NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #18/NN_1992_18.iso/spool/comp/arch/9017

Internet Message Format | 1992-08-22 | 3.6 KB

Path: sparky!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!rutgers!cbmvax!jesup
From: [e-mail] (Randell Jesup)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: A Little History
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 23 Aug 92 01:49:20 GMT
References: <[e-mail]>
Reply-To: [e-mail] (Randell Jesup)
Organization: Commodore, West Chester, PA
Lines: 58

[e-mail] (John Cooley) writes:
>> finally pushed me over the edge.  What I'm proposing is to split comp.arch,
>> in an attempt to move the discussions of computer architecture history into
>> a separate group.  I'm sure there will be some overlap, and discussions that

>Since the majority of us are more or less technonerds who've devoted a
>good chunk of our professional lives to advancing technology; I think
>it doesn't hurt to get a little history every now and then.

    I have no problem with that.  If we created comp.arch.history, I would
subscribe to it.  However, the division would make life far easier for me
to deal with catching up when I come back from a vacation, or from a few
weeks of not having time to read news at all.  The volume is such that if I
don't read it for a week or two, I have trouble making myself wade through
the chaff, and end up further behind.  When I'm around and not overloaded,
I find (some) of the history discussions interesting.  However, when I'm
faced with 300 unread messages in just this one group, the 'c' or even 'u'
keys get very tempting.  As the net volume has grown over the last 2 or 3
years, I've had to drop a lot of groups I would like to have time to read.

>There seems to have been an almost Stalinist approach to writing
>most college textbooks on physics, programing and electronics with the
>goal of purging practically all references to the people who did the original
>research.  We seem to have multiple generations of scientists & engineers
>who now know more about the fictional world depicted in Star Trek than, say,
>the stories of the people who created radio, TV, transistors and microchips.

    I think it's more a matter of relative importance.  Who thought up
the bubble-sort is less important (given limited classroom time) than when
to use it (or when not to).  Sure, such things may be personally interesting,
and you can learn some things from such types of history, but I think you're
overstating it's general importance.  I would think a history of engineering
course would cover such things better.

    I think you're also overblowing the causes.  I suspect the prime reason
is that the authors just don't think it's important as you do to the students.
I'm not saying they should put no history in; just that I think you've gone
too far the other way.

>People who have don't want to "waste time" reading occassional bits of history
>can very easily skip over these headers; that's why we use readers to
>go through newsgroups.

    Those "occasional bits" can at times amount to 70+% of the volume
of the newsgroup.  If it were occasional I wouldn't have brought it up.

    Another argument in favor of comp.arch.history is the fact that many
sites do not receive alt groups (such as alt.computers.folklore).  A sanctioned
group would make that computer history information available to more people,
without people having to cross-post to comp.arch.

--
"Rev on the redline, you're on your own; seems like a lifetime, but soon it's
 gone..."  Foreigner
-
Randell Jesup, Jack-of-quite-a-few-trades, Commodore Engineering.
{uunet|rutgers}!cbmvax!jesup, [e-mail]  BIX: rjesup
Disclaimer: Nothing I say is anything other than my personal opinion.