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Post by kerouac2 on May 17, 2019 3:55:41 GMT
At least we also have incorrect AutoCorrect. There are still a few people who are sure of what they typed that the don't even think to look if it has been sabotaged. On another forum, I was reading a trip report about Paris and somebody took a boat on the Seeing River.
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Post by bixaorellana on May 17, 2019 8:41:02 GMT
Kimby, the first time I used a word processor I heard dramatic music and the sky lit up with beautiful colors.
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Post by bjd on May 17, 2019 12:12:49 GMT
When did people stop talking about word processors and just started saying computers?
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Post by Kimby on May 17, 2019 13:03:09 GMT
bjd, I always thought of the word processor as the software and the computer as the hardware.
And come to think of it, there is/was an intermediate step: a word-processing typewriter with enough electronic memory to store and display several lines of text BEFORE putting it on paper, allowing you to fix your errors or make minor revisions.
Ps auto correct turned bjd to “bad”
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Post by bixaorellana on May 17, 2019 18:11:53 GMT
That is because she made a mistake -- bad Bjd! You are right about their being distinct things, Kimby. Also on the old enough to remember theme, K wormed as a typesetter using the magic IBM typewriters with the interchangeable type balls.
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Post by bjd on May 17, 2019 19:09:43 GMT
My bad! But I distinctly remember reading about somebody (President Carter?) writing his memoirs "on a word processor". Of course, that was a long time ago so my memory is probably failing me. Aha -- I just found it: "Mr. Carter's tale of electronic perfidy is a familiar one to journalists, since many newspapers have made the switch to word processors, versatile machines that resemble electric typewriters with video display screens. Now a growing number of writers are joining the electronic revolution, including Mr. Carter, who recently signed a contract with Bantam Books to write his memoirs in time for publication next year." Whole article here: nytimesNot so bad after all.
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Post by Kimby on May 17, 2019 20:41:07 GMT
😁
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Post by Kimby on May 17, 2019 20:42:35 GMT
That is because she made a mistake -- bad Bjd! You are right about their being distinct things, Kimby. Also on the old enough to remember theme, K wormed as a typesetter using the magic IBM typewriters with the interchangeable type balls. How does one worm as a typesetter? Another case of bad auto spelling?
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Post by kerouac2 on May 17, 2019 21:04:33 GMT
I actually had a device that was a word processor but which was not a complete computer. (I also had one of those typewriters with two lines of memory to allow you to make corrections before printing.) In fact, I still have my Philips Videowriter because I was so attached to it that I have been unable to get rid of it. It is hidden away out of sight somewhere. www.picclickimg.com/d/l400/pict/223245964804_/Philips-VideoWriter-4160-Raro.jpg
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Post by bixaorellana on May 17, 2019 21:21:53 GMT
How does one worm as a typesetter? Another case of bad auto spelling? Typing on a phone in a bouncy train. I wor ked as a typesetter on the fancier version of one of these. Later I worked on the proto-computer that had that console larger than a bedside cabinet.
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Post by bjd on May 18, 2019 5:55:21 GMT
Sounds like it's time to start decluttering, Kerouac! Or are you planning to open a museum of old technology?
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Post by patricklondon on May 19, 2019 11:53:15 GMT
My brother had one of the earliest "luggable" computers, a thing the size of a suitcase with a screen only a few inches square, but he travelled a lot on business, so presumably he found it useful. When he showed it to the rest of us that Christmas, he got my mother (who had only ever used a manual typewriter, not even a "golfball" or other electric machine) to try out the word-processing program. Every time she got to the end of the line she reached out and walloped the side of the thing. You had to make your own entertainment in them days. My blog | My photos | My video clips | My Librivox recordings"too literate to be spam"
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Post by bixaorellana on May 20, 2019 16:09:24 GMT
Ha ha! I do remember that transition period of remembering there was nothing to hit for "return". Also remember missing that nice ding telling you that were at the end of the line.
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Post by kerouac2 on May 20, 2019 18:59:58 GMT
Almost up until my retirement, I still knew people at the office who did not know that return was automatic at the end of the line, so they would hit the return key at random moments when they were writing something.
They often had to come to me for language corrections, and I would just silently groan and fix it all.
But that was nothing compared to my colleague Constantin who would come to see me a dozen times a day for Excel problems.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jun 10, 2019 14:32:22 GMT
When I moved to Paris, there were two double-decker municipal bus lines -- line 53 (Opéra-Porte d'Asnières) and 94 (Montparnasse-Levallois). I lived along line 53 so I was delighted and took that bus often. However, they were discontinued in 1977.
