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IEEE London Section
IEEE Hamilton Section
Telephone Set Development:
Beginning of Caller ID Video My boss didn't follow the
script so I look like an idiot trying to follow his lead, but it gives
an idea of what life was like in the 1980's when Ma Bell ruled.
Telephone Set Development Presentation
to Hamilton Section 2015-Jun-10
First year Engineering at university was general and I had still
been deciding between Mechanical and Electrical Engineering. My
first memory of the IEEE was joining the Student Branch as a second
year student. Back in the late 60's, we put a man on the moon using
slide rules and a computer was still a strange and expensive device
kept in a locked air-conditined room. Although we weren't supposed
to learn anything about them until third year, the third year
students were holding lessons for the class behind them. Then came
the power and prestige available through a professional
organization: it was arranged for we second year IEEE members to get
10 seconds of computer time per month for the rest of the academic
year.
It may not sound like much in today's terms, but students registered
in a computer course only got 30 seconds of CPU time on the IBM 7040
mainframe computer to do all their assignments. Things were much
more efficient in those days. Programmes were flow charted and
checked for logic before the first line of code was written in
longhand and Hollerith punch cards were typed. Then the cards were
run through a machine, called an interpreter, which gave a printout
of what was on the cards so they could be checked for formatting and
other errors. Only when you were sure that the programme was right
did you place your deck of cards in the job submission box to be run
overnight. In the morning you came back to review the mail slots and
find your output. Hopefully, you had used a few milliseconds of CPU
time and got some useful results. All too often, your submission had
a tiny syntax error and been kicked out by the compiler even before
it got to the computer's CPU. The other disaster was to blow a 2
second maximum run time time allotment on an endless loop, one
learned to be real careful checking branch conditions in the
flowchart next time.
Computer's were often thought of as being smart in those days. I
learned and have told students over the years that they just do what
they are told. I often use a personal anecdote to drive home the
point. I had been visiting my mother-in-law and heard her speak to
my son, "Would you please go to the family room and ask your father
if he would like a cup of coffe?" He comes into the room where I was
watching TV and asked, "Dad, gramma wants to know if you would like
a cup of coffee." My response, "Yes, please". At that point, he sat
down and started to watch TV. He had done what was asked... nobody
said he had to take the answer back!