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Linux Kernel Module written in Scratch (a visual programming language for kids)
Seriously. Someone did this. Because... why not?
Topics /
History & Retro Computing
The most popular blog posts about history & retro computing on Hacker News. 390 posts.
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P. J. O'Rourke, 1947-2022
Brilliant writer, beautiful soul
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How the Apple archive ended up at Stanford
The Real Story
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Secret Military Telephone Buttons
It's the first of the new year, which means we ought to do something momentous to mark the occasion, like a short piece about telephones. Why so much on telephones lately? I think I'm just a little burned out on software at the moment and I need a vacation before I'm excited to write about failed Microsoft ventures…
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I miss the programmable web (2021)
In some ways, we've taken a few steps back from a programmable web—two things I miss: bookmarklets and user scripts. Imagine having a bookmarked shortcut to do complex things like taking screenshots or saving a PDF. O...
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How the 8086 processor's microcode engine works
The 8086 microprocessor was a groundbreaking processor introduced by Intel in 1978. It led to the x86 architecture that still dominates de...
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Amazon’s distributed computing manifesto (1998)
Today, I am publishing the Distributed Computing Manifesto, a canonical document from the early days of Amazon that transformed the architecture of Amazon's ecommerce platform. It highlights the challenges we were facing at the end of the 20th century, and hints at where we were headed.
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WordPerfect for UNIX (1992)
I found this interesting print-ad for WordPerfect for UNIX, apparently the best UNIX product of 1992! (Very) Belated congratulations Corel!
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The tyranny of the wagon equation
A mathematical extension to ACOUP's recent blog post on military logistics
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The lost ways of programming: Commodore 64 BASIC (2020)
How we interact with programming environment matters more than the language, but such interaction has never been widely studied. Inspired by the idea of 'complementary science', this essay recovers interesting ideas from how programming used to be done using Commodore 64 BASIC. Reading about interactions is not enough…
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Unraveling the linothorax mystery, or how linen armor came to dominate our lives (2013)
Guest post by Alicia Aldrete As the wife, research assistant, and sometimes coauthor of an ancient historian who teaches at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, I had expected to spend many hours…
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Reverse engineering the 1988 NeXT keyboard protocol
Summary : Steve Jobs's NeXT computer company made a keyboard in 1988. With no prior electronics experience, I tried to get it to work over USB. To do so, I had to go way deeper than I ever expected - all the way back over 100 years to broadcast radio standards from the 1920s. I learned tons and tons, and had a lot of…
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My Mega65 has arrived
This week I returned from a business trip overseas for the past few weeks. This is why I haven't been able to blog this month until now. But...
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The Incredibly Stupid One
After being captured by enemy soldiers during the Vietnam War, U.S. Navy sailor Douglas Hegdahl’s cleverness and creativity allowed him to uncover valuable information about the prison camp.
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Brute Force Colors
Using modern brute force approach to improve image quality on retro computers, by Arnaud Carré
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The integrated timetable of Switzerland
When people talk about great nation-wide public transit systems, names such as Japan or Switzerland are often mentioned. In this article I will show what makes Switzerland’s network so unique and why it is has become so popular.
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Oberon (2009)
Steven Frank's essay on the current state of the desktop UI 1 reminded me of Oberon, a delightfully insane system I used back when I was studying computer science at ETH Zürich. The first thing you have to understand about Oberon is that it evolved entirely outside of the normal genealogy of user interfaces…
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Rome: Decline and Fall? Part II: Institutions
This is the second of a three part (I, II, III) series tackling the complicated and still very much debated question of ‘how bad was the fall of Rome (in the West)?’ In the last part, w…
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Rome: Decline and Fall? Part III: Things
This is the third and final part (I, II, III) of our series tackling the complicated and still debated question of ‘how bad was the fall of Rome (in the West)?’ In our first part, we lo…
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Why we need Lisp machines
A personal mind dump on operating systems
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Yes, the 8086 wanted to be mechanically translatable from the 8080, but
So many addressing modes, so little space.
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Roman Egypt was a strange province
Welcome back! We are back from our November hiatus and thus back to regular weekly posts! This week we’re going to answer the runner-up question in the last ACOUP Senate poll (polls in which …
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Balloon framing is worse-is-better (2021)
Today in the US, most houses and apartments are built using light framed wood construction. This system consists of load bearing walls made from 2x4s or 2x6s, which support a wood-framed floor or roof - usually either trusses, joists, or engineered i-joists. This system is a variant of a framing style known as balloon…
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Robertson vs. Torx screw drives (2021)
I’m going to get straight to the point and say that it’s time for Robertson screws to be retired and supplanted by Torx. This posting is to explain why and is partly motivated by lots o…