrote: > Joseph M. Newcomer wrote: > > Comments abound about the glories of being able to poke about in > > the memory dealing with raw hex values, as if this is an activity > > that has any meaning. Been there, done that. Don't ever need to do > > it again. > > Folks, this is exactly the kind of arrogance that allows shipping > a product with THOUSANDS of known bugs! Excuse me, but the gentleman is saying, he *USED* to do that, but today, he has more effective ways to find bugs... > Ever heard of BREAKPOINTS? ...For example, breakpoints. When Joe got started in programming, you set a breakpoint by using the front panel switches to deposit a halt instruction on top of the target, you single stepped by pressing a switch on the console, and you monitored variables by reading the binary console lights. But of course, you rarely got do do those things because other people were waiting for their precious turn to use the computer. > Talk about mixed metaphors! hex dumping a FORTRAN PROGRAM???????? I am slightly more than half Joe's age, but I've had to interpret hex dumps from Fortran programs, from C code, and from other compiled languages. It sucked, but sometimes it was the only way to find the bug. > FORTRAN happens to be a COMPILED LANGUAGE. You can't even begin to > trace the results of a hex dump without one hell of a lot of > knowledge about the COMPILER. Hey pal! If you don't know how to find where the compiler puts your variables in memory, then you're still riding with training wheels. I don't care if you never have to actually do it. There is a level of programming knowlege that you can't rise above without learning how compilers work. ###### From: ab528@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Heinz W. Wiggeshoff) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: 1 Nov 1998 22:49:02 GMT Organization: The National Capital FreeNet Lines: 29 Message-ID: <71iogu$a09@freenet-news.carleton.ca> References: <7188v7$iij$1@saturn.bton.ac.uk> <3646cad2.560941425@206.210.64.12> <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> <363CDAC3.114A@gazonk.del> Reply-To: ab528@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Heinz W. Wiggeshoff) NNTP-Posting-Host: freenet5.carleton.ca X-Given-Sender: ab528@freenet5.carleton.ca (Heinz W. Wiggeshoff) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newsgate.cistron.nl!het.net!news.tele2.nl!newsfeed1.swip.net!swipnet!newsfeed.cwix.com!198.138.0.5!newshub.northeast.verio.net!newsserver.jvnc.net!post.servtech.com!xcski.com!freenet-news.carleton.ca!FreeNet.Carleton.CA!ab528 "Foobar T. Clown" (foobar@gazonk.del) writes: > > Hey pal! If you don't know how to find where the compiler puts your > variables in memory, then you're still riding with training wheels. I > don't care if you never have to actually do it. There is a level of > programming knowlege that you can't rise above without learning how > compilers work. Don't be too hard on Mr. WetBehindTheEars. In Ye Good Old Years, the hardware and software shipped (from IBM /360 et al) came with copious quntities of manuals, eg. Principles of Operation Fortran / Cobol / PL/1 Language Reference Manual (the rules) User's Guide (sometimes; hints and techniques) Programmer's Guide and rarely Logic Manual Linkage Editor and Loader Guide Guide to Debugging (ie. how to read a dump - and I'm not talking copraphilia here). Storage Estimates, MFT/MVT Control Blocks plus the Abend manuals would enable one to resolve all but hardware problems, given enough time and skill. NOWADAYS - what does one get with IBM's OS/2 Warp 4 for documentation? ###### Message-ID: <363DBC38.704C@gazonk.del> Date: Mon, 02 Nov 1998 09:05:44 -0500 From: "Foobar T. Clown" Organization: Blurp X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.01 (WinNT; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? References: <7188v7$iij$1@saturn.bton.ac.uk> <3646cad2.560941425@206.210.64.12> <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> <363CDAC3.114A@gazonk.del> <71iogu$a09@freenet-news.carleton.ca> <363D022F.F1CA7E8D@one.net.au> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit NNTP-Posting-Host: 198.133.110.49 X-Trace: 2 Nov 1998 09:06:20 -0500, 198.133.110.49 Lines: 16 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!howland.erols.net!ix.netcom.com!zeus.nomos.com!198.133.110.49 Andrew Maizels wrote: > > Heinz W. Wiggeshoff wrote: > > NOWADAYS - what does one get with IBM's