[ih] Literary Estate of M A Padlipsky

[Andrew G. Malis]

Bill,

> 5 years ago on a E-mail vs email (vs netmail) thread, Andy commented on
[IH]

> Andy> As I recall, one of MAP's favorite uses of netmail was to discuss
scotch whisky.

> Absolutely. And that interest is also well represented.
> If Andy is still listening -- were you on MALTS-L? How early?

That was me. While I was a colleague of Mike's at MITRE, I wasn't on that
particular list. This was my first job out of college and my appreciation
of the finer aspects of whisky came a bit later in life.

Cheers,
Andy


On Sat, Apr 10, 2021 at 10:42 PM Bill Ricker <bill.n1vux at gmail.com> wrote:

> I have (with permission) added *Vint Cerf's pre-recorded eulogy* for
> MAP's Wake (2011 NOV) to the MAP Literary Estate
> <https://n1vux.github.io/articles/MAP/> website.
>
> 5 years ago on a E-mail vs email (vs netmail) thread, Andy commented on
> [IH]
>
> Andy> As I recall, one of MAP's favorite uses of netmail was to discuss
> scotch whisky.
>
> Absolutely. And that interest is also well represented.
> If Andy is still listening -- were you on MALTS-L? How early?
>
>
> I got an offlist query, which since 'twas off-list, i'm quoting
> anonymously (but y'all know each other ...)
>
> Anon> Does this include Mike’s famous “Ritual for Catharsis #1”  I think
>>>> I have a hard copy somewhere, if not.
>>>
>>>
>
>> >  I *will* keep an eye out for RfC#1 ... not to be confused with
>>> RFC#0001 :-D.
>>> > (I presume that initialism was intentional.)
>>> > Now that i know it's significant ...
>>>
>>
> Anon > Yes, it was very much intentional and talks about the Big Bad
>> Neighbor who delivers coal one lump at a time
>>
>
> Excellent.
> I have marked this MOST WANTED, and will keep an eye out as i sift
> physical files and obsolete hard-drives further.
> If *anyone* else has an easily accessible copy of the privately
> circulated *Ritual for Catharsis #1,* please do share.
>
> Re
> > one lump at a time
>
> That reminds me of how Wang Labs would beat DEC VAX/VMS in *actual* word-processing
> & email workload *tests*, despite a massive headstart in CPU clock for
> same $$ and # users, demonstrating "clock speed is just a number" (and
> one only relevant within a single architecture).
>
> DEC salespersons at the time touted their much larger clock speed as
> ^proof^ their offering was more cost effective. As salesweasels are wont
> to do.
>
> The Wang VS was an ASCII IBM 360 (the odd result of patent exchange - Dr
> Wang had one of the three key patents on magnetic core RAM, and c.1990
> recapitulated with a SIMM RAM patent
> <https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-federal-circuit/1201198.html>! ), so had
> block-mode green-screen terminals feeding controllers and channel
> processors,  same architecture as an IBM 360/370 MF, but *called* a
> mini-computer, without the retro-futuristic styling of 3270 cases, and
> with a heavy emphasis on word-processing and email, though business
> applications were very much possible too. The CPU polled channels for work
> waiting to be done, few interrupts required, and only processed
> *completed* transmitted screens.  Meanwhile the VMS CPU required an
> interrupt service routine to store each keystroke individually,including
> each backspace.   The force multiplier of delegation! A clock advantage 4x
> or more on CPU couldn't support even half the users the VMS way. (And
> Wang eventually caught up on Clock too ... just as the market for
> Word-processing shifted to PCs, even in Law Firms. Oops.)
>
> The coincidence that is not chance: the Big Bad Neighbor would have been
> TENEX (laterly TOPS-20), the BBN improvement on the DEC-10 OS for the
> PDP-10 processor. (Another ASCII MF pretending to be a minicomputer.)  DEC
> provided an escape sequence to put a VT-100/220 into Block Mode, but that
> was not the norm in that ecosystem.
>    (At least outside of the accounting side of a shop --  I'm guessing the
> only VMS application i know of that was ported from VAX to Alpha to iTanium
> / iTannic was block-mode, as it was COBOL. I think it's *finally* been
> retired, with workload moving to a commercial IBM MF COBOL application.
> Still good for accounting!)
>
> As MAP would close, with muted cheers,
>
> WILLIAM D RICKER
> for the Literary Estate of Michael A Padlipsky
> https://n1vux.github.io/articles/MAP/
>
>