First computer language

[Jerry Miller]

----- Original Message ----- 
> Message: 3
> Date: Sat, 03 Sep 2005 18:07:49 +0100
> From: Tony Arnold <tony.arnold at manchester.ac.uk>
> Subject: Re: First computer language
> To: Ubuntu Help and User Discussions <ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com>
> Message-ID: <1125767269.12266.5.camel at localhost.localdomain>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
> On Fri, 2005-09-02 at 14:00 -0300, Derek Broughton wrote:
>
>> Well, we used to have real coding forms - graph paper would be a cheap
>> substitute.  You have to remember (well, maybe not :-) ) that, until 
>> WatBOL

I remember WatFOR from an introductory C.S. course in 1968, and I also
remember column-specific formats at least as late as 76/77, by which time
there were terminal-based entry and disk-based storage alternatives to 
cards.

>> (at least, I'm pretty sure that was the first free-format COBOL), COBOL 
>> had
>> to be coded with labels in columns 1-6, a continuation character in 
>> column
>> 7, actual code in 8-72, and sequence numbers in 73-80.  The coding forms
>> would make it easy for the keypunch operator to get it right (because we
>> used to have to give it to a secretary to get it onto the computer - one
>> terminal or keypunch machine per 20 or 30 programmers).
>
> Ah! Those were the days. My undergraduate days of Computer Science were
> spent filling in coding forms or punching cards directly. It was really
> great when the operators dropped your cards and they got muddled up!
> Those sequence numbers were essential!

I was on a project in the 80's that had a story of an insidious bug from its
earlier card-deck incarnation that was eventually traced to a pair of cards'
having switched positions.

>
>> To answer Bjørn's question, I wouldn't even try to learn COBOL.  Just
>> because there's a ton of work for COBOL programmers doesn't mean you need
>> to learn it.  In the first place, the amount of COBOL code _should_ be
>> declining.  I doubt there's a whole lot of new COBOL development.  Also,
>> I've always believed that once you can program in a couple of languages,
>> you can program in anything.

As with Tony's response below, I too agree with this assessment as far as
the learning-curve aspect is concerned.  The problem is that those who are
unemployed, as I was for over two years ending with a relocation last April,
can't be that choosy, and the powers that be are seldom sufficiently 
computer-
literate themselves to appreciate the ease of acquiring new language skills.
I work for one of the exceptions, as I have always done since trading in my
formal education in Organic Chemistry for a career in Computer Science!

<RANT>
You can see from the laundry lists of specific skills in many classified ads
that that is the case.  They are looking for the type of person they've 
always
had and will, in my estimation, get what they've always gotten, i.e., the
mindset that makes many business forms as unintelligibly programmer-
friendly as they've always been.  (Looked at your bank statement lately?
Where is the heuristic ordering of entries that could go a long way toward
helping you balance your checkbook?  Even the "state of the art" in online
banking leaves a lot to be desired!)

The really ironic part is when one of those ads lists a Computer Science
degree among its requirements.  What self-respecting C.S. Dept. is going
to teach COBOL these days?!?!?
</RANT>

  With the advent of Java (yes, I know it
>> wasn't the first OO language, but it was the first to really catch on),
>> that changed a bit, because people familiar with many procedural 
>> languages
>> still had trouble getting their minds around OO, but still if you can 
>> write
>> two or three languages, you'll have no trouble figuring out COBOL.
>
> I agree with the above about once you've learnt a couple of languages
> you can write in anything (with the caveat about OO progs), however, I
> would include COBOL in the exceptions to this principle! I say this
> because as an undergraduate I learnt a number of languages and did very
> well with all of them, except COBOL. I'm not sure of it was the language
> or the transaction based problem I had to solve was the issue, but I
> never did get my one COBOL program to work properly!
>
> It's ironic, because COBOL was designed to be used by non computer
> people!

... and it shows!

