OT: You know you're old when...

[Bill Campbell]

On Tue, Sep 12, 2006, Jay R. Ashworth wrote:
>On Tue, Sep 12, 2006 at 02:38:41AM -0400, Fairlight wrote:
>> Okay, maybe not -old-...but it feels like it, relatively speaking.
>> 
>> The MMO community has general abbreviations for many things, such as
>> "ty" for thank you, "yw" for you're welcome, etc.  I was just wishing
>> someone luck before logging off for dinner and got this back from a
>> guildmate:  "tx - enjoy your dinner"
>> 
>> First thought:  "Transmit??  Transmit what?!"
>> 
>> I can't decide if it's a plus or a minus that the old modem abbreviations
>> have stuck with me.  :)  Actually, I think that predates modems and goes
>> back to teletypes, doesn't it?
>
>Ham radio.  Turn of last century, probably.

Never having been a Ham operator, I think of abbreviations like ``TX'' in
terms of tiny diagrams of pin-outs on connectors.

Another thing that people don't think of today is that many of these
abbreviations (and UNIX commands like ``cp'' for copy) go back to a time
when serial communications were much slower than they are today, or input
was on 80-column punch cards or paper tape where making a mistake was
fairly tedious to correct.

The first time sharing systems I used were on GE-235 main frames using
ASR-33 Teletypes half-duples at 110 baud.  Half-duplex was faster, but it
was always a gamble when uploading programs on paper tape to see if the
computer on the other end was still up when the tape was finished reading.

Bill
--
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