Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) References: <3CB5F585.2BC8E356@yahoo.com> Reply-To: jhaynes@alumni.uark.edu Organization: University of Arkansas Alumni X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test72 (19 April 1999) From: haynes@alumni.uark.edu (Jim Haynes) Lines: 44 Message-ID: Date: Fri, 12 Apr 2002 20:25:45 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 158.252.141.110 X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net 1018643145 158.252.141.110 (Fri, 12 Apr 2002 13:25:45 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 12 Apr 2002 13:25:45 PDT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-out.spamkiller.net!propagator2-maxim!propagator-maxim!news-in.spamkiller.net!newsfeed2.earthlink.net!newsfeed.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:105951 In article , Eric Fischer wrote: >CBFalconer wrote: > >> > It would have saved a lot of trouble if anyone on the ASCII standards >> > committee had been able to foresee the need for a discard-the-previous- >> > character control or for a single-character newline control and to get >> > these into the standard before different people were forced to make >> > their own incompatible decisions about how to encode them. >> >> They did. It is called BS, and usually generated by CTL-H. > >But they didn't. The standard says that BS moves the printing position >backwards, and the intent was that it was to be used for overstriking. A lot of the trouble came about, I think, because the Teletype Model 33 keyboard could not generate all the ASCII characters; and even some it could generate were awkward things like ctrl-shift-X. Designers of timesharing systems naturally gravitated toward things that could be done with single keystrokes for such commonly needed functions as erasing a character or a line. ASCII has a character FS for file separator, but who ever used that to mean end-of-file from a terminal? On a TWX machine if you used ctrl-D you would hang up the modem and have to redial. The Model 33 couldn't backspace either; that was reserved for the top-of- the-line machines. >The use of BS to delete previously typed characters is just as much of >a corruption as is the use of the DEL for the same function. > >ANSI X3.64/ECMA-48 does define a control function DCH (ESC [ P) to delete >a character, which is about as close as they've ever come to standardizing >the function that in practice DEL and BS are used for, but it came along >so late that no one implements it so it's nearly useless. There was >also an attempt in the early 1970s to tighten up the definition of the >CANcel control for this purpose, but it apparently never went anywhere. > I remember it was a long time before the escape sequences were sorta standardized. Did CAN ever get defined well enough so that anybody knew what it was supposed to be used for? >Eric ###### Message-ID: <3CB86B63.9A408106@earthlink.net> From: jchausler X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.72 [en] (Win95; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) References: <3CB5F585.2BC8E356@yahoo.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Lines: 30 Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2002 17:32:34 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 168.191.123.175 X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net 1018719154 168.191.123.175 (Sat, 13 Apr 2002 10:32:34 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2002 10:32:34 PDT Organization: EarthLink Inc. -- http://www.EarthLink.net Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.imp.ch!news.imp.ch!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.cwix.com!wn2feed!worldnet.att.net!207.217.77.102!newsfeed2.earthlink.net!newsfeed.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:105987 Joe Morris wrote: > But how many people ever used a TWX terminal to access a general-purpose > time sharing system? Recall that the TWX (TeletypeWriter eXchange) used > mark and space tones that were the opposite of what was used on DDD > circuits. (Think of the difference between WECo 103B1 and 103B2 Dataphones.) I still have an old acoustic coupler made in the 60's by Anderson Jacobson (model ADC 300, ser no 261) which has a switch on it to select "normal" or "inverted" tones as well as answer/originate and full/half duplex. Its in a nice wooden box and still (sort of) works. It also does both current loop and RS232 interfaces. Ready