Veamos qué nos depara la edición de febrero de 1985 de la revista…
![La portada tiene el tema de "computación y las ciencias". La ilustración es una doble hélice de ADN, pero la segunda hélice ha sido reemplazada por un cable de datos plano.](https://obm.corcoles.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/image-733x1024.png)
Vamos a comenzar con la sección de cartas, esta vez:
![ICONS ARE ARCANE
Circa 5000 years ago, writing was invented in ancient Mesopotamia. This earliest known script, cuneiform, was derived from pictographic symbols that became stylized and standardized in form. Eventually it became mixed with phonetic elements until it was almost entirely phonetic. Our alphabet is most probably ultimately derived from ancient Egyptian-also originally a pictographic system. The point is this: Over thousands of years a phonetic
and finally alphabetic system was developed. To anyone who has gone through the painful process of learning cuneiform or Egyptian, the superiority of the alphabet is readily apparent. A pictographic system (Apple's "icons") requires that the user learn many, many symbols. My contention is that though users may find icons more "user friendly," ultimately, as systems and software become more complex, the icon system will become more unwieldy and arcane than present
systems.
As a humanist who uses computers extensively in my work. I would like to see user interfaces developed for micros that are faster, more streamlined ("elegant" ), and smarter ("knowledge-based") to aid in the learning process. It doesn't take the
uninitiated user long to grow impatient with the Mac.
ANN MARCHANT
Berkeley, CA](https://obm.corcoles.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/image-1.png)
Servidor es un fan de las interfaces textuales y de controlar las cosas con el teclado como el que más. Pero, Ann, donde quiera que estés, espero que hayas olvidado tu clarividente carta… (¿Podría yo haber escrito una carta similar? No pienso responder si no es en presencia de mi abogado.)
Saltemos ahora al What’s New: y esta maravilla de portátil:
![Quadram's Datavue 25 is
a 14-pound portable
computer with a 360K-byte
5 1/4-inch disk drive and a
pivoting 80-character by
25-line LCD. It features an
83-key keyboard that communicates with the computer through infrared
signals. The Datavue 25 has
an 80C88 microprocessor, a
real-time clock, 128K bytes
of memory and serial and
parallel ports. It is powered
either by an AC adapter /
recharger or by built-in batteries that last up to four
hours.
Monochrome graphics are
available in either 640 by
200 resolution or 320 by
200 resolution with four
levels of gray. An internal
300-bps modem is an option. Memory can be expanded to 2 6K bytes using 64K-byte chips or to 1 megabyte using 256 Kbyte chips. Ouadram also plans to release an external IBM
PC-compatible bus
expansion chassis and an
external second floppy-disk
drive.
The Datavue 25 should be
available in March for
$2195](https://obm.corcoles.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/image-2.png)
Pregunta: ¿recogerá César todo lo que tenga que ver con Commodore? Respuesta:
![Commodore's B128 runs any program written for the Commodore 64 and has
a number of additional capabilities. This system has 128K bytes of memory, expandable to 512 K, and it
can display 80 columns by 25 lines of text in color on an optional monitor. In addition to the 8500 processor, which is used to run Commodore software. the B128 includes a 2-MHz Z80 coprocessor to run most CP/M-80 programs.
The 92-key keyboard has a numeric keypad, 4 cursor keys. 4 numbered shiftable function keys, and 4 special purpose function keys. Like the 64, the B128 can display 16 colors and 8 independently movable sprites and can generate sound in three voices each with a range of eight octaves. The B128 comes with the same serial, expansion, user, and joystick ports as the 64: it also includes video interfaces for a standard television or an RGB or NTSC monitor.
Commodore also introduced a faster disk drive for the Commodore 64 and B128. It transfers data to the 64 at 320 cps, or to the B128 at 2000 cps, or, when running CP/M. 3200 cps.
