Welcome to Advent of Computing, the show that talks about the shocking, intriguing, and all too often relevant history of computing. A lot of little things we take for granted today have rich stories behind their creation, in each episode we will learn how older tech has lead to our modern world.
168 episodes transcribedThe LGP-30 is one of my favorite computers. It's small, scrappy, strange, and wonderous. Among its many wonders are two obscure languages: ACT-I and A...
When I was down at VCF SoCal I ran into a strange machine: the Keypact Micro-VIP. It's a terminal without a keyboard, covered in dials, with a speaker...
A special treat from VCF SoCal. While visiting I had the chance to host a panel on restoration and preservation. I was joined by: David from Usagi Ele...
Have you ever looked at an old computer and seen a weird typewriter thing tacked on? In most cases that's a device called a Flexowriter. It's hal...
In the modern day Windows is a power house, but that wasn't always the case. In this episode we are looking at the fraught development of Windows 1.0....
This episode we are taking a trip back to UNIX world. We're looking at IDRIS, the first clone of UNIX. It was supposed to be highly compatible, but us...
In 1970 a little language called BLISS emerged from Carnegie Mellon University. It was a systems language, meant for operating systems and compilers....
In 1961 Texas Instruments unveiled the Molecular Electronic Computer, aka: Mol-E-Com. It was a machine that fit in the palm of your hand, but had all...
The Z4, completed by Konrad Zuse in 1945, is a computer with a wild story. It was made from scrounged parts, survived years of bombing raids, moved al...
In 1933 Konrad Zuse, a German civil engineer, caught the computing bug. It would consume the rest of his life. According Zuse he invented the world's...
Have you ever felt like a computer just refuses to work? Like a machine has a mind of it's own? In 1970 a hard drive at the National Farmers Union Cor...
This time we are diving back into the Jargon File to take a look at some hacker folklore. Back in the day hackers at MIT spent their time spying on on...
In 1962 Food Center Wholesale Grocers Inc installed a new IBM 305 RAMAC. That's when things started to go wrong. The faulty machine seemed to have a m...
Programming, as a practice and study, has been steadily evolving for the past 70 or so years. Over the languages have become more sophisticated and us...
The early history of computer games is messy, weird, and surprising. This episode we are looking at HUTSPIEL, perhaps one of the oldest games ever pla...
I'm finally back to my usual programming! This time we are taking one of my patent pending rambles through a topics. Today's victim: the humble type-i...
LIVE from VCF West 2024, my talk on edge notched cards! Since this is a live recording from an auditorium the audio is a little boomy, so be warned. A...
I've gotten busy preparing for VCF West, so this time you get a short one! In this byte-sized episode we are looking at a short and strange story: tha...
Have you ever formed a bad first impression? Way back when I formed a hasty impression of this language called TRAC. It's been called a proto-esoteric...
