Subject: [[email-masked]: Re: Packet Loss]

From: "Nadav Har'El" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 15 Dec 2000 20:42:52 +0200

I just read the following pearl in the NANOG (North American Network Operator
Group) mailing list. Just to bring you into the picture, the thread was
originally a question about how to define "packet loss", and the discussion
soon turned into a discussion of sending data the "physical" way (sending
data on tape via a car), and then soon turned into anecdotes about how long
ago people moved data around. Sound of these people evidentally have been
involved in the computer scene for over 30 years, so they have some nice
anecdotes.

I like the punched-paper-tape anecdote about a string of "1" bits making
the tape easier to tear (for people who don't know what a punched paper
tape is, take a look at 'ppt' from Redhat's bsd-games package, for example),
and the chad reference :) (what this means should be obvious to anyone
following the Florida recounts).

I've edited the message slightly for brevity's sake.

----- Forwarded message from Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]> -----

Date: Fri, 15 Dec 2000 11:20:44 -0500
From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Organization: Multicast Technologies
To: [email-masked], [email-masked]
Subject: Re: Packet Loss
Reply-To: [email-masked]

[email-masked] wrote:
> 
>...
> I still have 21 9-track tapes in my office that I need to do something with,
> as our last system with 3420-style round tapes is being decomissioned in
> the next few months.
>...

Hello;

   Real Men use punched paper tape to store programs and load the boot
block, after toggling
its binary location on the system console register :) The Gods Who Walk
Among Us program in machine 
code by toggling it in at the console. 

(I still have some punched paper tape somewhere. I remember feeling
impressed when I graduated to
punched cards. They didn't tend to crack if you had a string of all bits
set to one.)

On the other hand, I did tens of thousands of lines of code on IBM
punched cards and I never
once recall a bug caused by a chad, hanging or otherwise.

                                   Regards
                                   Marshall Eubanks

   Multicast Technologies, Inc.
   10301 Democracy Lane, Suite 201
   Fairfax, Virginia 22030
   Phone : 703-293-9624          Fax     : 703-293-9609     
   e-mail : [email-masked]     http://www.on-the-i.com

----- End forwarded message -----

-- 
Nadav Har'El                        |      Friday, Dec 15 2000, 19 Kislev 5761
[email-masked]             |-----------------------------------------
Phone: +972-53-245868, ICQ 13349191 |Life's a bitch, but god forbid the bitch
http://nadav.harel.org.il           |divorce me -- Nas