Posted on 01/05/2016 9:31:16 AM PST by Red Badger
Recovery comes just as 50th anniversary of “The Original Series†approaches
Documents written by “Star Trek†creator Gene Roddenberry have been recovered from 200 floppy disks owned by the late TV writer and producer.
DriveSavers and eDiscovery announced Monday that after months of work they were able to pull data from the disks, which Roddenberry used to store information while he was working on “Star Trek.â€
Mike Cobb, DriveSavers director of engineering, would not reveal what was on the disks, but he did offer some clues. “Lots of documents,†Cobb hinted in a press release. “2016 just happens to be the 50th anniversary of the original ‘Star Trek,’ anything could happen, the world will have to wait and see.â€
The original television series “Star Trek†ran from 1966 to 1969. Roddenberry created scripts for the futuristic show on a typewriter. Later, he used a pair of custom-built computers to record story ideas, scripts and notes. Over time, the author moved on to work with more mainstream computers, but kept the custom-built pair in his possession.
Although Roddenberry died in 1991, it wasn’t until much later that his estate discovered nearly 200 5.25-inch floppy disks. One of his custom-built computers had long since been auctioned and the remaining device was no longer functional.
But these were no ordinary floppies. The custom-built computers had also used custom-built operating systems and special word processing software that prevented any modern method of reading what was on the disks.
After receiving the computer and the specially formatted floppies, DriveSavers engineers worked to develop a method of extracting the data. There was no user manual for the computer, nor was there any technical documentation to help guide them.
It took over three months for the DriveSavers engineering team to develop software that could read the disks. Even though the engineers were able to crack the unusual formatting, reading the nearly 200 disks took the better part of a year to finish.
Paramount Pictures will release the latest entry in the rebooted “Star Trek†film franchise, “Star Trek Beyond,†in 2016. CBS also recently announced plans to launch a new “Star Trek†series on CBS All Access in 2017.
Hmm...”Fire Shatner. And lose the guy with the funny ears.”
Romulen recipes?
Don’t order Sulu to “set course for Uranus”
Its a cookbook!!
LOL! Good One!
Roddenberry had a number of ideas for the film versions (apparently few of which were acceptable to film makers).
Most of them dealt with ersatz missions like “finding God” (a variation of which was used in one of the less successful films).
The film makers wanted adventure stories (like The Wrath of Khan).
The other film makers generally prevailed.
The disks (which held much less storage than modern disks) ‘probably’ deal with his later film ideas, and not the series (and despite the high number of disks, there is probably not as much text there as their numbers would suggest, for the above noted reason)
“Rosebud”
Is it me, or does the author seem unaware there WAS no such thing as a floppy disc when the original series was on?
I agree - whatever is on there, it probably has to do with the later films, which elevates this “news story” (at least for me) into the realm of “so what?”.
The Bank Street Writer perhaps?
Reminds me of my first Kaypro 2 computer.
Im calling BS... custom computer, custom OS...i dont think so... maybe obscure or arcane......also 5.25 inch floppys first came out in 1976....before that you had 8 inch floppys
I started as a tech in 1980 as worked on stuff that would be “old” even back then...
Never heard of it. Was it like ‘Lisa’?.............
We had at work back then, 79-80, PDP-11’s that used 8 inch floppies!..................
Did Geraldo find them locked in a vault?
Obama was born on Romulus?
The first Apple 1 came out in 1976 for $666
So an Apple ( what Satan tempted Eve in the garden)...for 666?( the number of the beast)....
Gee did we miss it...Steve Jobs was the Antichrist?...it explains the cult of Mac ;)
Not hardware...software. Circa...1980s.
Was it a DIY S-100 bus computer?
A store in Los Angeles (on Rosecrans IIRC) sold bare boards and kits of integrated circuits so you could make your own computers.
It was popular with the aerospace workers/engineers that worked in the area.
HP-21MX Series had 9895A 8” dual-floppies as a storage option. I would have to replace the felt pads that pressed the floppy against the read/write heads.
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