for anything :-) > The hangup-on-^D feature of a TWX terminal (also present on a Teletype > on a DDD circuit if it had an internal WECo DataPhone 109) was designed > to permit a terminal to be left unattended with autoanswer enabled and a > tape in the reader. A distant system would dial the terminal and start > the reader; following the last data block on the tape would be a ^D to > drop the connection. ^D still forces a logoff from QNX. Is this also true with UNIX and its friends? Chris AN GETTO$;DUMP;RUN,ALGOL,TAPE $$ ###### Message-ID: <3CBAF7D3.CD812E7C@earthlink.net> From: jchausler X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.72 [en] (Win95; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) References: <3CB5F585.2BC8E356@yahoo.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Lines: 28 Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2002 15:56:22 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 168.191.124.197 X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net 1018886182 168.191.124.197 (Mon, 15 Apr 2002 08:56:22 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2002 08:56:22 PDT Organization: EarthLink Inc. -- http://www.EarthLink.net Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.imp.ch!news.imp.ch!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed1.cidera.com!Cidera!netnews.com!xfer02.netnews.com!newsfeed2.earthlink.net!newsfeed.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:106081 Don Stokes wrote: > In article , > Jim Haynes wrote: > >A lot of the trouble came about, I think, because the Teletype Model 33 > >keyboard could not generate all the ASCII characters; and even some it > >could generate were awkward things like ctrl-shift-X. Designers of > > Um, my (early 70s vintage) ASR33 keyboard has all the ASCII control > codes marked on the keyboard except FS, GS, RS and US. I can't be > bothered firing the thing up to check if those values can be generated > via Ctrl/"," etc, but the others are all generated by Ctrl/letter. I > don't think there's any Ctrl/Shift/key sequences -- a few keys are > marked with three glyphs, but that indicates that they can be used with > Ctrl or Shift. I'm not in a position to fire mine up at the moment either but IIRC the way you got a NUL code (no holes punched except the feed hole) was Ctrl/Shift P (hold down the "repeat key" as well and get a stream of them to make "leader" :-). Chris AN GETTO$;DUMP;RUN,ALGOL,TAPE $$ ###### From: "Bob Billing (AKA Uncle Bob)" Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2002 19:34:10 +0100 Message-ID: <3CBB1D22.CDDE51D7@tnglwood.demon.co.uk> References: <3CB5F585.2BC8E356@yahoo.com> <3CBAF7D3.CD812E7C@earthlink.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: tnglwood.demon.co.uk X-NNTP-Posting-Host: tnglwood.demon.co.uk:158.152.132.30 X-Trace: news.demon.co.uk 1018896829 nnrp-14:22122 NO-IDENT tnglwood.demon.co.uk:158.152.132.30 X-Complaints-To: abuse@demon.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.72 [en] (X11; U; Linux 2.2.14-5.0 i586) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Lines: 17 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-out.spamkiller.net!propagator2-maxim!propagator-maxim!news-in.spamkiller.net!xmission!news-out.nuthinbutnews.com!feed-ev1!propagator-sterling!news-in.nuthinbutnews.com!news-in-sterling.newsfeed.com!newsfeed.icl.net!kibo.news.demon.net!news.demon.co.uk!demon!tnglwood.demon.co.uk!falstaff.tanglewood!nobody Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:106134 jchausler wrote: > I'm not in a position to fire mine up at the moment either but IIRC the > way you got a NUL code (no holes punched except the feed hole) > was Ctrl/Shift P (hold down the "repeat key" as well and get a stream > of them to make "leader" :-). Correct. CTRL/A to CTRL/Z generate codes 1 to 26. CTRL/SHIFT/P is 0 and CTRL/SHIFT?K-L-M-N-O are 27 to 31. The trick is to hold down CTRL on a Teletype and you'll find everything except the letters lock, hold down SHIFT as well and everything except KLMNOP is locked. -- I am Robert Billing, Christian, inventor, traveller, cook and animal lover, I live near 0:46W 51:22N. http://www.tnglwood.demon.co.uk/ "It burned me from within. It quickened; I was with book as a woman is with child." CS Lewis - Till we have faces, Ch 21. ###### From: jcmorris@mitre.org (Joe Morris) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2002 15:45:18 +0000 (UTC) Organization: The MITRE Organization Lines: 23 Message-ID: References: <3CB5F585.2BC8E356@yahoo.com> Reply-To: jcmorris@mitre.org NNTP-Posting-Host: jmorris-pc.mitre.org X-Trace: newslocal.mitre.org 1018712718 4187 128.29.114.13 (13 Apr 2002 15:45:18 GMT) X-Complaints-To: news@mitre.