Clive B. Dawson 1984
I started work for the University Computation Center in 1975 as a systems programmer for the DEC-10, just a couple of months after it arrived on campus. My previous experience with a DEC-10 had ended when I graduated from Stevens Tech. Since then, I had spent four rather painful years doing graduate work on a CDC 6600 system for which I had to learn how to keypunch again. I welcomed the arrival of the 10 with the joy of someone being released from prison. I can't begin to count the hours I spent on that system--well over 10,000 connect hours-- developing software for it, fixing bugs, and helping users. In turn, it helped produce dissertations for both my wife and me, and was an endless source of fun and relaxation as well. (It was also responsible for extending my graduate school career by at
least four years!)
The KI processor had served the campus well for seven and a half years. Now the user population was drifting over to the two new DEC-20's, and it was only a matter of time before the rising maintenance costs could no longer be justified. A flurry of last-minute rescue efforts followed the announcement that the system would have to be shut down. It seemed incomprehensible that a perfectly good machine would be removed from service given the chronic state of saturation common to most computer systems on most university campuses. The efforts failed, and on October 31, 1982, the DECsystem-10 at the University of Texas at Austin was turned off for the last time.
The event did not pass without due ceremony. We held a farewell party on that Halloween Sunday, well attended by current and ex staff members as well as a few users. Many brought cameras to record a vanishing breed--they don't make 'em with lights anymore. In one of the stranger moments we cranked up the PTP: and had paper tape (might as well use it up) and scratch magtape draped all over the place. The laughing and joking helped. Many of us on the staff had built up an extremely close-knit group over the years which had slowly drifted apart as new machines and new responsibilites came along. This "wake" had a good cathartic effect, bringing us together at a time when we needed to share feelings that had hit us harder than we might have cared to admit.
I wondered about the users--all the faceless people scattered throug out dozens of small offices and terminal rooms throughout the campus--the complete opposite of our small, close-knit staff. Were they feeling the same emotions? If so, who could each of them share with?
At home very late that night, I felt the urge to dial up one last time. As I went through my normal routine of checking mail, the Bboard, and the various system mailboxes, I discovered something completely unexpected. During the last few hours users had logged in and sent mail to the bboard and to other system mailboxes like Operator. The curious thing is that these people had no way of knowing that anybody would ever be around to read these messages. They were, in the best way they knew how, sharing
their feelings directly with the machine. Some of the messages are reproduced here as I found them, with only the senders' names altered.
. From: R. B.
. Subject: Dec10
. To: GRIPE
Farewell DEC10 and thank you!
. From: [4435,244]
. Subject: The death of a friend
. To: Bboard
Goodbye, DEC-10, you've been a great friend and co-worker. I'm
going to miss you for a long time. I feel worse than when they
killed Hal in 2001.
. From: B. J.
. Subject: November the 2 is too late
. To: Bboard
it feels like this is the end of an old friend. who says
computers haven't got any personality?
. From: GVCE333
. Subject: Good-Bye old paint
. To: Bboard
The glue factory beckons... Sigh!
. From: [1276,1]
. Subject: Good-bye, DEC-10
. To: Bboard
As a well-spent day bring happy sleep,
so life well used brings happy death.
Leonardo Da Vinci, 1452-1519
Notebooks [c. 1500]
DEC-10, you've been a good and faithful (for the most part)
servant and companion. Farewell.
. From: BSAB553
. Subject: bye
. To: GRIPE
This is last "bye" to the DEC 10; too bad. I liked the DEC 10
better than the DEC 20. I find it hard to believe that this
system could not have been supported to some extent... So long
forever!
. From: LSDT141
. Subject: Bye
. To: OPERATOR
BYE BYE FAITHFUL FRIEND - THE DEC-10
. From: C
. Subject: Farewell
. To: Operator
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light...
The next day, one more message appeared on the DEC-20 Bboard:
Date: 1 Nov 1982 2133-CST
From: P.M.
Subject: the death of the dec-10
To: bboard
I was there till the bitter end. First, the one or two
faithful logged on via the micom were detached and
automatically logged off. As the only telephone hook-up, I
was privileged to be at his side a little longer. I fondly
reread the last farewells of those who had cared enough to
write a bboard message. Then I, too, was detached and logged
off. But even then the DEC-10 lingered on. Systat and help
functioned for several more minutes until the operator sent
the last message I or anyone will ever receive from the
DEC-10:
Time sharing is over permanently! Good-bye.
The stone has been rolled in front of the grave, my friends.
The DEC-10 is no more.
---------------------------------------
About six months later in St. Louis I heard DEC announce the end of the 36-bit systems. I wondered then how many times in the next few years the events told here would be repeated.
Recently I had occasion to visit the machine room where the old KI had stood. On one side of the room was a shiny new VAX 11/780. The other side of the room had boxes of IBM PC's stacked to the ceiling. Someday these machines would be old too. But somehow I knew that they would never have a day for themselves like Halloween of 1982. They don't make 'em with souls anymore.
----------------
Contributed by:
Clive B. Dawson
Advanced Micro Devices
Austin, Texas
I used an email address to try to contact the author, but it dead ended, so I hope you do not mind me reposting this, as it is one of many stories from back in the day that has so much meaning for those that were there and experienced the " New Tech " of that era and felt a loss when it was deemed that their day was over. Thank you, Clive, For sharing this.
To those of you reading this whether or not you lived through " Back in the Day ", or not, I hope you sense the feeling that was there for the beginning of what we have today.
Below is how wikipedia describes the DEC10
PDP-10
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- PDP-10.jpg (10.29 KiB) Viewed 4312 times
KL10-DA 1090 CPU and 6 Memory Modules
The PDP-10 was a mainframe computer family[1] manufactured by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) from the late 1960s on; the name stands for "Programmed Data Processor model 10". The first model was delivered in 1966.[2] It was the machine that made time-sharing common; it looms large in hacker folklore because of its adoption in the 1970s by many university computing facilities and research labs, the most notable of which were MIT's AI Lab and Project MAC, Stanford's SAIL, Computer Center Corporation (CCC), and Carnegie Mellon University.
The PDP-10 architecture was an almost identical version of the earlier PDP-6 architecture, sharing the same 36-bit word length and slightly extending the instruction set (but with improved hardware implementation). Some aspects of the instruction set are unique, most notably the "byte" instructions, which operated on bit fields of any size from 1 to 36 bits inclusive according to the general definition of a byte as a contiguous sequence of a fixed number of bits.