The Commodore B128 will sell for less than $400.](https://obm.corcoles.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/image-3.png)
Buenas ideas sobre el papel que no lo son en la práctica… Todo el software del Commodore 64, más CP/M, más un ordenador nuevo, por menos de 400 dólares, deberían haber servido para continuar con la misión de Commodore de dar más por menos y llevar la informática personal a cada casa de planeta. En la práctica, CP/M ya había muerto a manos de MS-DOS y el tener todo el software del 64 hizo que básicamente nadie desarrollara nada específico para el 128… Dice la wikipedia que vendieron dos millones y medio de unidades, que no está nada mal, pero en la práctica, me da a mí, deberían contabilizarse más como Commodores 64 que otra cosa. (Por cierto: «maravillosa» la velocidad de los discos nuevos, ¿eh?)
Pasemos ahora a nuestro leitmotiv «no hay nada nuevo bajo el sol»:
![Satellite Broadcast Network has announced satellite service that will transmit financial and news
information to personal computer owners. SBN plans
to have the service operational in May. You will need a 12-GHz satellite-receive antenna, a low-noise amplifier, a solid-state
receiver, and SBN's demodulator; all are
available from SBN for $695.
SBN will also charge a fee for access to each type of information. starting at about $25 per month.
SBN will use multiple
9600-bps channels. Some
channels will broadcast news
and weather information, others will transmit stock and commodity prices. One
channel might permit down
loading of software sample
programs, while another
could include special-interest
database information. A user could place a request for special database information with modems and telephone lines, but the response could be broadcast via satellite to avoid phone charges. A special header code would ensure that only one person could decode the information.](https://obm.corcoles.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/image-4.png)
¿He oido Starlink? (No, no es lo mismo, que la tecnología de la época solo permitía un modelo broadcast. Pero.) Y vamos a seguir con ello, con una segunda misiva de los lectores, en esta ocasión de la sección «Ask Byte»:
![Dear Steve.
I am planning to build a house and would like to provide for computer control in my home. Can you offer any suggestions?
PAUL W. MARSH
Urbana. IL
With the almost daily announcement of some computerized device, it makes
sense to provide a means for installation in the home. However, it is difficult to know what devices will ultimately be required.
I will be presenting a series of three articles, beginning in April, covering the construction of the Circuit Cellar home control system. -Steve](https://obm.corcoles.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/image-5.png)
¿Alguien tiene los ánimos para contarles a Paul y Steve que, cuarenta años más tarde, todavía quedan tantísimas cosas por resolver en esto de las «smart homes«?
La sección de crítica de libros de Byte, ya lo hemos visto en alguna ocasión, tenía buen ojo para localizar libros de largo recorrido:
![ALAN TURING: THE ENIGMA
Andrew Hodges
Simon & Schuster
New York: 1983
600 pages. $24.95
And thus it was that... thinking in his spare time, an English homosexual atheist mathematician... conceived of the computer. This startling claim is at the heart of the first major biography of Alan Mathison TuJring (1912-1954), a man whose legacies include the Turing machine and the Turing test. Andrew Hodges has uncovered the genius of this complicated man and recorded the evolution of his ideas within the unique context of the tumultuous times in which he lived. Hodges's fascinating study adds new information to the history of computer science, counters it's all American bias, and claims a rightful place for the eccentric Alan Turing...](https://obm.corcoles.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/image-6-922x1024.png)
Sí, el libro en el que presuntamente se basa la peli de 2014 con Benedict Cumberbatch haciendo de Turing (me consta que se lo leyeron, pero menudo destrozo le hicieron). Los fans de Turing, por favor, no se retiren y sigan leyendo:
![THE BIRTH OF A COMPUTER
CONDUCTED BY JOHN C. NASH
An interview with James H. Wilkinson on the building of a computer designed by Alan Turing
The story of the construction of the first computers is both fascinating and instructive. Understanding the insights and decisions of computing's innovators may explain how the technology evolved to its present state and may illuminate the directions it might take in the future. Among computing's innovators were Alan Turing (see page 65 for a review of a Turing biography) and the men he assembled to help him build a computer based on his Universal machine. Turing's team included James H. Wilkinson, a mathematician who had studied at Cambridge and worked for the British government as a ballistics engineer doing numerical analysis of explosives problems during World War II.
