Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!husc6!seismo!mcvax!ukc!its63b!hwcs!chris From: chris@hwcs.UUCP Newsgroups: comp.misc Subject: Re: What the world needs now [exploding computers] Message-ID: <1256@brahma.cs.hw.ac.uk> Date: Tue, 26-May-87 11:22:41 EDT Article-I.D.: brahma.1256 Posted: Tue May 26 11:22:41 1987 Date-Received: Fri, 29-May-87 00:40:05 EDT References: <12067@topaz.rutgers.edu> <37@oresoft.UUCP> Reply-To: chris@cs.hw.AC.UK (Chris Miller) Organization: Heriot Watt University, Computer Science Lines: 19 This story is second-hand, and I am afraid that I can't supply all the corroborative details I should like to, but ... An ex-colleague of mine had previously worked on an early (I think ICT, one of the fore-runners of ICL) system that had a random-access card memory (really!). This consisted of a bank of cards; when one was selected, it would drop into a reader path, be carried round some convoluted track, and eventually drop back into its original slot. Of course, it was read-only. The problem was that some nasty little piece of wire crossed the return path whenever a new card was read; if another card was returning at the time, it would be neatly sliced in half. Inevitably, someone managed to work out the timings to carry out a complete destructive "memory erase" operation. -- Chris Miller, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh chris@cs.hw.ac.uk !ukc!hwcs!chris chris@hwcs.uucp chris@uk.ac.hw.cs