8-Bit Software Online Conversion

Do you remember...? ------------------- by Steven Flintham ------------------ Yes, it's nostalgia time. Today, I finally got around to clearing out my magazine cupboard. At first, just the recent copies of The Micro User, but as I got right down into the depths, I stumbled upon an ancient copy of Your Computer dated September 1984. Almost immediately, the eight years rolled away. The cover boasted such features as, "Toshiba and Einstein reviewed" and "ZX-81 sprites" - ah, such memories! 1984 was, if I recall correctly, the year I first owned a computer. Of course, I didn't buy Your Computer then, but the memories stirred by the pages are familiar nevertheless. As the main readership of 8BS is, I expect, the real computer enthusiast, there should be at least one person reading this who cannot help but feel touched at the mention of the original Electron advertisement. Occupying a full two pages in glorious colour, it extolls the virtues of this brand new computing wonder. And what facilities - BBC Basic, rapidly becoming a standard in British schools, a good, solid, electric typewriter style keyboard - including a space bar! On the hardware side, it boasted a 2MHz 6502, 32K ROM and 32K RAM, eight colours and a 1200 baud CUTS tape interface with motor control. And all for just #199! I'm not criticising the Electron in particular, but it stirs memories of the dim and distant past for such features to be outstanding rather than commonplace. Indeed, it is a tribute to the design of these early micros - in particular the BBC and Electron - that we are still using them happily today. A few pages later, we find an advertisement for ViewSheet featuring a BBC system which would have cost a fortune at the time - twin disc drives, a colour monitor and a JP101 inkjet. The letters pages contain such exotica as correspondance on the unreliability of the Oric-1 and an angry letter about the criticisms of the Sinclair QL. Who would have dreamed at the time that the QL, with its 68000 style processor and 16-bit capabilities would fade away more rapidly than the trusty eight bit systems? [I imagine the QL was as revolutionary in those days as the Archimedes is now - and both seem to have had roughly equal lack of success in breaking into the business market!] Yes, those were the days when computers existed for the enthusiast, when 16K was a lot of RAM, when graphics over 256x256 needed a monitor, when a 40 track disc drive cost hundreds, when structured programming was unheard of and when, in short, computing was computing. How things change - and how will things change? Will we see a similar amount of change from the present state eight years hence? Yes, this is the inevitable part of the nostalgia where I speculate on the future. Well, just a few days before I wrote this I saw an advertisement on the front of a magazine for a 66MHz 80486 PC. Is this the way things are going? I think that we'll see a recurrence of what happened with the original ARM chip - computers will just keep getting faster and faster by increasing the clock rate until someone comes up with the next new development - parallel processing, maybe? We might see the introduction of the "intelligent" computer - something that's always rather appealed to me. The idea of discussing the bugs in your program with the computer is particularly fascinating! Prediction is always dangerous, though - I can well remember the children's books in the early 1980's making predictions about the next ten or twenty years. We were told that computers would be controlling our homes, that cash would have become obsolete and that as a result the entire population would be computer literate. Sadly, none of this has come to pass - very few homes have computers controlling anything - usually an alarm system, and cash is still just as popular as ever (although it seems to become scarcer!). I suppose the only way to find out is to sit and wait - perhaps the October 2000 issue of 8BS will contain an article giving the answers, and asking the same questions? -- I suppose it is just possible I will have abandoned my Master for an Archimedes by October 2000, but I won't if I can't do something with it that I can't already do with a BBC Master (and I don't mean printing outline fonts, either). With regard to 66MHz PCs, some Archimedes users claim that the ARM3 chip is the equivalent in processing terms to 80 or 100MHz on a normal chip - does anyone have definitive information? On the subject of artificial intelligence, has anyone read Roger Penrose's "The Emperor's New Mind" (actually I haven't either as I missed out the middle third concerning maths, physics and other assorted complexities - and the conclusion seemed to be based on rather too many "feelings" for a book written by a scientist! However, it is interesting and thought-provoking, even if only because it provokes me to disagree.) As for the inexorable rushing ahead of technology, I suppose chip speeds, memory sizes etc. will always increase, but that is just processing power - it is the ideas for applications