This interview was conducted for BYTE by Dr. John C. Nash and took place on July 13, 1984. at the Ninth Householder Gatlinburg Conference held at the University of Waterloo,
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
BYTE: Dr. Wilkinson. how did you become involved with Alan Turing and his computer?
JHW: Shortly after the war. I discovered that a Mathematics Division was being set up at the National Physical Laboratory (NPL). I got in touch with E. T. Goodwin. who had been a colleague of mine at Cambridge in the Maths Lab. He was one of the first to join this new division. He invited me to have a chat with him at NPL in Bushy Park, Teddington. and there I met Turing, who I knew already
by reputation as something of an eccentric. Turing and I had a long discussion. and I was very impressed with him. Presumably he must have been
reasonably satisfied with me since he said if I came to NPL he would like me to work with him. I think that this offer and my friendship with Goodwin were the decisive factors. So in May 46, six and a half years after I joined the government service. I moved to NPL (as I thought then, temporarily) in
stead of going back to Cambridge University.
Turing had worked alone on the
logical design of an electronic computer. When I arrived, he had presented his plans to what you might call a "review committee" at NPL. This
consisted of a small group of Fellows from the Royal Society. The committee decided that Turing's ideas were basically sound, and they gave him a
mandate to go ahead and recruit the appropriate staff.
Up to that time everything associated with the project had been done by Turing himself. He was a man with an original and inventive mind. His
design had practically nothing in common with the group of computers which arose out of discussions at the Moore School of Electrical Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania. John W. Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert had already successfully completed
the construction of the first electronic computer, the ENIAC (this was not a stored-program computer), and their influence was at its peak. When I went
to NPL in May '46. Turing was working on what he called version 5 of [his] computer, though I never saw any
documents relating to versions 1 to 4. Turing was not a great documenter, and no doubt the earlier versions were buried in the rubble on his desk. Perhaps I should attempt to give some idea of the flavor of version 5,
a typical Turingesque creation. It was... (continued)](https://obm.corcoles.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/image-10-1024x1000.png)
Es obvio a posteriori, pero a mí me da un cierto vértigo pensar que, teniendo yo once añitos, estuviese vivo un colaborador de Alan Turing (y ni siquiera era tan mayor: tenía 65 años, aunque fallecería al año siguiente), y que yo podría haber leído esa entrevista por aquel entonces (que Byte entraba con una cierta regularidad en mi casa).
El John C. Nash que firma la piez, por cierto, no es el John C. Nash que por aquel entonces estaba a punto de comenzar a trabajar para Xerox y que acabaría fundando una compañía llamada Adobe que quizás os suene. Este era «solo» un profesor de la Universidad de Otawa dedicado a la computación científica. Para completar la lista de nombres famosos de la entrevista y los saltos atrás en el tiempo difíciles de digerir, aparece en ella un Charles Darwin bisnieto de ese Charles Darwin.
La entrevista es bastante técnica y no sé yo si interesará mucho al público en general, pero aparece en ella un «cabreo» que contribuyó a llevar a Turing de Cambridge a Manchester, donde acabó siendo condenado por su homosexualidad, resultando en su suicidio. Quién sabe, igual sin ese cabreo la historia de la ciencia del siglo XX habría sido diferente (Turing, en sus últimos años, se dedicó a investigar en temas de biología (en serio) que hace solo unos pocos años que se han recuperado).
En la sección «cosas que hoy son obvias pero que hace cuarenta años había que explicar con detalle», hoy toca… el correo electrónico (bueno, quién sabe, al ritmo al que vamos igual dentro de diez años tenemos que volver a explicar qué es el correo electrónico a gente joven que no la ha usado jamás en su adolescencia y que sufren un cierto shock traumático al tener que usar algo que no sea mensajería instantánea y redes sociales).