Of course, since 2001 all sorts of hop-on hop-off (and rip-off the tourists) buses can be seen all over Paris.
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Post by bjd on Jun 10, 2019 15:17:06 GMT
I remember the number 56 bus in Paris which went along Blvd Voltaire and up to Montmartre (I think). It had a little open space in the back where you could stand and smoke, or else just stand and watch the traffic. That bus was still around in the early 2000s.
Just checked -- it goes from Château de Vincennes to Clignancourt.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jun 10, 2019 15:34:54 GMT
I went out on some of the open platforms from time to time, but there were not many buses that had them. Probably a grand total of 4 people could have squeezed out on one of them, but normally they were empty unless there were kids on the bus.
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Jun 10, 2019 16:51:43 GMT
We have double deckers here...I rarely sit upstairs unless I'm on a scenic route...the X3 bus runs between Leicester and Market Harborough and travels between lots of small Leicestershire villages..it's only about 25 minutes in the car but the bus takes an hour. Such fun.
We got our first computer in 2000 when youngest last home. It was dial up and very clunky but we loved it. I'd been using the work computers since started there in 1988...they were on a pathology based system that had to be backed up onto huge disks every Friday...I remember going into the master suite in the middle of winter to find the computer engineer in shirt sleeves as it was so hot in there..
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Post by kerouac2 on Jun 10, 2019 17:00:40 GMT
We had a very small computer room in my office, but I roasted whenever I had to go in there in spite of an air conditioner going full blast. No solution has been found for that yet, and it is apparently one of the major environmental problems for the future. Without even mentioning the heat, apparently computers already represent 7% of global electricity consumption.
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Post by fumobici on Jun 11, 2019 4:09:40 GMT
When I was a wee lad in Davis, California (think oven-hot in Summer), the university computer center was the only place I knew of that was both free and air conditioned. The IBM mainframes there with their tape drives required it. We would take a handful of punch cards from the waste basket, go up too the roof and set them free. The would rise up high into the sky on the thermals spinning slowly as they did until they were just a tiny speck in the sky, eventually disappearing altogether. They probably wound up in the high Sierra Mountains off to the East. What a litterbug I was!
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Post by bixaorellana on Jun 11, 2019 9:51:14 GMT
But such poetically described littering!
Anyway, paper is biodegradable, so setting free the cards has somewhat of an ancient ritual feel to it. Go ye forth, therefore, and write a haiku.
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Jun 11, 2019 20:03:24 GMT
In our laboratory we used to hate the summer...a wall of windows letting in the bright sun, no way of opening them much because of traffic fumes (city centre hospital)....and we had to wear thick white lab coats done up to the neck.....it got very hot in there. We had no AC at all so folks were passing out right, left and centre...staff would fight over the desk fan that we managed to pinch from the manager's office. Then we got some new, very expensive equipment. They wouldn't give accurate results if the lab got too hot. We got AC within weeks.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jun 11, 2019 20:10:24 GMT
Machines are much more important than human beings.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jul 8, 2019 17:21:13 GMT
I remember having to turn audio cassettes over every 30 minutes before the incredible technical progress of autoreverse.
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Post by patricklondon on Jul 9, 2019 10:34:06 GMT
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Jul 9, 2019 11:47:37 GMT
Good grief.... We bought a device for changing vinyl to digital a few years ago...got one for tapes too. I do miss the glorious ritual of carefully removing an album from its sleeve, then the paper inner...holding it gently suspended between my palms, being careful not to TOUCH the playing surface...inspecting it carefully on both sides (perhaps blowing on it ) before ceremonially placing it on the turntable...and breathe... Starting the turntable spinning before v-e-r-y s-o-w-l-y...and with a feather light touch lowering the stylus onto the silent bit at the start of the album. Creeping back to the sofa and sinking into the sounds belting from the speakers....*sigh*
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Post by kerouac2 on Jul 22, 2019 14:34:22 GMT
I felt as old as the hills today when somebody brought this object to an auction show on television and nobody knew what it was spontaneously, even though most of the people on the show are no more than 10 years younger than me.
imagizer.imageshack.com/img921/6180/F1t0D5.jpg
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Post by bjd on Jul 22, 2019 14:45:57 GMT
What is it?
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Post by mossie on Jul 22, 2019 15:25:52 GMT
An envelope licker?
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Post by kerouac2 on Jul 22, 2019 15:35:50 GMT
It's a stamp wetter. When I moved to France, they still had them in every post office.
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