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The old one will stay as it was, but the new one will get a few more modern things. How about using a SD card or USB stick as a hard disk? Or maybe I can find a PIC microcontroller that can generate a VGA signal. Nothing fancy, like 256 colors and 320 x 240 (more likely 160x120)
I have lived with several Zen masters - all of them were cats.
His last invention was an evil Lasagna. It didn't kill anyone, and it actually tasted pretty good.
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these days I'm sure you can. What with all the hobbyist kits out there now. best of luck with this project.
i've been considering building a custom ECU for certain types of diesel engines - the kind used in schoolbusses and other medium industrial vehicles making them more suitable as boondocking vehicles, but i didn't have the property i needed to be able to work on one until maybe now. We'll see. It's a hail mary of an idea, but it's kind of cool if anything comes of it.
When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.
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Schoolbus? How boring 
The Elf's CDP1802 was the first processor to fly into space. It was even believed that it was aboard the Viking and Voyager probes, but that's probably not true. That would be great when Voyager Six returns.
I have lived with several Zen masters - all of them were cats.
His last invention was an evil Lasagna. It didn't kill anyone, and it actually tasted pretty good.
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the exciting part isn't so much the tech, but what can be done with it.
When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.
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Meant to ask how the Cosmic(?) Elf coming along?..
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COSMAC
Quote: The RCA-CDP1802 is a byte-oriented central process-ing unit (CPU) employing the COSMAC architecture and utilizing complementary-symmetry MOS technology (CMOS).
RCA was a pioneer in early CMOS devices and sent quite a bit of it into space because of it's lower power consumption. Early on they even called CMOS COSMOS, which of course was a similar acronym.
glennPattonWork wrote: Meant to ask how the Cosmic(?) Elf coming along?..
It's my project for the winter and I want to replace lots of discrete logic with microcontrollers. AT least the tiny OS already works.
I have lived with several Zen masters - all of them were cats.
His last invention was an evil Lasagna. It didn't kill anyone, and it actually tasted pretty good.
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Well when I heard of it I was thinking a microcontroller could get rid of the discrete logic (and the joys of static/dynamic hazards due to propagation delay) but wasn't too sure if you wanted to go that route...
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The biggest problem at the moment is to find a PIC32 that still runs at 5V. I could run the CDP1802 at 3.6V, but then I would have to lower its clock frequency. I have had an underclocked 1802 for 40 years, now I want to overclock[^] it.
I intend a smaller PIC to conrol the 1802's clock frequency and operating mode. It also must communicate with a small serial ROM and copy it's contents into memory after a reset. This way I can keep the ROM out of the Elf's memory map and still have something to boot from. With a PIC in control of the clock frequency, I can do almost everything, from single stepping instructions to full blast or overclocking.
I have lived with several Zen masters - all of them were cats.
His last invention was an evil Lasagna. It didn't kill anyone, and it actually tasted pretty good.
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Silly I know, but what about a potenial divider 5V to 3.6V, Vo = Vi ((R2)/(R1+R2)),
Vo = 5(3.3K /(3.3K+ 1.7)), Vo = 3.3v, I always go for slightly below max. There are some good level shifting IC's (Texas Instruments)...
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It's usually done that way, but it's the data bus that I must hook up to the PIC. I need something like a dual level bus transciever.
Edit: I found this one[^], but I would need eight of them. The rest of the signals are inputs for the PIC and it's 5V tolerant.
Edit 2: Here we go[^]
I have lived with several Zen masters - all of them were cats.
His last invention was an evil Lasagna. It didn't kill anyone, and it actually tasted pretty good.
modified 9-Sep-19 13:37pm.
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Coding was something my father could not understand, so he couldn't "take over", as it were. Plus the computer room in 7th grade was a great place to hide from the bullies.
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Marc Clifton wrote: Plus the computer room in 7th grade was a great place to hide from the bullies.
The computer room is where the bullies knew they'd find me.
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After my first exposure to "software" (in the 70's), I decided I could do it better.
Over 40 years later, that has not changed.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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fair enough. i just wanted to take things apart. build things with the pieces. make what suits my fancy, and explore making it do things it wasn't supposed to. that has not changed.
i'm a subverter and a deconstructionist when it comes to code i guess. Derrida's ghost is probably sideeying me right now.
When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.
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#realJSOP wrote: After my first exposure to "software" (in the 70's), I decided I could do it better.
Over 40 years later, that has not changed.
Over 40 years later, you look at your own code and decide you could still do it better. It's a no-win situation.
(ok, it doesn't take 40 years to get to that stage...)
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My family got a TI/99-4a around '83 I think. I learned how to write BASIC programs to solve my HS algebra/geometry/trig homework problems. A few years later, I was at UNI as a CS major until I found a job that paid well, but interfered with lab hours so I quit school. 10 years later, I went back to school and finished. I got my first coding job before I graduated and I'm still here 20 years later!
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
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When I was about 10, my father gave an AP course in FORTRAN for high-school students at the local University. He took me along a couple of times, and I was hooked.
This was about the year 6 BT (Before Terminals). God only knows how many punched cards I ruined before I got a program that would compile. 
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.
-- 6079 Smith W.
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Was gainfully employed as a chemist and was exploring a new Inductively Coupled Argon Plasma Spectrometer we had just bought. Could not find any analysis tools for the PDP-11 running the dang thing, so I learned PDP-11 assembly and wrote my own. Then did the same for a Gas Chromatograph we were using for oilfield gas analysis.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, navigate a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects! - Lazarus Long
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what a way to get started. into the fire as it were.
I almost bought a crusty old PDP-11 but i didn't know where i'd keep it.
These days, i could probably emulate one on a phone. 
When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.
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Quote: what a way to get started. into the fire as it were.
Yep. Bear in mind that the argon plasma was created by passing argon gas through a coil of water cooled copper tubing energized by a 5KW RF generator. Never set anything on fire, but the generator frequency was very close to the middle of the CB Radio bands. If we ever forgot to close the faraday cage, we blew up every CB radio in town.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, navigate a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects! - Lazarus Long
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stoneyowl2 wrote: If we ever forgot to close the faraday cage, we blew up every CB radio in town.
That sounds like fun. =)
When I was growin' up, I was the smartest kid I knew. Maybe that was just because I didn't know that many kids. All I know is now I feel the opposite.
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I sucked rocks as an elementary school teacher. Was married and needed a new career. Luckily, programming and I were a good fit.
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I got to do some C programming in my first calculus class in college and found out that I enjoyed it. I picked up more programming skills on my own then decided to take some programming classes. Fun times 
Just because the code works, it doesn't mean that it is good code.
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Ah, 'twas the year 1983, and I decided to find out what all the hoo-rah was about.
I had seen a classmate's BASIC code a few year's earlier and the idea that a few arcane incantations could actually tell a machine to do something interesting was totally baffling.
But, once I was introduced to it and tried it, I found that I could do it like nobody's business.
(BASIC-Plus on a PDP-11 running RSTS-E)
Money for nothing, and the chicks for free.
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