From: "George R. Gonzalez" Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Early Interrupt Designs, glitches Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 10:29:29 -0600 Organization: University of Minnesota, Twin Cities Campus Lines: 13 Message-ID: X-Trace: laurel.tc.umn.edu 1016728618 29124 160.94.124.25 (21 Mar 2002 16:36:58 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@laurel.tc.umn.edu X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4522.1200 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4522.1200 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.imp.ch!news.imp.ch!fr.clara.net!heighliner.fr.clara.net!news.stealth.net!news.stealth.net!logbridge.uoregon.edu!hardy.tc.umn.edu!laurel.tc.umn.edu!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:104176 IMHO the concept of the "hardware interrupt" is one of the more brilliant and amazing ideas. But it seems that the idea didnt pop up until relatively late, circa 1958 was it? Anybody know what machine was the first one with interrupts? ###### From: mark@hubcap.clemson.edu (Mark Smotherman) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Early Interrupt Designs, glitches Date: 21 Mar 2002 16:05:35 -0500 Organization: Clemson University Lines: 38 Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: localhost X-Trace: hubcap.clemson.edu 1016744735 9760 127.0.0.1 (21 Mar 2002 21:05:35 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@hubcap.clemson.edu NNTP-Posting-Date: 21 Mar 2002 21:05:35 GMT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!feedme.news.mediaways.net!news0.de.colt.net!news-fra1.dfn.de!news-han1.dfn.de!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!news-ext.gatech.edu!hubcap.clemson.edu!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:104218 "George R. Gonzalez" writes: > > IMHO the concept of the "hardware interrupt" is > one of the more brilliant and amazing ideas. > > But it seems that the idea didnt pop up until > relatively late, circa 1958 was it? > > Anybody know what machine was the first one with > interrupts? I believe that the generally-agreed-upon "first system" to use interrupts was the UNIVAC 1103A (for wind tunnel data capture, see J. Mersel's paper in WJCC 1956); but note An experimental system was run on the EDSAC [ca. 1952-1955] and Stan Gill wrote the subroutines which interrupted the processor when data arrived from the [magnetic tape] reading head - a technique which was more widely used later. I left in 1955 to join Decca Radar to introduce digital computer technology into radar systems where we used the interrupt system extensively. (http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/UoCCL/misc/EDSAC99/reminiscences/index.html) I'd like to hear more about how this worked. And if there were other early interrupt systems. Also, Fred Brooks and Dura Sweeney have a patent on an interrupt system (US Patnet No. 3,048,332, filed in 1957), and Brooks wrote a paper on interrupts for EJCC in 1958. -- Mark Smotherman, Computer Science Dept., Clemson University, Clemson, SC http://www.cs.clemson.edu/~mark/homepage.html ###### Message-ID: <3C9A564F.6045AA6A@yahoo.com> From: CBFalconer Reply-To: cbfalconer@worldnet.att.net Organization: Ched Research X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.75 [en] (Win98; U) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Early Interrupt Designs, glitches References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Lines: 17 Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 21:57:20 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 12.90.178.6 X-Complaints-To: abuse@worldnet.att.net X-Trace: bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net 1016747840 12.90.178.6 (Thu, 21 Mar 2002 21:57:20 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 21:57:20 GMT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.imp.ch!news.imp.ch!sunqbc.risq.qc.ca!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!feed2.news.rcn.net!rcn!wn14eed!worldnet.att.net!135.173.83.71!wnfilter1!worldnet-localpost!bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:104208 "George R. Gonzalez" wrote: > > IMHO the concept of the "hardware interrupt" is one of the more > brilliant and amazing ideas. > > But it seems that the idea didnt pop up until relatively late, > circa 1958 was it? Anybody know what machine was the first one > with interrupts? According to my parents, me. -- Chuck F (cbfalconer@yahoo.com) (cbfalconer@XXXXworldnet.att.net) Available for consulting/temporary embedded and systems. (Remove "XXXX" from reply address. yahoo works unmodified) mailto:uce@ftc.gov (for spambots to harvest) ###### From: Charles Shannon Hendrix Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Early Interrupt Designs, glitches Date: Sun, 24 Mar 2002 00:49:47 -0500 Organization: Too Much Message-ID: References: <3C9A564F.6045AA6A@yahoo.com> Reply-To: shannon@nospam.widomaker.com User-Agent: slrn/0.9.7.3 (Linux) X-Complaints-To: newsabuse@supernews.com Lines: 20 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.imp.ch!news.imp.ch!fr.clara.net!heighliner.fr.clara.net!news.tele.dk!small.news.tele.dk!209.249.90.70!sn-xit-01!sn-post-01!supernews.com!corp.supernews.com!escape!nobody Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:104432 In article <3C9A564F.6045AA6A@yahoo.com>, CBFalconer wrote: > "George R. Gonzalez" wrote: >> >> IMHO the concept of the "hardware interrupt" is one of the more >> brilliant and amazing ideas. >> >> But it seems that the idea didnt pop up until relatively late, >> circa 1958 was it? Anybody know what machine was the first one >> with interrupts? > > According to my parents, me. I hate you. That one was mine, all mine, and I nearly posted first without reading yours. Damn you. :) ###### Message-ID: <3C9D9847.4040401@telegraphics.com.au> From: Toby Thain User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC Mac OS X; en-US; rv:0.9.9) Gecko/20020310 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Early Interrupt Designs, glitches References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Original-NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.134.29.156 Lines: 34 X-Original-NNTP-Posting-Host: 127.0.0.1 Organization: iPrimus Customer - reports relating to abuse should be sent to abuse@iprimus.com.au Date: Sun, 24 Mar 2002 09:11:39 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.134.67.67 X-Complaints-To: news@primus.ca X-Trace: news.tor.primus.ca 1016961099 203.134.67.67 (Sun, 24 Mar 2002 04:11:39 EST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 24 Mar 2002 04:11:39 EST Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newscore.univie.ac.at!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!feed.cgocable.net!feed.tor.primus.ca!feed.nntp.primus.ca!news.tor.primus.ca!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:104384 George R. Gonzalez wrote: > IMHO the concept of the "hardware interrupt" is one of the more brilliant > and amazing ideas. > > But it seems that the idea didnt pop up until relatively late, circa 1958 > was it? > Anybody know what machine was the first one with interrupts? Just discovered, reading Blaauw & Brooks Jr's "Computer Architecture", that it was the Univac 1103A, delivered in 1956: "The 1103A seems to have been the first commercial machine to have an interruption system [Mersel, 1956]. The system, suggested by Richard Turner of NASA, provides for an external asynchronous interruption when enabled by a Control instruction, EF. After the interruption system was developed, it was retrofitted to the card reader-punch to signal the appearance of a card row under the brushes or punches." [ Mersel, J., 1956: "Program Interrupt on the Univac Scientific Computer." Proc., AIEE-ACM-IRE 1956 Western Joint Computer Conf., 9: 52-53. ] Toby > > > > > > >