[anymouse]

Interesting history of the few parts of the government that has greatly improved our lives. Is D(ARPA) still as effective as it has been in the past?

[massgopguy]

I remember in 1978, a PDP-1 came back to the OEM Dept. where I worked at Digital. It was absolutely mammoth. We sent it to the Computer Museum.

[GitmoSailor]

I remember delivering about 86 papers the day of that milestone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!..............

[I still care]

One of our very favorite movies is “October Sky”. It’s about how the launch of Sputnik inspires a boy in a rural coal town to become an aerospace engineer.

One of the few “feel good” movies around. And it’s a true story.

[JRios1968]

So, we can thank Sputnik for

[mountainlyons]

I thought that I. Gore invented all of that?

[sig226]

I remember learning to program in BASIC on a PDP-11, then using the programs other students and teachers had written. One of the ironic oddities was the infamous command to the user, “Type 1 for yes, type 2 for no.” Why wasn’t it one and zero? Binary, my ass. :)

Somebody showed me how to get an input statement to recognize a character string, then someone else showed me how to take apart a character string and analyze each letter. Well, I thought, I can have it read the first letter of the answer so that if the answer starts with a ‘y’ it will go to the routine for a positive answer.

“No, have them type one for yes and two for no . . .”

I became disillusioned.

[LibFreeOrDie]

Gosh, has it been 50 years already?

http://history.nasa.gov/sputnik/sputnik.wav

I remember what a wonder it was to watch those early Russian satellites in the night sky.

[krb]

IBM with SNA ... all brain-dead protocols.

This guy is smoking crack.