OS/2 Warp 4 for > > documentation? > > Yeah, I really hate this trend. Once upon a time, you got manuals > which were actually useful for something. On paper. Which you > could *read*. Then, there's the Microsoft Developer's Network documentation which makes you wonder where you'll find space on your bookshelf for all of those CDs. I shudder at the thought of having to search through it all for some vital bit of information. ###### Message-ID: <363D022F.F1CA7E8D@one.net.au> Date: Mon, 02 Nov 1998 11:51:59 +1100 From: Andrew Maizels Reply-To: andrew@one.net.au Organization: PixyMisa Mining and Manufacturing Corporation X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.07 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? References: <7188v7$iij$1@saturn.bton.ac.uk> <3646cad2.560941425@206.210.64.12> <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> <363CDAC3.114A@gazonk.del> <71iogu$a09@freenet-news.carleton.ca> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Lines: 21 NNTP-Posting-Host: cyan.one.net.au Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newsfeed.wirehub.nl!howland.erols.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.news.gtei.net!cam-news-feed2.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!news.shore.net!uunet!in4.uu.net!news-hk.telia.net!d2o501.telia.com!news-hk.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!203.17.224.157.MISMATCH!pink.one.net.au!shampoo!192.168.11.5 Heinz W. Wiggeshoff wrote: > Guide to Debugging (ie. how to read a dump - and I'm not talking > copraphilia here). Coprology? Or is that *writing* a dump? No, that's coprography. Someone help me out here! > NOWADAYS - what does one get with IBM's OS/2 Warp 4 for documentation? Yeah, I really hate this trend. Once upon a time, you got manuals which were actually useful for something. On paper. Which you could *read*. Now, if you're lucky, you get to pay the bookshop 2x the software list price for the manuals it should have come with. If you're unlucky, they just don't exist nowhere. -- Andrew Maizels Senior Technical Officer (STO/3) One.Net Software Development Services 4th Pacific Battalion - "We Live to Code" ###### From: lisard@zetnet.co.uk Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: 2 Nov 1998 17:00:50 GMT Lines: 48 Message-ID: <71kog2$ouu$10@irk.zetnet.co.uk> References: <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: man-029.dialup.zetnet.co.uk X-Trace: irk.zetnet.co.uk 910026050 25566 194.247.41.36 (2 Nov 1998 17:00:50 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: 2 Nov 1998 17:00:50 GMT X-Everything: Net-Tamer V 1.08X Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!feed1.news.luth.se!luth.se!news-stkh.gip.net!news-lond.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!demeter.clara.net!news.clara.net!peer.news.zetnet.net!zetnet.co.uk!not-for-mail In a generally execrable post, this bit really caught my eye. On 1998-10-31 bill_h@azstarnet.com said: :> .........Try debugging a FORTRAN program that has taken a numeric :> underflow and the only evidence is a program counter, a link map, :>and 200 pages of hex characters. Do you know how to decode a :>hexadecimal floating point number? Can you do it without a hex :>calculator? That's what the Good Old Days were, and I'm VERY glad :to be rid of them! :Ever heard of BREAKPOINTS? Breakpoints aren't much use if you don't even know when your program is going to get run, let alone have a console to execute it from. Your mind seems to be very firmly stuck in the mode of interactive computing. :Talk about mixed metaphors! hex dumping a FORTRAN PROGRAM???????? I've dome (partial) hex dumps of the stacks of C programs to thread back from them. Enough to admire anyone who can follow through the hex dump of an entire program. :FORTRAN happens to be a COMPILED LANGUAGE. You can't even begin :to trace the results of a hex dump without one hell of a lot :of knowledge about the COMPILER. There IS NO TRACEABILITY from :a hex dump to FORTRAN SOURCE without considering and studying :and debugging the COMPILER! ??? What rot. If you have the symbol table (which you probably got from the compiler), you can go find the routines. It's all just opcodes by then anyway, so unravelling the mess of a compiler is probably no harder than unravelling the mess of a hand coder. Probably easier, because the compiler won't be giving you optimal code. Also, Fortran tended not to use a stack, so