Home » Forum » Story Discussion and Feedback

Forum: Story Discussion and Feedback

The Adolescence of P-1

PotomacBob 🚫

About 50 or so years ago I read a story called "The Adolescence of P-1." As I recall, it was about the presence of an artificial intelligence in a forerunner of the Internet. At the time, according to the story, there were approximately 20,000 mainframe computers hooked together, linking the Pentagon, other government agencies and colleges and universities, and the combined computing power of those computers was 5800 mb, and one character speculated that some day the combined computing power of the world's computers might be double that. In 50 years my memory is almost certainly fuzzy, so some of those numbers may be off. Today, those numbers seem to me to be unbelievably small. Anybody else remember that story and whether the numbers are anywhere close to accurate?

Replies: irvmull jimq2 REP jimq2 Vonalt Eric Ross LonelyDad jimq2

irvmull 🚫
Updated:

@PotomacBob

By 1970, IBM alone had produced 33,000 System 360's.

By 1976, there were 63 host computers connected to ARPANET - the forerunner of the internet.
Those were places like Stanford, UCSB, Rand Corp, NASA...

So, assuming that the story was set in 1975, the answer about networking would be no.

When it comes to computing power, however, it isn't measured in mb. That would be memory. The first IBM 360 had 8k to 64k memory. That may seem to be "unbelievably small", but it was enough for lots of business and scientific uses. Later, more expensive models had as much as 8mb, with an additional 8mb "add on" if you could afford it.

We had an IBM system 360 at the large gov't. agency where I worked until 1980. We certainly were not connected to any kind of "internet" or ARPANET.

As for processing speed: currently, a Raspberry Pi is faster than the fastest 1975 IBM. So is your phone. And either one has 1,000 times (or more) memory than the biggest IBM.

jimq2 🚫

@PotomacBob

Your smart phone has more memory and computing power than you could have fit in a 1000 sq ft room in 1975. I remember in 1980 hauling disc drives that were the size of a washing machine and weighed 700 pounds and had a capacity of 128kb or 256kb. It was not unusual for a computer room to have 10 or 20 of them.

Replies: akarge

akarge 🚫

@jimq2

Author was Thomas Joseph Ryan. I have a copy somewhere in my dead trees boxes.

REP 🚫

@PotomacBob

The Adolescence of P-1

The story was published in 1977. I wasn't that familiar with computer systems at that time of my career.

A coworker said that he had a computer system at home, but did not define what he had. In my mind, he had a small mainframe computer, but I think he was referring to a desktop computer. At that time in my career, I used a terminal connected to my company's mainframe to do my work. That was about the time that my company started upgrading its worker's equipment to desktop PCs. At that time, the prototypes of laptops were just starting to be introduced.

I don't know what the total computing power was at that point in history.

jimq2 🚫

@PotomacBob

In '77, the IBM PC hadn't been released yet. It didn't came out until August of '81.

Replies: AmigaClone TheDarkKnight

AmigaClone 🚫

@jimq2

In '77, the IBM PC hadn't been released yet. It didn't came out until August of '81.

Home computers started becoming popular 1977. That year saw the introduction of the first home computers by Commodore, Apple, and Radio Shack (the Commodore Pet, the Apple II, or the TRS-80 Model I respectively).

For a bit more history see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_computer

Now where do I leave the bucket and mop for AJ to use after they spit...

Replies: jimq2

jimq2 🚫

@AmigaClone

The first PC's IBM developed used the same 6502 chip that Apple and the others used. They later switched to the 8088 chip because "Corporate" felt that using the 6502 chip would validate Apple, Radio Shack, and Commodore as being real computers. This delayed the release several years.

TheDarkKnight 🚫

@jimq2

In '77 I was just starting my career as a programmer at a medium-sized university. We wrote our COBOL code on coding sheets then waited for access to one of two keypunch machines. The next step was to turn in the 80-column cards to Operations. Later that day, or maybe the next day, we would go back down to get a printout of our errors. Rinse and repeat, until you had clean code.

Needless to say (what a silly expression), things had changed drastically when I retired from the same university 30 years later.

Vonalt 🚫

@PotomacBob

TRS-80 Model I

The Trash-80 used the Zilog Z80 processor. The processor was alos used in several "laptops" back then as well as luggables such as the KayPro II, the Epson Qx-10 and the fun little Sinclair ZX Spectrum British made computer. This was the era when I first came on board and spent the next 20 plus working with these"antiques"

Replies: Pixy awnlee jawking redthumb

Pixy 🚫

@Vonalt

and the fun little Sinclair ZX Spectrum British made computer

Which was actually proceeded by the 8 bit BBC micro. The BBC micro led to the Acorn Archimedes a few years later which was one of the first 'home' computers to run a 32 bit processor.

