HPR2968: Life and Times of a Geek part 3

Introduction

In the last part of my story (show 1811 in 2015) I told you about some of my experiences at the University of Manchester as a postgraduate student from around 1973.

Today I want to talk a little more about my time in Manchester and mention some of the things I did that may be of interest to Hackers!

Researching for the episode

As I have been researching for this HPR episode I realise how long ago some of these events were - in Internet years particularly. In many cases I could find no online records of places, equipment or people. This seems to be because any records there might be are on paper and have never made it online. I contacted a company that made some of the laboratory equipment I used that I thought might be of interest, and the person I contacted said that although he remembered what I was referring to the company had kept no records of it and had had to discontinue it due to modern safety concerns.

I find this somewhat dispiriting and it makes me feel very very old!

Long notes

I have provided detailed notes as usual for this episode. The HTML version can be viewed here and the ePub version downloaded from here.

Links

• Building experimental apparatus:
  
  • Wikipedia page for Dexion - for building metal structures
  
  
  • Wikipedia page on the “Skinner Box” or Operant Conditioning Chamber
  
  
  • “Handy Tube” used for making Skinner Boxes
  
  


• Video tape recorders:
  
  • The Rewind Museum reel-to-reel video recorders
  
  
  • Wikipedia page on Video tape recorders
  
  
  • Youtube video about a Sanyo Reel to Reel Video Tape Recorder
  
  


• Logic programming:
  
  • Wikipedia page on the Logic Gate
  
  
  • Wikipedia page on the (electronic) “Flip-Flop”
  
  


• D-MAC Digitiser:
  
  • StackExchange article discussing the D-MAC digitiser
  
  


• ICT (ICL) computers:
  
  • Wikipedia page on the ICT (ICL) 1900 series
  
  
  • Wikipedia page on the ICL GEORGE operating system
  
  


• Teleprinter:
  
  • Wikipedia page on the Teletype Model 33
  
  


• CDC computers:
  
  • Wikipedia page on the CDC Cyber range
  
  


• Wikipedia page on the APL language


• Sinclair calculators:
  
  • Wikipedia page on the Sinclair Scientific
  
  
  • New Scientist advertisement December 1975
  
  
  • Sinclair Scientific operating instructions [This link might be dead; try the archive.org one below]
    
    • https://web.archive.org/web/20141021211903/http://phils.bitboxes.co.uk/scan_and_ocr/manuals/sinclair_scientific/
    
    
  
  
  • Sinclair Scientific simulator
  
  
  • Vintage Calculators
  
  
  • Reverse Polish Notation
  
  


• Previous episodes:
  
  • Life and Times of a Geek part 1 (2014-12-18)
  
  
  • Life and Times of a Geek part 2 (2015-07-13)
  
  


• Resources:
  
  • Full show notes
  
  
  • ePub show notes