you knew where all the variables were, including arguments to functions and such. Given that, traceability can be pretty good overall. :I think we're being trolled. To whom does this statement refer? Him, or yourself? Perhaps you should withdraw head from arse and develop the imagination to put yourself in the place of someone working before such niceties as the ability to sit down at a terminal and start a debugger were commonplace. -- Communa (of the sir-you're-a-moron league) you know soft spoken changes nothing to sing within her... ###### From: lisard@zetnet.co.uk Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: 2 Nov 1998 17:00:54 GMT Lines: 14 Message-ID: <71kog6$ouu$11@irk.zetnet.co.uk> References: <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: man-029.dialup.zetnet.co.uk X-Trace: irk.zetnet.co.uk 910026054 25566 194.247.41.36 (2 Nov 1998 17:00:54 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: 2 Nov 1998 17:00:54 GMT X-Everything: Net-Tamer V 1.08X Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newsfeed.wirehub.nl!btnet-peer!btnet-feed1!btnet!peer.news.zetnet.net!zetnet.co.uk!not-for-mail On 1998-10-31 grg@foundsys.com said: :As a side note, IMHO we've made huge reverse progress, in 1974 we :could get a call traceback: SUBROUTINE XXX WAS CALLED FROM LINE :YYY OF SUBROUTINE ZZZ CALLED FROM LINE QQQ OF ..... :There's plenty of modern languages that don't even give us that. I'll say Amen to that! Just the idea of having a register containing the line number of the line in question... and the Cybers weren't register rich, either. What was the code quality like...? -- Communa (together) we remember... we'll see you falling you know soft spoken changes nothing to sing within her... ###### From: timothy.mccaffrey@spam2filter.unisys.com.takethisoff (Tim McCaffrey) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: 2 Nov 1998 19:45:08 GMT Organization: A series networking Lines: 34 Message-ID: <71l244$qss$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> References: <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net> <71kog6$ouu$11@irk.zetnet.co.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: mccafftm.tr.unisys.com X-Newsreader: WinVN 0.99.9 (Released Version) (x86 32bit) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newsfeed.wirehub.nl!diablo.theplanet.net!news-lond.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!newsfeed.cwix.com!192.61.103.81!eanews1!plnews.pl.unisys.com!not-for-mail In article <71kog6$ouu$11@irk.zetnet.co.uk>, lisard@zetnet.co.uk says... > > > >I'll say Amen to that! Just the idea of having a register containing the >line number of the line in question... and the Cybers weren't register >rich, either. What was the code quality like...? >-- >Communa (together) we remember... we'll see you falling >you know soft spoken changes nothing to sing within her... The code quality was usually excellent. I remember a time that I was asked if a certain routine could be optimized that the Fortran compiler had produced. For the life of me, I couldn't see anything worthwhile. (Part of the reason for this is that the CPU was so much faster than the memory). OTOH, there was this time somebody came in with a program that counted how many bits where on in a word, and they were using a EXP/LN function set to it (the POP count instruction would do it in 2 cycles). That program was rather easy to speed up. BTW, I did plenty of dump reading on the 6500 and Cyber 750. It was pretty easy (its amazing how fast you could memorize the octal encodings of the instruction set). However, I must admit I have been spoiled by the Burroughs/Unisys A series. Debugging on Micros is a pain. PC's, Windows, C, and x86 architecture has set Computer Science back 30 years. Tim McCaffrey NOT the opinion of Unisys. ###### Message-ID: <363F17DA.3DE1@gazonk.del> Date: Tue, 03 Nov 1998 09:48:58 -0500 From: "Foobar T. Clown" Organization: Blurp X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.01 (WinNT; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? References: <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net> <71kog6$ouu$11@irk.zetnet.co.uk> <71l244$qss$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit NNTP-Posting-Host: 198.133.110.49 X-Trace: 3 Nov 1998 09:49:35 -0500, 198.133.110.49 Lines: 22 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newsgate.cistron.nl!het.net!news-feed.inet.tele.dk!bofh.vszbr.cz!howland.erols.net!ix.netcom.com!zeus.nomos.com!198.133.110.49 