General Chat

oh gosh ................... I remember those reels of magnetic tape!


The computer building was (and still is) in the centre of the campus, our building then was on the northern edge of campus, about 1 km away ................... we used to have to walk there, carrying our input forms, often in pouring rain.

We handed the input forms over to the keypunch clerks, and got back the punched cards days later.

We had to take those down to the next floor, hand them over to the computer guys ....................


and eventually get back the box of punched cards AND the printout, which once a year would be over 400 pages long



and then walk back, usually in the rain :-)


Eventually, the punch cards were done away with, and we were given a remote monitor to use for inputting. That monitor had been discarded by the Computing Centre workers as too old ................. for the last 10 years that I used it, it could not be turned off, or it would not have come back on.


We still had to walk over to the main Centre to pick up the printouts ...........

............ but in 1991 we moved to a new building built specially for us, on the very southern edge of campus, about 2 km away from Computing. By this time, the printout had grown to about 600 pages (remember those large computer sheets?) plus several smaller ones for specific parts of the major one.

It was eventually suggested that one of the guys use the departmental truck to drive me there and back .............. he could park that truck in the loading zone, whereas private cars were not allowed in the central part of campus.


In 1995, I got the PC, and could do my own printouts, as and when needed.

OH first used computers in 1970 too, working for the MOD. Punched card interface, no screens or nice editors :-), Even when I started my HND course in 1980, most of our large programming assignments were done on punched cards - great fun, especially when one of my friends accidentally dropped their substantial stack of cards from the third floor of the building.

My first proper job in 1975 we used to answer the phone to customers and if it was a query about their bill we'd ask them to hold while we went across to check it on the computer - there were two between forty clerks. The people who worked in IT dept had to be physically fit because the magnetic tapes were big and heavy. :-(

I was well and truly told off by someone on this site years ago when I posted that I first used a computer in 1963 .................. my professor at university had one. The "works" completely filled a wall in his office.

I first worked regularly with a computer beginning in 1970 ....... using the university's main frame computer, which filled a whole room, and needed punched data cards.



this person went to great effort to find information that the first PC was not until later than those dates, and therefore I was lying.


her information was true ................... but I wasn't using a PC, and didn't have one at work until 1995 when my department had to buy one for me because the main frame computer was finally going off-line. We then had to get a whole new software programme written for my use, and transfer everything over from the main frame.

Liked the bit about nothing new under the sun. Not sure how computers have been here before though or am I misinterpreting . . .

I'm 73, I started using main frame computer belonging to local council in 1974. Went online about 2000 but using a TV with internet access then son gave me his Windows 98 PC about 2002 and now on my 3rd "Tower" Have a mobile with camera and can access 'net if want from that.. Friends of ours wont (apart from wife with mobile) make use of any modern aids. They refuse to use ATMs, Teletext et al Their son gave em PC but it got binned, son gave them satnav - chucked in drawer, gave his father a mobile - chucked in drawer. The guy has little idea of wot most "buttons" on his car dash are for and wont even alter car clock when needed. Whilst the wife has mobile she keys in number she want to fone manually even tho son put all numbers she uses in the Contacts List on fone. She doesn't use camera on fone nor can she text. Can't persuade em to "get with it" - their decision and they're happy that way. Incidentally my sons PC plus a printer plus a scanner (no 3in1s those days) cost him over £1300 in 1998! I usually only get online in the evenings but make good use of Face Book - family and ex mil mates on there plus other ex mil sites

In two weeks time it will be exactly 143 years since 'the father of the computer' died.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Babbage

Charles Babbage, who came up with the concept of a programmable computer, conceived his Analytical Engine in 1834.

http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/onlinestuff/stories/babbage.aspx

…All things are wearisome; Man is not able to tell it. The eye is not satisfied with seeing, Nor is the ear filled with hearing. That which has been is that which will be, And that which has been done is that which will be done. So there is nothing new under the sun. Is there anything of which one might say, "See this, it is new "? Already it has existed for ages Which were before us.…Ecclesiastes 1:9

It makes me laugh when the younger ones show astonishment at us "oldies" using computers. They seem to think they invented them.

I love telling them that my late father in law was the head Professor of computing studies at a well known Aussie university. If he was still alive he'd now be nearly 88!

We have 2 desk top computers and 1 laptop at home

OH is retired, but still has 2 offices on campus, each has a computer


so we are pretty computer literate .......................



but I will not use a computer for on-line banking of any type



We neither of us have a cell phone, let alone a smartphone or a tablet


we quite honestly have never seen the need to be constantly connected

I f anyone wants us, they can call us on the land-line, when we are at home, not out and about.


I find it most annoying to be on a bus, train, in a restaurant etc with people talking on their cells.

I do NOT want to know their sex history, nor the sex history of their caller.



............ and don't get me started on the incredibly rude people who conduct business with bank tellers or sales staff with a cell phone stuck to their ear!



I do see the safety aspect of having a cell phone ........................ and have tried to buy one over the years between about 2000 and last year, for use when we were driving back and forth to our cabin. But only about 10% of the 800 km round trip is actually within range of any cell phone reception


We may consider buying a cell phone each now for emergency use as we get older .............. but it will be for contact only between the two of us, or to call 911

OH isn't into technology either ,he hates the phone and clams up if he has to answer it

He left school at 14 and went straight into work ,like many folks of our age our families didnt have home phones ,cameras.etc

I had taken me yonks to persuede him it's ok to set up direct debits for monthly out goings like council tax etc . He doesn trust anyone to have access to his bank account

Even now I do any online payments for him as has no idea how to work a computer .

I was lucky that computers came in when I was still working and we were taught how to use them which has given me the confidence now to follow my genealogy hobby

Hubby is 80 and I am late 70's which does surprise some younger folks that nan is up there with her PC ,IPad and mobile phone :-D

I am sure if my mum was alive she would be utterly confused with it all. She died in 1994 well before computers became common place. She was still thinking the TV was wonderful!! Bless him, I wish my Dad was alive to see all the modern technology, he would have embrased it and loved it. He died in 2001.

My Mum is very 'suspicious' of technology and thinks using computers is a black art. She regards it as 'cheating' look up answers to things, even though I tell her it is the same as using a dictionary or encyclopedia! I have also told her that it is not a question of just pressing a button, you have to know what you're looking for. And how she has benefitted from us using technology - from looking up old pictures of her home town, finding details about old friends, ordering things for her, organising carers and answering medical queries :-D She goes quiet when I tell her that - she is nearly 91 so perhaps can be forgiven ;-)

I do find it strange when people announce the fact that they don't use computers or tablets or mobiles as if it is something to be proud of. OK I don't have a problem if they have no need of them or don't want them but surely it is nothing to be proud of?

Reading Shirley-i-g-t-h-o-i's post about not getting a reply from the priest made me think of another related issue:

Those of us who go online for everything regard checking our emails daily as important, because they can be from important people who we care about. Some folk regard computers as bad and something others do to avoid doing the dishes or other 'real work' :-P :-P so they do it as little as possible.

I was chatting to someone yesterday who moaned about everyone and everything (from people using their mobiles on the bus to the state of the Labour Party). Then he announced proudly that all he had was a wristwatch, no mobile, no computer, nothing. I was amazed when he then proudly announced his age as though he was some nonogenarian. He wasn't even seventy!

And actually, I had been on the previous bus at the same time as him (unknowingly at the time) and yes, I had answered my mobile to one of my family who was ringing because they needed my help, so :-P :-P