>
> Is it available for LINUX? Just curious, I have no intention of trying
> it again!
>
> Regards,
> Tony.
> -- 
> Tony Arnold, IT Security Coordinator, University of Manchester,
> IT Services Division, Kilburn Building, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL.
> T: +44 (0)161 275 6093, F: +44 (0)870 136 1004, M: +44 (0)773 330 0039
> E: tony.arnold at manchester.ac.uk, H: http://www.man.ac.uk/Tony.Arnold
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 4
> Date: Sat, 03 Sep 2005 20:16:05 +0200
> From: "R.L. Reingard" <reingard at hispeed.ch>
> Subject: creating file by 'dd'
> To: "Ubuntu Help and User Discussions" <ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com>
> Message-ID: <op.swjg03lq1oq7po at localhost.localdomain>
> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; delsp=yes; charset=utf-8
>
>
> Hi Lee,
>
> i do want to have a try with the idea of creating a (huge)file and then
> erase it afterwards
> so i changed the command to create a small file first, which i could use
> for a test.
> how to understand the outcome?
>
> user at ubuntu:~$ dd if=/dev/zero of=/home/user/hugefile bs=1 count='expr
> 1024 \* 1'
> dd: ungültige Zahl â?zexpr 1024 \\* 1â?o
> user at ubuntu:~$
>
> thank you for help
> René
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 5
> Date: Sat, 3 Sep 2005 14:01:44 -0400
> From: Emerzen <ulist at gs1.ubuntuforums.org>
> Subject: Re: Mounting FAT -partitions on boot-up
> To: ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com
> Message-ID: <Emerzen.1uspba at gs1.ubuntuforums.org>
>
>
> Hi, I get the same error with my FAT32 partition, and I've never had a
> problem with it.  It's a bit unnerving during bootup, but as far as I
> can tell it causes no problems.  The only problem I've had w/ my FAT
> partition was trying to write files (DVD) that were too big.
>
>
> -- 
> Emerzen
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 6
> Date: Sat, 3 Sep 2005 14:49:03 -0400
> From: AsteriskNix <ulist at gs1.ubuntuforums.org>
> Subject: Re: marillat
> To: ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com
> Message-ID: <AsteriskNix.1usr5z at gs1.ubuntuforums.org>
>
>
> Can we please FIX THE SCRIPT and move the political/linux/Apple/Windows
> conversation to another thread?
>
>
>
> The script is broken AGAIN.
>
>
>
> Get:12 http://ubuntu-backports.mirrormax.net hoary-extras/restricted
> Packages [6122B]
>
> Get:13 ftp://ftp.nerim.net testing Release [2192B]
>
> Get:14 ftp://ftp.uninett.no hoary Release.gpg [189B]
>
> Get:15 ftp://ftp.nerim.net testing/main Packages [18.9kB]
>
> Get:16 ftp://ftp.uninett.no hoary-updates Release.gpg [189B]
>
> Get:17 ftp://ftp.uninett.no hoary Release [26.2kB]
>
> Get:18 ftp://ftp.uninett.no hoary-updates Release [16.8kB]
>
> Get:19 ftp://ftp.uninett.no hoary/main Packages [490kB]
>
> Get:20 ftp://ftp.uninett.no hoary/restricted Packages [4374B]
>
> Get:21 ftp://ftp.uninett.no hoary/universe Packages [2169kB]
>
> Get:22 ftp://ftp.uninett.no hoary/multiverse Packages [88.4kB]
>
> Get:23 ftp://ftp.uninett.no hoary-updates/main Packages [12.0kB]
>
> Get:24 ftp://ftp.uninett.no hoary-updates/restricted Packages [14B]
>
> Fetched 2950kB in 29s (101kB/s)
>
> Failed to fetch http://tinyurl.com/7dkwz  MD5Sum mismatch
>
> Reading package lists... Done
>
> E: Some index files failed to download, they have been ignored, or old
> ones used instead.
>
> ERROR # 100 : There was an error in apt-get update.
>
> root at eiganjo:/home/ares #
>
> ](*,)
>
>
> -- 
> AsteriskNix
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 7
> Date: Sat, 03 Sep 2005 21:07:57 +0200
> From: Guillaume ROMAGNY <gr at grhq.net>
> Subject: bittorrent tracking servers broken ?
> To: info at ubuntulinux.org,  ubuntu-mirrors at lists.ubuntu.com,
> ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com
> Message-ID: <4319F48D.7020502 at grhq.net>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
>
> Hi,
>
> I've been using bittorrent for breezy colony 3 letting people uploading.
>
> I cannot reach IP 82.211.81.143 (the tracker) for 2 days at least
> in fact port 6969 is closed, port 80 and ping are working
>
> I cannot find a suitable mailing list for this
>
> My permanent IP 81.57.49.22 AKA gr.homeunix.org
>
> [gr at gr gr 0 nwm]$ ping 82.211.81.143
> PING 82.211.81.143 (82.211.81.143) 56(84) bytes of data.
> 64 bytes from 82.211.81.143: icmp_seq=1 ttl=50 time=48.4 ms
> 64 bytes from 82.211.81.143: icmp_seq=2 ttl=50 time=48.6 ms
> 64 bytes from 82.211.81.143: icmp_seq=3 ttl=50 time=48.7 ms
> 64 bytes from 82.211.81.143: icmp_seq=4 ttl=50 time=49.2 ms
> 64 bytes from 82.211.81.143: icmp_seq=5 ttl=50 time=49.4 ms
>
> --- 82.211.81.143 ping statistics ---
> 5 packets transmitted, 5 received, 0% packet loss, time 3999ms
> rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 48.428/48.910/49.487/0.465 ms
>
>
> Nmap test
>
> PORT     STATE  SERVICE
> 80/tcp   open   http
> 6969/tcp closed acmsoda
>
> the command
> bittorrent-curses --max_upload_rate 25 breezy-install-i386.iso.torrent
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> | file:     breezy-install-i386.iso
>                              |
> | size:     620,644,352 (592 MiB)
>                              |
> | dest:     /home/gr/torrent/breezy-install-i386.iso
>                              |
> | progress:
> #########################################################################################
> |
> | status:   seeding (100.0%)
>                              |
> | dl speed: 0.0 KB/s
>                              |
> | ul speed: 0.0 KB/s
>                              |
> | sharing:  oo  (0.0 MB up / 0.0 MB down)
>                              |
> | seeds:    0 distributed copies (next: 1:0.0%)
>                              |
> | peers:    0 seen now
>                              |
> |
>                              |
> | error(s):[20:55:04] Tracker announce still not complete 59 seconds
> after starting it                |
> |          [20:55:37] Problem connecting to tracker - <urlopen error
> (111, 'Connection refused')>     |
> |          [20:57:04] Problem connecting to tracker - <urlopen error
> (111, 'Connection refused')>     |
> |          [20:59:07] Problem connecting to tracker - <urlopen error
> (111, 'Connection refused')>     |
> |
>
>
> thanks !
>
> -- 
> Best regards,
>
> Guillaume
>
> "The Desert, it's a tremendous place to cross!
> you only see people you like and who truly like you."
> Nicolas Sarkozy.
>
> http://www.grhq.net/homer.txt
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> ------------------------------
>
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>
> End of ubuntu-users Digest, Vol 13, Issue 26
> ********************************************
>