Tim McCaffrey wrote: > > Debugging on Micros is a pain. Can't find the right adaptor for your in-circuit emulator? Seriously, what do you mean by "micros," and what are you comparing them to that is or was so much better? > PC's, Windows, C, and x86 architecture has set Computer Science > back 30 years. That's a pretty broad statement. Somewhat exaggerated too, since most of those things are less than thirty years old. The only part of it I can agree with is that Microsoft has probably slowed progress down a bit. I've always suspected that there must be kids out there who would have contributed to computer science if they hadn't got lost reading Microsoft manuals. I picture them, in their final year of college, wishing they had signed up for "72-402: Advanced DirectX Programming," struggling to catch up with the latest SDKs and "technologies," and wondering whether they should have listened to dad and studied accounting instead. ###### From: "Samael" Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: Tue, 3 Nov 1998 11:11:55 -0000 Lines: 17 Message-ID: <363ee4fc.0@127.0.0.1> References: <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net> <71kog6$ouu$11@irk.zetnet.co.uk> <71l244$qss$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 194.126.84.8 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3155.0 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3155.0 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newsgate.cistron.nl!het.net!news-feed.inet.tele.dk!bofh.vszbr.cz!nntp.news.xara.net!xara.net!news.itg.net.uk!127.0.0.1!192.168.0.1 Tim McCaffrey wrote in message <71l244$qss$1@mail.pl.unisys.com>... >In article <71kog6$ouu$11@irk.zetnet.co.uk>, lisard@zetnet.co.uk says... >> >Debugging on Micros is a pain. PC's, Windows, C, and x86 architecture >has set Computer Science back 30 years. Maybe it's just me, but I find debugging very easy on my PC. Maybe its because I'm running Foxpro (Msofts xbase variant) and I _can_ set up breakpoints and run traces, look at the call stack and change variables in realtime, but I don't see what the problem is. Samael ###### From: colincampbell@my-dejanews.com Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: Tue, 03 Nov 1998 20:22:59 GMT Organization: Deja News - The Leader in Internet Discussion Lines: 17 Message-ID: <71non3$55b$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com> References: <7188v7$iij$1@saturn.bton.ac.uk> <3646cad2.560941425@206.210.64.12> <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> <363CDAC3.114A@gazonk.del> <71iogu$a09@freenet-news.carleton.ca> <363D022F.F1CA7E8D@one.net.au> NNTP-Posting-Host: 139.142.50.74 X-Article-Creation-Date: Tue Nov 03 20:22:59 1998 GMT X-Http-User-Agent: Mozilla/4.5 [en] (Win98; I) X-Http-Proxy: 1.0 x5.dejanews.com:80 (Squid/1.1.22) for client 139.142.50.74 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!feed1.news.luth.se!luth.se!cyclone.news.idirect.com!island.idirect.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.cwix.com!204.238.120.130!news-feeds.jump.net!nntp2.dejanews.com!nnrp1.dejanews.com!not-for-mail In article <363D022F.F1CA7E8D@one.net.au>, andrew@one.net.au wrote: > Heinz W. Wiggeshoff wrote: > > Guide to Debugging (ie. how to read a dump - and I'm not talking > > copraphilia here). > > Coprology? Or is that *writing* a dump? No, that's coprography. > Someone help me out here! > I would guess that coprolysis might be the word. Coprophilia implies that you *like* busting dumps. I suppose the very old, rather small ones on the pile of printout in the corner would be copro-lite.... -- Ecc. 12:13-14 -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ###### From: timothy.mccaffrey@spam2filter.unisys.com.takethisoff (Tim McCaffrey) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: 3 Nov 1998 22:04:36 GMT Organization: A series networking Lines: 67 Message-ID: <71nulk$npp$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> References: <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net> <71kog6$ouu$11@irk.zetnet.co.uk> <71l244$qss$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> <363F17DA.3DE1@gazonk.del> NNTP-Posting-Host: 192.63.213.73 X-Newsreader: WinVN 0.99.9 (Released Version) (x86 32bit) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!newscore.univie.ac.at!btnet-peer!btnet!newsfeed.cwix.com!192.61.103.81!eanews1!plnews.pl.unisys.com!not-for-mail