I could well be wrong, but I think the 32bit RISC OS was far superior to the Windows OS equivalent of the time which I think was still on 16 bit.

awnlee jawking 🚫

@Vonalt

The Trash-80 used the Zilog Z80 processor.

Did the TRS-80 family change chips at some point? The UK had a TRS-80 'clone' called the Dragon 32, which had a 6809 chip.

the fun little Sinclair ZX Spectrum

and the even funner Jupiter Ace (although that didn't support colour like the Spectrum).

AJ

Replies: Vonalt Michael Loucks Grey Wolf

Vonalt 🚫

@awnlee jawking

The only other Sinclair I can remember being out about the same time was the Timex Sinclair 1000. I will have to look in my junk box, I may have one in amongst my "valuables." Its major selling point, it was under $100 and came with an adapter you could attach to your analog TV. The resolution was so great that you could play space invaders on it 12 hours before going blind.

Michael Loucks 🚫

@awnlee jawking

Did the TRS-80 family change chips at some point? The UK had a TRS-80 'clone' called the Dragon 32, which had a 6809 chip.

The main TRS-80 line used the Z-80, but there were computers released by Tandy with Motorola 6809 and 68000 processors.

The TRS-80 Color Computer was 6509 based.

As for 'clones' of the TRS-80, I used an ABC-80 which was Z-80 based when I lived in Sweden 1979-80. Read all about in AWLL 1 Book 3.

You can read about my TRS-80 and Apple II experience in AWLL 1 Books 1-5. I wrote video games in Z80 assembler for a company called Nuvatec in the early 80s (again, see AWLL 1 Books 8-10).

Replies: AmigaClone

AmigaClone 🚫

@Michael Loucks

The main TRS-80 line used the Z-80, but there were computers released by Tandy with Motorola 6809 and 68000 processors.

The TRS-80 Color Computer was 6509 based.

As for 'clones' of the TRS-80, I used an ABC-80 which was Z-80 based when I lived in Sweden 1979-80. Read all about in AWLL 1 Book 3.

In the early 1980s Brazil had several TRS-80 clones. My parents owned one that included a CP/M board. The first word processor I used was WordStar on that system.

Replies: Michael Loucks

Michael Loucks 🚫

@AmigaClone

In the early 1980s Brazil had several TRS-80 clones. My parents owned one that included a CP/M board. The first word processor I used was WordStar on that system.

I cover quite a bit about early computers and early software in AWLL. Also discussed in CTL.

One early piece of 'word processing' software was Electric Pencil on the TRS-80.

Grey Wolf 🚫

@awnlee jawking

Yes, the TRS-80 family changed chips. The 'TRS-80 Color Computer' (introduced in 1980) used the 6809.

The Z80-based models were discontinued in 1981.

There is also the 'TRS-80 Model 16' which used a Motorola 68000 processor (same as the original Mac).

And there's the 'TRS-80 Model 100' which gets credit as the first commercially successful notebook computer. It came out in 1983 and used an Intel 80C85.

Tandy was all over the map, in other words.

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_TRS-80_and_Tandy-branded_computers for more.

redthumb 🚫

@Vonalt

I can remember the first computer I sort of used. To save what we we were doing it had to same it on a tape cassette. I think it was a Sinclair, but if not, please enlighten me.

Replies: jimq2

jimq2 🚫

@redthumb

Atari 400 & 800 were like that. I used to copy programs out of the computer mags and save it on tape so I could run them.

Do you remember the early modems that clamped to a phone handset?

Eric Ross 🚫

@PotomacBob

I certainly remember the story, especially the way that P1 took over the world. Don't remember the numbers, but keep in mind that what was astronomical in the day would be a pittance today. The first system I wrote code for was a Xerox Sigma 9 mainframe with (drumroll please) 16K of core memory. Through the magic of context switching, and a 64K Winchester disk the size of a trash can lid, it could support 60ish college students doing their compsci assignments.

LonelyDad 🚫

@PotomacBob

My first real exposure to computers came in 1975. The college I was attending had a single DEC terminal/printer timesharing on a computer sixty miles away. The next year we got our onw PDP 11/35, and added a CRT as a second terminal.
My buddy, who was evengeekier than I was, figured out how to crash that computer so we could play with/explore the OS directly.
given that experience I moved on to a programming job for a few years, then a stint as a Service Engineer with Datapoint, that was a power in the minicomputer field at the time.Then on to writing CAD/Cam software for a while. I finally retired at 62. So now I spend my time wandering around the Net and blathering here.

jimq2 🚫

@PotomacBob

You came late to the party. In the mid 60's, I was programming hard wired boards with jumper wires to determine the way to sort punch cards. I know, I just dated myself.

Reply to topic

Forum: Story Discussion and Feedback

The Adolescence of P-1

WARNING! ADULT CONTENT...