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2002 15:45:18 +0000 (UTC) X-Newsreader: NN version 6.5.6 (NOV) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!feedme.news.mediaways.net!image.surnet.ru!surnet.ru!newsfeed.rt.ru!news-out.cwix.com!newsfeed.cwix.com!newsfeed1.cidera.com!Cidera!netnews.com!xfer02.netnews.com!news.tufts.edu!newstransit.mitre.org!news.mitre.org!jcmorris Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:105975 haynes@alumni.uark.edu (Jim Haynes) writes: > ASCII has a character FS for file separator, >but who ever used that to mean end-of-file from a terminal? Um...wasn't FS defined as *FIELD* separator, as in data entry formatting? > On a TWX >machine if you used ctrl-D you would hang up the modem and have to redial. But how many people ever used a TWX terminal to access a general-purpose time sharing system? Recall that the TWX (TeletypeWriter eXchange) used mark and space tones that were the opposite of what was used on DDD circuits. (Think of the difference between WECo 103B1 and 103B2 Dataphones.) The hangup-on-^D feature of a TWX terminal (also present on a Teletype on a DDD circuit if it had an internal WECo DataPhone 109) was designed to permit a terminal to be left unattended with autoanswer enabled and a tape in the reader. A distant system would dial the terminal and start the reader; following the last data block on the tape would be a ^D to drop the connection. Joe Morris ###### From: Steve O'Hara-Smith Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2002 22:23:51 +0200 Organization: Wanadoo NL Lines: 14 Message-ID: <20020413222351.55825798.steveo@eircom.net> References: <3CB5F585.2BC8E356@yahoo.com> <3CB86B63.9A408106@earthlink.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: i1501.vwr.wanadoo.nl Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: scavenger.euro.net 1018730882 90320 194.134.213.227 (13 Apr 2002 20:48:02 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@wanadoo.nl NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2002 20:48:02 +0000 (UTC) X-Newsreader: Sylpheed version 0.7.4 (GTK+ 1.2.10; i386-portbld-freebsd4.5) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.imp.ch!news.imp.ch!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!colt.net!newspeer.clara.net!news.clara.net!news2.euro.net!news.euronet.nl!ams-gw.sohara.org!nobody Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:106033 On Sat, 13 Apr 2002 17:32:34 GMT jchausler wrote: J> ^D still forces a logoff from QNX. Is this also true with UNIX and J> its friends? It is, although it's often disabled by default these days. I usually turn it back on pretty promptly :) -- C:>WIN | Directable Mirrors The computer obeys and wins. |A Better Way To Focus The Sun You lose and Bill collects. | licenses available - see: | http://www.sohara.org/ ###### From: Eric Fischer Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) Date: 14 Apr 2002 01:42:38 GMT Lines: 22 Message-ID: References: X-Trace: UmFuZG9tSVbJP3e3DFXV84iqPxKEOPgI2qC2Bo0kVHji2A00gvf29mkpP6Vb8Rv3 X-Complaints-To: abuse@rcn.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 14 Apr 2002 01:42:38 GMT X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test72 (19 April 1999) Originator: enf@enteract.com (Eric Fischer) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-out.spamkiller.net!propagator2-maxim!propagator-maxim!news-in.spamkiller.net!sfo2-feed1.news.algx.net!dca6-feed2.news.algx.net!allegiance!feed2.news.rcn.net!feed1.news.rcn.net!rcn!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:106012 Joe Morris wrote: > haynes@alumni.uark.edu (Jim Haynes) writes: > > > ASCII has a character FS for file separator, but who ever used that > > to mean end-of-file from a terminal? > > Um...wasn't FS defined as *FIELD* separator, as in data entry formatting? It really is file, not field. The definition in the current (1986) edition of the ASCII standard reads: FS (FILE SEPARATOR) (INFORMATION SEPARATOR 4). A control character used to separate and qualify data logically; its specific meaning has to be defined for each application. If this character is used in hierarchical order, as specified in the general definition of the information