In article <363F17DA.3DE1@gazonk.del>, foobar@gazonk.del says... > >Tim McCaffrey wrote: >> >> Debugging on Micros is a pain. > >Can't find the right adaptor for your in-circuit emulator? Seriously, >what do you mean by "micros," and what are you comparing them to that is >or was so much better? > > >> PC's, Windows, C, and x86 architecture has set Computer Science >> back 30 years. > >That's a pretty broad statement. Somewhat exaggerated too, since most >of those things are less than thirty years old. The only part of it I >can agree with is that Microsoft has probably slowed progress down a >bit. I've always suspected that there must be kids out there who would >have contributed to computer science if they hadn't got lost reading >Microsoft manuals. I picture them, in their final year of college, >wishing they had signed up for "72-402: Advanced DirectX Programming," >struggling to catch up with the latest SDKs and "technologies," and >wondering whether they should have listened to dad and studied >accounting instead. I think it is thirty years, because it'll take another 10 years to get things back to the point they were in the late 70s. I looked at many a program in the late 70s/early 80s from system programmers, and there was something that is missing from modern software. I believe it was because they sat down and designed things with a great deal of thought before they started writing code. Data structures were designed for efficient space utilization, and to allow easy optimization of code. (You may argue that we don't have to worry about bits, since memory is so cheap. How you use the cache is still important, and wasting bits will impact performance sooner or later). The PC architecture is not very well thought out, but in another 10 years Intel, Microsoft, et al should have managed to ditch ISA, Sound Blaster, VGA, 8086/286 compatibility and probably serial/parallel ports. That *will* clean things up a great deal. I find Pascal better than C, but Pascal is pretty much out of the picture these days (except for Delphi, which I think is great). Pascal's pointer types are more "secure" than C, and C enums are a joke. Java is an improvement, but I haven't used it enough to really buy into it yet. Modern IDEs are nice, that I have no objection to. However, what happens when the customer runs into a bug? Getting a Protection violation without a lot of back up information isn't very helpful. On the A series (and any other mainframe I've looked at) you usually get an indication of the line where the problem occurred, a memory dump is usually available (although it may be optional) and there is a comprehensive system log, which tracks all of the actions external (file I/O, memory used, CPU time used) to your program, nicely timestamped. All of which are tremendously helpful in tracking down problems (actually, I usually can do it just from the line number, but the logs help many times as well). The CDC systems had similar, if not exactly the same capabilities, and I would imagine IBM 390 systems do as well. NT is getting there, but the NT admin class I took basically said that logging was a big performance hog, and if you aren't debugging something, turn it off. (Oh, my fortune teller said there would be system crash today, I better turn on system logging!). Oh golly, I think I have had a button pushed :). All the above is strictly my opinion. Tim McCaffrey ###### From: "Samael" Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: Wed, 4 Nov 1998 10:23:47 -0000 Lines: 26 Message-ID: <36402b34.0@127.0.0.1> References: <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net> <71kog6$ouu$11@irk.zetnet.co.uk> <71l244$qss$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> <363F17DA.3DE1@gazonk.del> <71nulk$npp$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 195.147.8.77 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3155.0 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3155.0 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!nntp.news.xara.net!xara.net!news.itg.net.uk!127.0.0.1!192.168.0.1 Tim McCaffrey wrote in message <71nulk$npp$1@mail.pl.unisys.com>... >The PC architecture is not very well thought out, but in another 10 years >Intel, Microsoft, et al should have managed to ditch ISA, Sound Blaster, VGA, >8086/286 compatibility and probably serial/parallel ports. That *will* clean >things up a great deal. My PC doesn't