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The inner beauty of a Tesla Stropkov DS 3600 telephone from the early 1980s
This is a DS 3600 analog telephone made by Tesla Stropkov in about 1982. It's still functional and to my mind it's absolutely beautiful. Bu...
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History & Retro Computing
The most popular blog posts about history & retro computing on Hacker News. 325 posts.
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My encounter with Medley Interlisp
Imagine someone let you into an alien spaceship they landed in your backyard, sat you at the controls, and encouraged you to fly the ship...
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Hal Finney Was Not Satoshi Nakamoto
A compilation of evidence that Hal Finney and Satoshi Nakamoto were different people.
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The History of Windows 95
The Dawn of Microsoft's Golden Age
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Recreating Medieval English Ales (1998)
In medieval England, ale was an alcoholic drink made from grain, water, and fermented with yeast. The difference between medieval ale and beer was that beer also used hops as an ingredient. Virtually everyone drank ale. It provided significant nutrition as well as hydration (and inebriation). The aristocracy could…
276
Do painters subconsciously paint themselves into their work?
The Renaissance history of automimesis, and a proposal for research
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Ford 021C Concept Car (1999)
Marc Newson has been described as one of the most influential designers of his generation. He has worked across an extremely wide range of disciplines, and his clients include some of the best-known and most prestigious brands in the world spanning diverse sectors from manufacturing and technology to transportation…
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The analog computer for the Nike missile system (2001)
Nike computer - Installed in class room, not BC van. From Rolf Goerigk Left rack has the power supplies - outputs about 7 different voltages. Top panel is switches, meters, voltage warning lights. (Note: in the van installation, this rack is on the right side of the computer.) Middle two racks - operational amplifies…
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Running SunOS 4 in QEMU (Sparc)
SunOS is a historical UNIX operating system widely used from the mid 80s into the early/mid 90s. Older versions of QEMU struggled to emulate the SPARC platform that SunOS ran on, but QEMU v7.2 supports SPARC well enough to install and run SunOS without any unusual workarounds.
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The Rise of Steel Part II
Welcome to the Rise of Steel part II.
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The curious death of Oppenheimer’s mistress (2015)
Who killed J. Robert Oppenheimer's Communist lover?
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The Rise of Steel – Part I
One of the defining characteristics of the modern world is the ubiquity of steel.
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Age of Invention: How the Dutch Did It Better
You’re reading Age of Invention, my newsletter on the causes of the British Industrial Revolution and the history of innovation.
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The First App Store
Editor’s Note: This article ends on a cliffhanger. The next part goes out in a week. I will start with an honest admission. I didn’t set out to write about the world’s first app store. I set out to write about Brother printers. But doing my research,
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Microsoft forced people to install their browser (2010)
It was a happy time for PC users. Microsoft had just delivered Windows 95, an incredibly vast improvement over windows 3.1 and DOS.
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How to Roman Republic 101, Part IIIa: Starting Down the Path of Honors
This is the third of our planned five part series (I, II, IIIa, IIIb, IIIc, IV, V, A1, A2) on the structure of the Roman Republic during the third and second centuries. Last time we discussed Rome&…
289
Dick Smith’s Wizzard-ry 8 (Bit)
Homemade clone of the Dick Smith Wizzard/VTech CreatiVision game console.
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Windows 3.x VDDVGA
While working on my Windows 3.x display driver , I ran into a vexing problem. In Windows 3.1 running in Enhanced 386 mode, I could start a DOS session and switch it to a window. But an attempt to set a mode in the DOS window (e.g. MODE CO80 ) would destroy the Windows desktop, preventing further drawing from happening…
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RIP WC
So farewell then, Havant station’s 1930s railway toilets. It is doubtful whether many passengers will mourn their loss, but they are another piece of railway heritage that has slipped beyond …
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Programming culture in the late aughts (2022)
How it felt to be computing in the late aughts vs. now.
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Here be four bits of dragons: the Mattel D&D Computer Game and the TMS1100
When my parents sold the house and moved to the great white north, they dropped off a few boxes of my stuff that was still in the garage. ...
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The King doesn't own all the swans in Britain
So who does?
297
One Year into the War in Ukraine
Today marks the end of the first year of Putin’s War in Ukraine. I will not call it an anniversary, because I don’t think anyone is celebrating. Nevertheless I think this makes a useful…
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USB-C done cheap: when 2 ports become 1 (2020)
How PC hardware is implementing USB-C in a way that may or may not violate standards.
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Reverse-engineering an airspeed/Mach indicator from 1977
How does a vintage airspeed indicator work? CuriousMarc picked one up for a project, but it didn't have any documentation, so I reverse-en...
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