separators (see 4.1.5), it delimits a data item called a "file." It's US, the Unit Separator, that has a smaller scope than RS, the Record Separator, and would be used to separate fields. Eric ###### Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) References: Reply-To: jhaynes@alumni.uark.edu Organization: University of Arkansas Alumni X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test72 (19 April 1999) From: haynes@alumni.uark.edu (Jim Haynes) Lines: 14 Message-ID: Date: Sun, 14 Apr 2002 21:12:03 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 158.252.140.51 X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net 1018818723 158.252.140.51 (Sun, 14 Apr 2002 14:12:03 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 14 Apr 2002 14:12:03 PDT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!feedme.news.mediaways.net!unlisys!news.snafu.de!priapus.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!hermes.visi.com!newsfeed1.earthlink.net!newsfeed.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:106064 In article , Eric Fischer wrote: >Joe Morris wrote: > >> Um...wasn't FS defined as *FIELD* separator, as in data entry formatting? > >It really is file, not field. The definition in the current (1986) edition >of the ASCII standard reads: > > FS (FILE SEPARATOR) (INFORMATION SEPARATOR 4). A control character used And this points up another of my pet gripes. Getting a copy of a standards document is sufficiently difficult that few people bother; they just guess at what it says. Leading to further ASCII subversion in this case. ###### Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) References: <3CB5F585.2BC8E356@yahoo.com> Organization: Daedalus Consulting X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test72 (19 April 1999) From: don@news.daedalus.co.nz (Don Stokes) Lines: 43 Message-ID: Date: Sun, 14 Apr 2002 22:23:39 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.96.144.16 X-Complaints-To: abuse@tsnz.net X-Trace: news02.tsnz.net 1018823019 203.96.144.16 (Mon, 15 Apr 2002 10:23:39 NZST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2002 10:23:39 NZST Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-out.spamkiller.net!propagator2-maxim!propagator-maxim!news-in.spamkiller.net!news02.tsnz.net!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:106110 In article , Jim Haynes wrote: >A lot of the trouble came about, I think, because the Teletype Model 33 >keyboard could not generate all the ASCII characters; and even some it >could generate were awkward things like ctrl-shift-X. Designers of Um, my (early 70s vintage) ASR33 keyboard has all the ASCII control codes marked on the keyboard except FS, GS, RS and US. I can't be bothered firing the thing up to check if those values can be generated via Ctrl/"," etc, but the others are all generated by Ctrl/letter. I don't think there's any Ctrl/Shift/key sequences -- a few keys are marked with three glyphs, but that indicates that they can be used with Ctrl or Shift. >timesharing systems naturally gravitated toward things that could be >done with single keystrokes for such commonly needed functions as >erasing a character or a line. ASCII has a character FS for file separator, And of course the ASR33 has ESC, DEL and LF keys more or less where God intended them to be. But no BS key; you need Ctrl/H to send that. I gathered Ctrl/C for "stop" was chosen more for its proximity to the Ctrl key (but not too close) than for its mnemonic or ASCII meanings. Other keys used by timesharing systems tended to be based on mnemonics, e.g. Ctrl/B and Ctrl/F for backwards and forwards. ASCII's control codes, being designed in the early 60s before timesharing was comming, strongly reflect a bias towards batch processing; the control codes are for printing and file/record/field transmission, not keyboard interaction or TTY or video terminal display. >I remember it was a long time before the escape sequences were sorta >standardized. Did CAN ever get defined well enough so that anybody >knew what it was supposed to be used for? ANSI X3.64 tried to standardise them, but in real life the only standards that mattered were de-facto standards like VT-100, VT-52 or AMD 3A. (Yes, the VT-100 does follow ANSI X3.64, but the set of functions implemented by the VT-100 and its descendants merely intersects X3.64; if you follow X3.64 you don't get something you can replace a VT-100 with.) -- don ###### From: stanb@dial.pipex.com (Stan Barr) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) References: <3CB5F585.2BC8E356@yahoo.com> Organization: Metropolis Grafix Reply-To: stanb@dial.pipex.com Message-ID: X-Newsreader: slrn (0.9.4.3 UNIX) Date: 15 Apr 2002 17:45:14 GMT Lines: 17 NNTP-Posting-Host: 62-190-202-138.pdu.pipex.net X-Trace: 1018892714 news.dial.pipex.com 8511 62.190.202.138 X-Complaints-To: abuse@uk.uu.net Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newscore.univie.ac.at!newsfeed.online.be!130.240.42.8.MISMATCH!luth.se!lnewspeer01.lnd.ops.eu.uu.net!lnewspost00.lnd.ops.eu.uu.net!emea.uu.net!