![Software Review
E-mail for the Masses
MCI Mail and Western Union's EasyLink
By Wayne Rash Jr.
Two giants of the telecommunications industry have started electronic mail services. MCI Telecommunications Corporation's MCI Mail and
Western Union Telegraph Company's Easy Link offer the services to individual consumers and businesses. Both services are heavily advertised, and both promise to
open the world of easy and inexpensive instant communications to nearly anyone. Only one fully delivers on this promise.
MCI MAIL
MCI Mail is part of the same corporation that provides MCI telephone communications. MCI has expanded its operations to include electronic mail. billing itself as the
"nation's new postal system":· You can access MCI Mail with a local phone call in 64 cities around the country and with a toll free number to its Washington, DC, headquarters. You can use these numbers with your computer to transmit letters and documents to other MCI Mail subscribers in the U.S. and Canada or to telex addresses anywhere in the world. If your recipient does not have access to MCI Mail or Telex, you can have a paper copy of the communication mailed or delivered. As of January 1, 1985. MCI Mail service was available in 41 countries.
MCI Mail's hard-copy communications are prepared using a laser printer at 18 locations in the U.S. Courier delivery is available within four hours in some locations, and
overnight courier delivery is available in most major metropolitan areas. Delivery by
mail usually takes two business days. Because they are prepared on a laser printer, the MCI letters look like they were
done on a letter-quality printer and then photocopied. You can have your letterhead and signature placed on file with MCI so they can appear on your letters. Otherwise, the MCI Mail letterhead will appear on the
first page of your letter.
You can log on to MCI Mail with either a 300- or 1200-bps (bit per second) modem.
...](https://obm.corcoles.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/image-11-1024x949.png)
Acérquese al artículo por la curiosidad de qué habrá que explicar sobre el correo electrónico… y quédese por joyas como
- «Puedes acceder a MCI Mail con una llamada local en 64 ciudades del país y con un número gratuito en su sede de Wahsington DC». No, queridas: el correo electrónico no «es» un programa. No «es» una URL. Es… ¡un número de teléfono!
- «Puedes usar estos números con tu ordenador para transmitir cartas y documentos a otros suscriptores de MCI Mail en los Estados Unidos y Canadá o a direcciones de Telex de todo el mundo». 🤯
- «Si el receptor no tiene ni MCI Mail ni Telex, se le puede enviar una copia en papel de la comunicación».
¿Cómo os habéis quedado? A ver si creíais que os iba a poner el artículo así porque sí…
(Por cierto, a ambos servicios se podía acceder con módems de 300 ¡o hasta 1200! bits por segundo.)
Y cerramos con otro clásico: «artículos que hoy harían explotar cabezas»:
![Programming Insight
Simultaneous Equations with Lotus 1-2-3
By Jan- Henrik Johnsson
An example from Macroeconomics
SPREADSHEETS ARE amazingly useful in a number of applications. In this article. I will show how macroeconomic models can be formulated as simple spreadsheet programs as long as they can be defined using just linear simultaneous equations. I will then go on to show how to solve such equations numerically using standard spreadsheet commands.
My inspiration for this article came after reading an article by Patrick E. McGuire (see reference 3). He published a simple BASIC program that solved simultaneous equations analytically. and he therefore seemed to have solved the problem I was in terested in. But programming everything in BASIC from now on seemed to me to be a step backward. Was there a more general approach? I will illustrate a different method by using only the familiar spreadsheet Lotus 1-2-3. I will use it to solve systems of simultaneous linear equations through iteration (successive recalculations) rather than through successive transformations of the equations. The technique demonstrated here is in fact quite general and can...](https://obm.corcoles.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/image-14-1006x1024.png)
Publique usted hoy un artículo en una revista generalista de informática (por muy introductorio que sea) sobre modelado macroeconómico y resolución de sistemas de ecuaciones con métodos iterativos, publique…
En fin. Como siempre, el mes que viene, más (o no). Y si os queréis ir a la fuente, https://vintageapple.org/byte/.