and their implementation, the marketing and the resultant public perception that is all-important. Many innovative Sinclair products, the QL included, failed through bad implementation leading to public scepticism despite the soundness of the underlying idea, and the power (then) of the hardware being used. Admittedly the increases in power have, ever since the Apple Macintosh and the string of resulting imitators (including the RISCOS desktop!), been used to make computers more user-friendly and hence much more widespread in business, but I agree with Steven that the promised revolutionary effects on the way we actually live (as opposed to the way many people now work) have failed to materialise. Business is driven by the need to take advantage of new technology in order to remain competitive, but the way we lead the rest of our lives is still decided by what we are most used to. I imagine quite a large proportion of the population are now computer literate, at least to the extent that they will be prepared to sit down in front of a desktop system and use it, without being terrified of it, as some older people with no computer experience still are. The ability of the majority of the population to accept and make use of computers is just as important as the ability of a minority to visualise, design and implement new applications for them. Teaching people to accept computers in this way is one of the most significant results of the introduction of microcomputers into schools and homes in the early 1980s. It should be borne in mind though, that being able to use a desktop WIMP system does not mean you understand the computer; I very much imagine the majority of Archimedes-only users will have little programming ability, apart from actual commercial programmers and those who have upgraded from the 8-bit machines. The important thing about the 8-bit micros is that, by their relative simplicity, they encourage understanding of the machine, followed by development of your own ideas. Perhaps the next millenia will see the final triumph of technology over human fear of computers. The next technological revolution is certainly overdue, since as far as I can see nothing has changed significantly in the way technology affects our lives in the last few decades. Hopefully some 8BS members will be helping to get things underway! In the meantime, something on a rather similar topic: Has the Computer caught on.....? By A. Technophobe The brave new world of the computer has not, perhaps, transformed our lives in quite the way it was envisaged in the 1960's. The prospect of having an electronic machine controlling our daily round created a real concern. However, the reality has not matched the promise. The perception of the "computer" is linked with fear. We are faced with "computerised" toasters which are nothing fancier than an old fashioned toaster with an electronic timer. We book in at hotels where staff have to refer to a centralised "computer" and cannot tell you if you can have a room until the computer says so. Is this really progress? The important question to ask about the computer is, "Does it make life easier?" We face, on a daily basis, advertisements telling us to buy bigger, more powerful, smaller, more powerful, medium sized, more powerful, computers. What do they do which I cannot do? I admit that they can multiply and divide faster than I can, but it is not really necessary to know my 352 times table. The mental excercise is quite good for me. The wonderful word-processor with this add-on and that add-on, and devices to spell things for me, makes me even lazier. I know how to spell - I do not need a machine to give me three different spellings of a word when the machine does not even understand what the word means. I know how to type - I do not need to see what I have typed on a screen. When I have written my piece, I know that it is correct. Give me a machine which brews up when I whistle - better still, give me a machine which whistles for me..... -- Although the complete rejection of computers implied in the above is a little unreasonable (the author does make use of word processors in business), there are a few points worth bearing in mind. There are only so many things that a word processor can do, and yet while my word processor is built into the machine and loads in instantaneously, the word processor of the richest 486 PC owners (even 66 MHz) will be supplied on up to thirty disks and take some considerable time to load. Despite the differences in processor price and power, both word-processors will operate at exactly the same speed - in my case, just under forty words per second. It is easy to be carried away by numerical details of technological progress. The criticism of spell-checkers is also valid to a certain extent - I know from articles I have received that spell-checkers cannot correct mistakes like confusing "there" and "their", and that any real advantage to be gained from them requires an ability to spell in the first place, which makes the exercise pointless. However, let's not be too cynical...