use any of its ISA slots, my sound card does nto emulate SB, my 3D card isn't VGA compatible and my 2D card only supports the original VGA spec for backwards compatibility. Windows 95/98/NT all require 386's or above (NT requires a Pentium). Serial ports are trickier, as my ISDN card emulates a serial port. I actually find this handy for sending AT command directly to it with HyperTerminal, but I see no reason why you shouldn't be able to have a modem on a USB connection. We are nearly there, but the reason why people are sticking to their Wintel PC's _is_ backwards compatiblity. I wouldn't have upgraded to Windows 98 if I couldn't have carried on playing all my old games (well, the more recent ones anyway) and running all my old software. Samael ###### From: rrt@amadeus.austx.tandem.com (Robert Teisberg) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: 4 Nov 1998 14:03:24 -0600 Organization: Compaq Computer Corp. Tandem Division, Austin, TX Lines: 19 Message-ID: <71qbuc$gp6@amadeus.austx.tandem.com> References: <7188v7$iij$1@saturn.bton.ac.uk> <3646cad2.560941425@206.210.64.12> <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: amadeus.austx.tandem.com Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.wli.net!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!su-news-feed1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsgate.tandem.com!news.mpd!not-for-mail In article <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net>, George R. Gonzalez wrote: > >Another cute thing you could do with dumps is to look at the first 100 >words. Of course, today's whipper-snappers probably need to be reminded that you mean 100 octal. Real Programmers know from context whether 100 is octal or hex. If it's decimal, of course, they'll say so explicitly. Thanks, George, for the trip down memory lane. -- Bob Teisberg @ Compaq | robert.teisberg @ compaq . com 14231 Tandem Blvd. | Austin, Texas 78728-6699 | (512) 432-8119 Me? Speak for Compaq? I'm not even allowed to speak for my cat. ###### From: sam@greenaum.demonARSE!ARSE!ARSE!.co.uk (Sam.) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: Thu, 05 Nov 1998 22:09:54 GMT Organization: Rossum's Universal Robots Message-ID: <364a201b.2274602@158.152.254.68> References: <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net> <71kog6$ouu$11@irk.zetnet.co.uk> <71l244$qss$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> <363F17DA.3DE1@gazonk.del> <71nulk$npp$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> <36402b34.0@127.0.0.1> Reply-To: sam@greenaum.demonARSE!ARSE!ARSE!.co.uk NNTP-Posting-Host: greenaum.demon.co.uk X-NNTP-Posting-Host: greenaum.demon.co.uk:194.222.71.189 X-Trace: news.demon.co.uk 910303809 nnrp-04:18834 NO-IDENT greenaum.demon.co.uk:194.222.71.189 X-Complaints-To: abuse@demon.net X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.452 X-No-Archive: yes MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Lines: 25 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!howland.erols.net!newsfeed1.swip.net!swipnet!diablo.theplanet.net!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!news.demon.co.uk!demon!greenaum.demon.co.uk!not-for-mail On Wed, 4 Nov 1998 10:23:47 -0000, "Samael" sprachen: >My PC doesn't use any of its ISA slots, my sound card does nto emulate SB, >my 3D card isn't VGA compatible and my 2D card only supports the original >VGA spec for backwards compatibility. So, games that write straight to it's registers won't work then? It doesn't do mode 13, or CGA and EGA emulation? I couldn't boot DOS off a floppy and play Wolfenstein on your PC? You still have those ISA slots don't you, and if you didn't you could always buy a PCI adapter. >We are nearly there, but the reason why people are sticking to their Wintel >PC's _is_ backwards compatiblity. No it's because they're damn cheap. The amount of PCs in the world must have doubled in the last couple of years. It's also because apart from the odd Mac, they're *all* you can buy in shops. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The person who said he was a crap presenter knows nothing because compared to the outwardly camp stuart miles, speech impediment Katy Hill and nothing upstairs Konnie Huq, he was a true professional. Heh heh heh. ###### From: nospam@zk3.dec.com (Eric Werme - replace nospam with werme) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: 6 Nov 1998 03:17:51 GMT Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation Lines: 33 Message-ID: <71tpov$h2p$1@nntpd.lkg.dec.com> References: <7188v7$iij$1@saturn.bton.ac.uk> <3646cad2.560941425@206.210.64.12> <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com> <71f69f$v9c$2@strato.ultra.net> Reply-To: (Replace nobody with werme) nobody@zk3.dec.com NNTP-Posting-Host: alingo.zk3.dec.com X-Newsreader: NN version 6.5.0 CURRENT #60 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newsgate.cistron.nl!het.net!diablo.theplanet.net!london-news-feed1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!cam-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!su-news-feed2.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!news1.digital.com!pa.dec.com!nntpd.lkg.dec.com!not-for-mail jmfbahciv@aol.com writes: >In article <363B2533.6024@azstarnet.com>, > bill_h wrote: >>Joseph M. Newcomer wrote: > >>> .........Try debugging a FORTRAN program that has taken a numeric >>> underflow and the only evidence is a program counter, a link map, and >>> 200 pages of hex characters. Do you know how to decode a hexadecimal >>> floating point number? Can you do it without a hex calculator? That's >>> what the Good Old Days were, and I'm VERY glad to be rid of them! >> >>Ever heard of BREAKPOINTS? I don't think I _ever_ used breakpoints in any program I submitted on cards. I forget what TSS/360 offered in its early days. It wasn't until I got on the PDP-10 that I started writing programs in DDT. And TECO, and SAIL, etc. >I feel sorry for him...he's obviously an IBMer and never got >to do real debugging on a timesharing system.... Who? Joe? He was JN11 at C-MU (I was EW13). On of my first programming tasks on the PDP-10 was to write code to convert C-MU account numbers into PPNs. Joe was on the BLISS team and did a lot of work on I/O packages for it. He also did a lot on the 360. He was one of the more practical folks within the CS Dept. -- <> Eric (Ric) Werme <> The above is unlikely to contain <> <> ROT-13 addresses: <> official claims or policies of <> <> <> Compaq Computer Corp. <> <> <> http://www.cyberportal.net/werme <> ###### From: "Samael" Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: What happened? What day is it? Where am I? Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1998 15:14:34 -0000 Lines: 41 Message-ID: <3643125c.0@127.0.0.1> References: <71fekn$ddp$1@shadow.skypoint.net> <71kog6$ouu$11@irk.zetnet.co.uk> <71l244$qss$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> <363F17DA.3DE1@gazonk.del> <71nulk$npp$1@mail.pl.unisys.com> <36402b34.0@127.0.0.1> <364a201b.2274602@158.152.254.68> NNTP-Posting-Host: 195.147.12.202 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3155.0 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3155.0 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!feed1.news.luth.se!luth.se!news-peer-europe.sprintlink.net!news.sprintlink.net!Sprint!newsfeed1.swip.net!swipnet!rill.news.pipex.net!pipex!nntp.news.xara.net!xara.net!news.itg.net.uk!127.0.0.1!192.168.0.1 Sam. wrote in message <364a201b.2274602@158.152.254.68>... >On Wed, 4 Nov 1998 10:23:47 -0000, "Samael" >sprachen: > >>My PC doesn't use any of its ISA slots, my sound card does nto emulate SB, >>my 3D card isn't VGA compatible and my 2D card only supports the original >>VGA spec for backwards compatibility. > >So, games that write straight to it's registers won't work then? It >doesn't do mode 13, or CGA and EGA emulation? I couldn't boot DOS off >a floppy and play Wolfenstein on your PC? You still have those ISA >slots don't you, and if you didn't you could always buy a PCI adapter. > I play games that use DirectX and therefore don't give a damn what my sound card or vide card are. That's what API's are there for. >>We are nearly there, but the reason why people are sticking to their Wintel >>PC's _is_ backwards compatiblity. > >No it's because they're damn cheap. The amount of PCs in the world >must have doubled in the last couple of years. It's also because apart >from the odd Mac, they're *all* you can buy in shops. Nope, in order to stick with our current software, we have to buy machines that will run it. I know of several large companies that are still running Win3.11, because to upgrade all their machines would cost them a fortune. According to MS figures, Win3.11 is still installed in more places than 95 and NT put together. People didn't upgrade because their software wouldn't run. Samael