TIL: I am as old as dirt.

I found myself describing two experiences of my mis-spent Computer 
youth.  The conversation in sdf.org COM had drifted into IBM-360.  
That prompted me to inquire...
[pa2]   whats IBM's 1969 hot offerring
[pa2]   Ran FORTRAN 4 on the school system's IBM washing-machine-sized  
card reader, "CPU", console keyboard (WMSed), and a couple of tape
 drives, and a Cake-Box HD. 

It turns out it was most likely a v.69 or v.70 IBM-360.  3 hours on 
Friday nights, 7 to 10.  One dedicated physics instructor and a 
handful of nerds, dweebs, twerps, and me, all three.  Standing 
expectantly around a washing-machine-sized "CPU" (once causing it to 
overheat and shut down, Errrrr.)  Then the wide green-bar printout of 
our punch card code to try and see the typo, the 'bug'.  Back to the 
card punch, correct the card, reread, rerun, rinse, repeat.

THE PROGRAM: Tic-Tac-Toe

Lesson learned: A.) the program required a COBOL subroutine, a novelty 
in the FORTRAN world, to access the W-M-S Keyboard (kinda sticking 
outa the top but part of the big box).  Between watching the line 
printer to tell when the  program had completed its turn as was 
waiting for KYBD imput.  A maximum of nine turns before the game ends 
and the program exits printing, "The computer wins." or "The game is a 
draw, if they are careful."  B.) the program can be programmed to 
never be beaten, only a draw. C.) it is no fun to consistenly lose or 
draw to the computer.

Adult me wishes I had the opportunity to introduce the then-me to 
random plays,  or  even matrix data structuring, or ... old,  I am 
just old.  And then the same day I found myself responding to a 
hashnix.club Dream meandering about BBS's...

<pa2> 1987ish Lil'BBS (one-line college town bbs) running on a 286  
and a 20 MEG HD.  Risk was the favorrite door - very competitive.
<pa2> Would I _evah_ consider doing something like that again, NOPE.  
<pa2> Mustang BBS software.  b*tchin

Sure, it is nostalgic but ... I am old.  Life is too short now.  I 
have been given the gift of standing on the *cough* leading edge. I  
have every intention in see where we are going, not where we have 
been.

Back to the Future!

peace