Stupid Astronomer Tricks #7: Positive feedback
We’re running a membership drive this month – our goal is 150 new members – and as a part of it we’re including this blatant clickbait series… Besides, it’s a chance to tell some of the funny stories that come up during cloudy nights at the VATT! The old astronomer tells the tale… When I arrived, the lab was proud to boast that it had its own computer! It was, as I recall, a CDC 6400, with about as much power as your watch when it is asleep… but it took up a room the size of a classroom in the building. A special raised floor above all the cables. And, of course, a jacked up air conditioning system to take care of all the heat it put out. But times change, technology changes, and even computers changed. Eventually it was replaced by a new-fangled “mini-computer” (probably a PDP-11 but I don’t actually recall) which was merely the size of a … Continue reading →