Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!munnari!mulga!ausmelb!ejp
From: ejp@ausmelb.oz (Esmond Pitt)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: PDP-11 bus contention
Message-ID: <760@ausmelb.oz>
Date: 14 Sep 88 05:35:47 GMT
Reply-To: ejp@ausmelb.oz (Esmond Pitt)
Organization: Austec International Limited, Melbourne
Lines: 18

Many years ago at a job interview, after I had claimed to know something
about the PDP-11, I was asked the following question:

	"What special measures are taken in the PDP-11 software _and
	hardware_ to minimize bus contention?"

At the time, I didn't have the presence of mind to ask the interviewer
exactly what he was looking for, and in the intervening 10 years I have
neither learned the answer, nor met anyone who knew the answer, nor
indeed anyone who didn't think it a damn silly question to ask a
systems programmer, as against the guy who designed the hardware.
However that may be, I am prompted to ask this august forum what the
answer to this question would be.


-- 
Esmond Pitt, Austec International Ltd
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