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Probably still faster and more reliable than typing it in from those magazines!
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
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Oh God yes! And typing most of it in in 2 digit hex values. 
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Especially when print magazines used the same character for lower case "L" "l" and number One "1".
C64 had a total melt down if you typed
FOR 1=1to100
... instead of ...
For l=1to100
Yes. They are different lines: One versus L.
This taught me to "Save the program before trying to run it!".
Confession: It took two times of typing in a 6 page program ("Castle Dungeon") and having it freeze (core dump with loss) on execution. After the second occurrence, my sister and I realized that we should save it BEFORE running it. That was our favorite game for a while. Probably, it was because of the sweat equity due to typing it three times.
Historical aside: Many old typewriters did not even have a "1" key because you could use lower case "L".
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Compared to paper tape 16KB was impressive and 1 minute extremely fast. Paper tape readers were manually seek (find label written on tape) and pull it through as fast as you can. If you were rich and had an ASR33 teletype with mechanical paper tape the transfer rate was a breathtaking 10 bytes per second.
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ASR33 was probably the noisiest device used for printing.
We're philosophical about power outages here. A.C. come, A.C. go.
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TRS - 80 ! That's where my coding started. No floppy though, I had to retype my progs every afternoon.
... such stuff as dreams are made on
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There were interfaces for all kinds of 8 bit computers, even for kits like mine.
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a f***ing golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?"
"You mean like from space?"
"No, from Canada."
If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns.
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Yep, same here but it was even more limited: 1K ROM, 1K RAM, 6x7 segment display and a hex keyboard.
Type in the Assembly programs ( 6502 assembly ) over and over again, raw hex code that is, no fancy assembler or anything.
Then again, you learn assembly fast enough and thoroughly that way.
Too bad my "Junior computer" ( for those who remember  ) was zapped by a lightning strike a few years later.
It is still sitting somwehere in the attic and is not visibly damaged but the TTL chips on it did not like the 15 V DC they got when the power supply gave in to the lightning strike.
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CDP1802 wrote: n 1978 a floppy controller plus drive was far beyond my budget.
Me too, but mostly because I was still in diapers. 
There are only 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
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Not exactly diapers, but my budget was still defined by my weekly allowance.
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a f***ing golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?"
"You mean like from space?"
"No, from Canada."
If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns.
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I started with C64 and a 1530 (upgraded version), later got an 1451 - that was a big deal!!!
All used the counter (mechanical) to find files faster... Otherwise you had to wait for a full search at an average speed 50 bytes/sec...
Skipper: We'll fix it.
Alex: Fix it? How you gonna fix this?
Skipper: Grit, spit and a whole lotta duct tape.
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Come right over. I have two C64 with 1541 floppies in my shelf, ready to go.
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a f***ing golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?"
"You mean like from space?"
"No, from Canada."
If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns.
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I always play with the thought to buy one, but afraid I will play with it all day long... Just loved it...
Skipper: We'll fix it.
Alex: Fix it? How you gonna fix this?
Skipper: Grit, spit and a whole lotta duct tape.
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I also have several Atari ST, an Atari 400, two Atari 600XL, an Atari 800XL....
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a f***ing golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?"
"You mean like from space?"
"No, from Canada."
If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns.
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Never had Atari. I moved to Amiga (500 and 3000) and PC next...
Skipper: We'll fix it.
Alex: Fix it? How you gonna fix this?
Skipper: Grit, spit and a whole lotta duct tape.
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Kornfeld Eliyahu Peter wrote: Never had Atari. I moved to Amiga (500 and 3000)
That, sir, is a contradiction. The Amiga was based more on the 8 bit Ataris than anything else, while the Atari ST was designed by the guys who also designed the C64.
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a f***ing golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?"
"You mean like from space?"
"No, from Canada."
If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns.
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Not the 3000 - it was a 32 bit machine with extreme abilities...
Skipper: We'll fix it.
Alex: Fix it? How you gonna fix this?
Skipper: Grit, spit and a whole lotta duct tape.
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Still, its chipset was an enhanced version of the older Amiga chipset and many of those extreme abilities came from that chipset.
The 8 bit Ataris were years ahead of their time in 1979 because of their custom chipset and the engineers who designed it wanted to design their own game console. Their company, named Amiga, was later bought by Commodore and the console was expanded to a full computer and the chipset was constantly improved until Commodore kicked the can.
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a f***ing golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?"
"You mean like from space?"
"No, from Canada."
If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns.
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CDP1802 wrote: until Commodore kicked the can
Amiga was a sad case of incompetent marketing dumping the excellent work of engineers - originated from Atari or Commodore...
Skipper: We'll fix it.
Alex: Fix it? How you gonna fix this?
Skipper: Grit, spit and a whole lotta duct tape.
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From about 1984 on, both Atari and Commodore fell behind. The 16 bit computers kept both going for a few years, but they failed to come up with new concepts and the PCs took over. Their last models like the Atari Falcon or the Amiga 3000 were too little innovation and came too late.
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a f***ing golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?"
"You mean like from space?"
"No, from Canada."
If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns.
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I still have my Amiga 500 complete with its 40MB hard drive and memory expander (bringing it up to an astounding 1 MByte).
I wrote my first PC programs on this box using Lattice C and a translator. That was in the days when windows was scarce and DOS was king.
The most memorable thing about the A500 was the ridiculously heavy mouse.
Well I remember the arguments betweem Atari and Amiga fans. Bottom line is they have both faded into the dim and distant past.
We're philosophical about power outages here. A.C. come, A.C. go.
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The Amiga 500 was 32 bit based on the Motorola 68000 chipset. The same chipset as the original MACs, but Amiga supported a true, pre-emptive OS with "virtual" desktops and color. The original MAC was black and white.
It was used a lot in broadcast TV for generating graphics. (pre-HD)
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The CPU was from Motorola all along, as well as for the Macs and the Atari ST/TT/Falcon. The chipsets (graphics, sound, IO, 'Blitters') were made by the companies,
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a f***ing golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?"
"You mean like from space?"
"No, from Canada."
If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns.
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All you young whipper-snappers have life easy. When I started out on a DEC PDP-11, I had to store my files on paper tape, and feed then in through a teletype which printed them out as it loaded, one character at a time.
Cheers,
Mick
------------------------------------------------
It doesn't matter how often or hard you fall on your arse, eventually you'll roll over and land on your feet.
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Did you ever endeavour to construct a mnemonic device using stone knives and bears kins?
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a f***ing golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?"
"You mean like from space?"
"No, from Canada."
If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns.
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