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:106077 On Sun, 14 Apr 2002 22:23:39 GMT, Don Stokes wrote: > >I gathered Ctrl/C for "stop" was chosen more for its proximity to the >Ctrl key (but not too close) than for its mnemonic or ASCII meanings. >Other keys used by timesharing systems tended to be based on mnemonics, >e.g. Ctrl/B and Ctrl/F for backwards and forwards. As I understood it, the control characters were hex 01 upwards, and assigned Ctrl/A upward in alpha order. Ctrl/C was Hex03 - End of Text. Ctrl/H (BS) is Hex 08. -- Cheers, Stan Barr stanb@dial.pipex.com The future was never like this! ###### Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) References: Reply-To: jhaynes@alumni.uark.edu Organization: University of Arkansas Alumni X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test72 (19 April 1999) From: haynes@alumni.uark.edu (Jim Haynes) Lines: 13 Message-ID: Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2002 20:11:54 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 158.252.141.22 X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net 1018901514 158.252.141.22 (Mon, 15 Apr 2002 13:11:54 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2002 13:11:54 PDT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-out.spamkiller.net!propagator2-maxim!propagator-maxim!news-in.spamkiller.net!feed.newsfeeds.com!cyclone-sf.pbi.net!131.119.28.146!paloalto-snh1.gtei.net!lsanca1-snf1!news.gtei.net!newsfeed2.earthlink.net!newsfeed.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:106130 In article , Don Stokes wrote: > >Um, my (early 70s vintage) ASR33 keyboard has all the ASCII control >codes marked on the keyboard except FS, GS, RS and US. I can't be >bothered firing the thing up to check if those values can be generated >via Ctrl/"," etc, but the others are all generated by Ctrl/letter. I >don't think there's any Ctrl/Shift/key sequences -- a few keys are >marked with three glyphs, but that indicates that they can be used with >Ctrl or Shift. > That's fairly late as Model 33 keyboards go. The earlier ones used 1961 (or was it 62) ASCII and had various kinds of lameness. ###### From: Eric Fischer Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) Date: 17 Apr 2002 04:34:19 GMT Lines: 27 Message-ID: References: <3CB5F585.2BC8E356@yahoo.com> X-Trace: UmFuZG9tSVZtGj2oqsXTmD+obAOL+5wdfCO9wkyOjzsDm0ewpNYDHBoJvCQJe/ZZ X-Complaints-To: abuse@rcn.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 17 Apr 2002 04:34:19 GMT X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test72 (19 April 1999) Originator: enf@enteract.com (Eric Fischer) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.imp.ch!news.imp.ch!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!feed2.news.rcn.net!feed1.news.rcn.net!rcn!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:106229 Jim Haynes wrote: > I remember it was a long time before the escape sequences were sorta > standardized. Did CAN ever get defined well enough so that anybody > knew what it was supposed to be used for? It never did. In August, 1970, Eric Clamons of the ANSI X3L2 committee described the CAN situation this way: ASCII also provides a Cancel character which is not too well defined. Originally Cancel was a quasi-communications control character which deleted an entire message. A recent proposal from ECMA defines Cancel as the first chraracter of a two-character sequence which causes the string preceding it to be deleted up to but not including the occurrence of the second character of the Cancel character sequence. The two- character Cancel sequence itself is also deleted. This proposal is more difficult to implement than the other group deletes since it requires a memory and search capability. The use of Cancel as a line delete function would more closely approach its original intent. Unfortunately