Re: OT Bit Buckets (was RE: Mainframe and caps (was: A question about macro quote))

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There's always the one about keeping on the right side of the operations
staff. If you didn't, when you handed in a stack of cards to be read:

"Whoops, I seem to have dropped your cards. It's a pity they've
scattered all over the place!"

or they'd give the cards a quick shuffle once you'd gone.

I actually missed using punched cards by a gnat's whisker but those were
the anecdotes that were still doing the rounds when I started out.

----------------------------------------
Nigel Pain
Scottish Executive
Analytical Services Team
Victoria Quay
EDINBURGH
EH6 6QQ
UK
Tel +44 131 244 7237
Mob. +44 7795 618362
Mailto:nigel.pain@scotland.gsi.gov.uk
Website: http:\\www.scotland.gov.uk

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Nat Wooding [mailto:Nathaniel_Wooding@DOM.COM]
> Sent: 23 November 2004 21:35
> Subject: Re: OT Bit Buckets (was RE: Mainframe and caps (was: A
question a bout macro
> quote))
>
> We did have a situation at NC State wherein the card reader would fail
if
> the cards were not loaded backwards. The cards in question were
mark-sense
> cards (you filled in the bubbles and a reader would hopefully punch
them
> according to the marks) and we prepunched them with a program to
correspond
> to certain id codes. Prior to the prepunch step, we would use a
mimeograph
> (the younger members of the L can look that up in the dictionary of
> historical devices) to put some verticle lines on the cards -- these
made
> it easier for the data takers to hit the proper bubbles. If the cards
were
> not loaded backwards, the mimeo ink would stick to the feed rollers
and
> eventually cause a problem. It happened that the guy in charge of
this
> operation inserted a line in his punch program that would print out a
> message "Hey stupid, put the cards in the hopper backwards". Well, one
> night, the guy who ran the wildlife stat project felt the need to
punch
> some of the cards and got the "hey stupid" message. Needless to say,
like
> Queen Vickie, he was not amused.
>
> Ps, the project was a telephone survey of dove hunting in the east so
I
> have to say, I was in on the cutting edge of annoying telephone calls.
>
> Nat Wooding
>
>
> |---------+---------------------------->
> | | "Richard A. |
> | | DeVenezia" |
> | | <radevenz@IX.NETC|
> | | OM.COM> |
> | | Sent by: "SAS(r) |
> | | Discussion" |
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> | | GA.EDU> |
> | | |
> | | |
> | | 11/23/2004 02:42 |
> | | PM |
> | | Please respond to|
> | | "Richard A. |
> | | DeVenezia" |
> | | |
> |---------+---------------------------->
>
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> ---------------------|
> |
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> | To: SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> |
> | cc:
|
> | Subject: Re: OT Bit Buckets (was RE: Mainframe and caps
(was: A question a
> bout macro quote)) |
>
>-----------------------------------------------------------------------
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> ---------------------|
>
>
>
>
> Schechter, Robert S wrote:
> > And more punch card trivia:
> > Made of stiff cardboard, the punch card represents information by
the
> > presence or absence of holes in predefined positions on the card. In
> > the first generation of computing, from the 1920s into the 1950s,
> > punch cards were the primary medium for data storage and processing.
> > They were an important medium, particularly for data input, well
into
> > the 1970s, but are now long obsolete outside of a few legacy systems
> > and specialized applications.
> >
>
> I recall reading some stories about punch card readers that would fail
or
> break down, but only after running cards of a certain color! (I think
it
> was
> green). Perhaps part of some urban myth. Let me blend two or more
> myth/anecdotes and propose that it happened only on Thursdays when the
> green
> cards arrived. The delivery man used back service elevator to leave
and
> the
> elevator motor ran with noisey voltage, causing the reader to crash
when
> programs on the first batch of new cards where being processed.
>
> Then there is the paper tape punch....
>
> --
> Richard A. DeVenezia
> http://www.devenezia.com/

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Nigel.Pain@SCOTLAND.GSI.GOV.UK sagely pointed out:
> There's always the one about keeping on the right side of the
operations
> staff. If you didn't, when you handed in a stack of cards to be read:
>
> "Whoops, I seem to have dropped your cards. It's a pity they've
> scattered all over the place!"
>
> or they'd give the cards a quick shuffle once you'd gone.
>
> I actually missed using punched cards by a gnat's whisker but those
were
> the anecdotes that were still doing the rounds when I started out.

That's why we old-timers learned to take a magic marker and make a
big diagonal stripe across the top of our card deck, just to deal with
these two cases.

Still, not everything could be avoided. One guy on our floor, Stephen,
had a
dad who worked for IBM, and Stephen knew WAY too much about the innards
of
IBM mainframes and the software that ran on them. (He wrote his own
IBM 360/70 assembler simulator, just to simplify his homework in one
comp sci course. He wrote the simulator in APL so he could type
assembler
code in at a keyboard. Be afraid. Be very afraid.) Stephen took the
stock
JCL card that went at the front of everyone's deck, and 'altered' it.
I still don't know what he did. But one large card reader had two
output
hoppers, so each job would go into a different bin, to be scooped up
while
the next card deck was spit into the other output bin. Stephen's card
caused a card deck to get spit into both bins. Alternating, card by
card.
[Insert a :-) or a :-( here depending whether it was your deck].

David
--
David Cassell, CSC
Cassell.David@epa.gov
Senior computing specialist
mathematical statistician