Jim
Yes the days before browsers...
We would ftp an index of websites and look for interesting documents then ftp the file to read and then ftp our replies.
I was gifted a Unix system 4 manual when the AT&T system manager retired. It had a chapter that spoke of dialing in and listed baud rates of 60... and some sites have a 1800 baud...
The book itself was a hardcopy of the "man" command.
I was working for DEC (DEC, Texas Instruments and Xerox invented Ethernet) and had access to the internet and VAX's to use as I chose.
Sea Story Time!
While working second shift for a couple years when my son was young, I would spend any time I was not out on a service request learning to program and use computers. A fellow engineer had figured out how to run a Star Trek game written for a pdp 11 in compatiblity mode on a VAX.
He asked"Ben, why do you waste your time studying that software stuff when you can play games?"
After a few minutes and fewer words I figured out what file was tracking his Star Trek game state, copied it to a safe space and captured another copy a few seconds later. After quick binary compare I located the offset of the"time remaining" value and changed it to "-1".
Copied my file over his and he never had a game timeout on him.
I skip other stories for now but do you remember the phrase;
I got to the end of the internet.
?
Ben
Trash 80sYes Ben, I got to the end of the internet but that was when the internet wasn't up yet. I forget what they called it (linknet??) but at that time there only a few universities and colleges connected. At that time South Africa was the last spot on the net and I could only circle back from where I had been. I was using my TRS-80 that I bought in 77 or 78??? IBM compatibles were just becoming a thing. I waited for the 286 chips before changing over.
Sorry about that Jim.Ok, I've tried to retrack the train a few times.
If y'all want to talk old computers.
Go start a thread.
This is not the thread for it.
People come here for a laugh , not computer talk.
Jim
Thanks Jim, you are now responsible for the next fight with my wife.
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