nothing ever came of either of these proposals. Instead, ISO, ITU, ECMA, and ANSI have all remained agreed that "the specific meaning of [CAN] shall be defined for each application and/or between sender and recipient" or some minor variation on these words, so the character is basically undefined. Eric ###### Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) References: Organization: Daedalus Consulting X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test72 (19 April 1999) From: don@news.daedalus.co.nz (Don Stokes) Lines: 54 Message-ID: Date: Mon, 22 Apr 2002 23:46:19 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.96.144.16 X-Complaints-To: abuse@tsnz.net X-Trace: news02.tsnz.net 1019519179 203.96.144.16 (Tue, 23 Apr 2002 11:46:19 NZST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 23 Apr 2002 11:46:19 NZST Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!news-han1.dfn.de!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!cyclone.bc.net!news-out.newsfeeds.com!propagator2-maxim!propagator-maxim!news-in.spamkiller.net!news02.tsnz.net!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:106706 In article , Stan Barr wrote: >On Sun, 14 Apr 2002 22:23:39 GMT, Don Stokes wrote: >> >>I gathered Ctrl/C for "stop" was chosen more for its proximity to the >>Ctrl key (but not too close) than for its mnemonic or ASCII meanings. >>Other keys used by timesharing systems tended to be based on mnemonics, >>e.g. Ctrl/B and Ctrl/F for backwards and forwards. > >As I understood it, the control characters were hex 01 upwards, and >assigned Ctrl/A upward in alpha order. Ctrl/C was Hex03 - End of Text. >Ctrl/H (BS) is Hex 08. You should remember that the ASR-33 keyboard is mechanical. There is no key matrix decoding going on here; when you depress a key, you engage and lock a series of switches corresponding to the ASCII code of the character you typed. The '33 then runs a commutator around each of the bits thus engaged to transmit the character, and the switches (and the keys) are released ready for the next keystroke. The Ctrl and Shift keys modify the bit pattern that is locked in for transmission. Control codes match their corresponding alpha codes in the bottom five bits. The control key simply clears bits 6, so Ctrl/A is simply A - 2^6, i.e. 1000001 -> 0000001. Parity is obviously allowed for; since Ctrl always clears a bit, it always inverts the parity bit. (I've left parity off the bit patterns for clarity.) The Shift key simply inverts bit 4. For numbers, this clears bit 4, e.g. 1 -> !, 0110001 -> 0100001. For most letters, it sets the bit, e.g. K -> [, 1001011 -> 1101011. Again, the parity bit is also inverted. What keys can be pressed in conjunction with Ctrl and Shift depend on mechanical interlocks. Numbers, for example, can be shifted, but if the Ctrl key is depressed, the keys number won't depress. Ctrl can be used with all the alpha keys, but only a few can be shfted. Ctrl/Shift/P as someone noted, is an odd case. Shift/P generates '@', i.e. 1010000 -> 1000000. This is the only case where an alphabetic character can be shifted and inverting the bit 4 clears the bit rather than setting it, as '@' is the only non-alphabetic character with a 101xxxx bit pattern. Pressing Ctrl/Shift/P in turn clears bit six, generating 0000000, i.e. NUL. I suspect from this, that Ctrl/Shift/L generates FS, i.e. 1001100 -> 0011100, Ctrl/Shift/M generates GS, Ctrl/Shift/N generates RS and Ctrl/Shift/O generates US. But again, I haven't fired it up to see. If this is correct, all possible codes from 0000000 (NUL) through 1011111 ('_', or on older machines, '<-') can be generated by the ASR-33. -- don ###### From: Charles Shannon Hendrix Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) Date: Sun, 12 May 2002 20:15:35 -0400 Organization: Too Much Message-ID: References: Reply-To: shannon@nospam.widomaker.com User-Agent: slrn/0.9.7.3 (Linux) X-Complaints-To: newsabuse@supernews.com Lines: 23 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-out.spamkiller.net!propagator2-maxim!propagator-maxim!news-in.spamkiller.net!sfo2-feed1.news.algx.net!allegiance!news-hog.berkeley.edu!ucberkeley!newsfeed.stanford.edu!sn-xit-01!sn-post-01!supernews.com!corp.supernews.com!escape!nobody Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:107602 In article , Jim Haynes wrote: > In article , > Eric Fischer wrote: >>Joe Morris wrote: >> >>> Um...wasn't FS defined as *FIELD* separator, as in data entry formatting? >> >>It really is file, not field. The definition in the current (1986) edition >>of the ASCII standard reads: >> >> FS (FILE SEPARATOR) (INFORMATION SEPARATOR 4). A control character used > > And this points up another of my pet gripes. Getting a copy of a standards > document is sufficiently difficult that few people bother; they just guess > at what it says. Leading to further ASCII subversion in this case. Technically speaking, are we supposed to be using the standard instead of things like | or , to delimit records in free-form databases? FS as a file seperator makes no sense to me except in a stream perhaps. How was it supposed to be used? ###### From: colonel@monmouth.com (The National Folk Hero of the Net) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) Date: 13 May 2002 16:29:42 GMT Organization: F. K. Dingy & Son Lines: 27 Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: bg-tc-ppp1544.monmouth.com X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test76 (Apr 2, 2001) Originator: gls@news.monmouth.com (George Sicherman) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.imp.ch!news.imp.ch!nntp-out.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!news.monmouth.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:107578 In , shannon@nospam.widomaker.com wrote: > > Technically speaking, are we supposed to be using the standard instead > of things like | or , to delimit records in free-form databases? > > FS as a file seperator makes no sense to me except in a stream perhaps. > How was it supposed to be used? I read somewhere (probably in Mackenzie's _Coded Character Sets_) that the separator characters were meant to be hierarchical (file > group > record > unit) but had no intrinsic meanings. If I remember right, some APLs used the unit separator as a newline. By the way, few programmers know that the non-printing ASCII characters have standard graphic representations. I don't recall offhand which standard defines them. -:- T One big monster, he called TROLL. He don't rock and he don't roll, Drink no wine and smoke no stogies; He just Love To Eat Them Roguies. --The Roguelet's ABC -- Col. G. L. Sicherman colonel@mail.monmouth.com ###### From: Eric Fischer Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: ASCII subversion (was Re: looking for information on the IBM 7090 instruction set) Date: 20 May 2002 05:50:52 GMT Lines: 32 Message-ID: References: X-Trace: UmFuZG9tSVa8DSWKy1LWj9OCMDbkqtdCkg3NIhbPLv079VMTVbAsDNmfOizx2dtM X-Complaints-To: abuse@rcn.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 20 May 2002 05:50:52 GMT X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test72 (19 April 1999) Originator: enf@enteract.com (Eric Fischer) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.imp.ch!news.imp.ch!news.stealth.net!news.stealth.net!jfk3-feed1.news.algx.net!dca6-feed2.news.algx.net!allegiance!feed2.news.rcn.net!feed1.news.rcn.net!rcn!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch alt.folklore.computers:107782 Stan Barr wrote: > From the Standard: > > FS,GS,RS and US is a heirarchical group of information separators used for > formatting and string processing. FS is the most inclusive, and US the least > inclusive. A file is a grouping of all realated records. A group is a > collection of records within a file. A record is a collection of related > fields of data. A unit is a number of fields 1 to 80 characters long. What standard are you quoting? The current edition of ASCII (ANSI X3.4-1986) doesn't limit the length of a unit to 1 to 80 characters. Earlier editions even explicitly deny that the length is defined by the standard: "The content and length of a file, group, record, or unit are not specified." > >By the way, few programmers know that the non-printing ASCII characters > >have standard graphic representations. I don't recall offhand which > >standard defines them. > > Also from the Standard... > NUL is a square, VT a down arrow, SUB (ctrl Z) is a backwards ? etc... > Logically enough, ACK is a tick (check) mark and NACK the same with a line > crossing it out. Bizarrely, MIL-STD-188C defines a different set of graphics for the ASCII controls. There, NUL is a backslash with serifs at the top and bottom, SUB is a box with a vertical line down the middle, ACK is a bow-tie shape, and NAK is a circle with an X in it. Some of the other graphics do correspond to the ANSI X3.32 ones, though. Eric