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In high school "we" had a few of these (Philips P2000T), and that was my first introduction with programming:


(picture from Wikipedia)

Strangely enough the school did not offer any computer related lessons. There were a few P2000T computers in a single classroom, and after school hours you could lend the key, to work with them. They were very much a novelty, and I think there were only a couple of kids interested.

(12-08-2017 02:10 PM)jthole Wrote: [ -> ]Strangely enough the school did not offer any computer related lessons. There were a few P2000T computers in a single classroom, and after school hours you could lend the key, to work with them. They were very much a novelty, and I think there were only a couple of kids interested.

It was very similar in my school. The first computer they had was a desktop calculator from Compucorp, must have been around 1977, with no display, just a keyboard and a printer. Math teachers would haul it into their classrooms in turns and demonstrate stuff like Newton's method, numerical integration or Fibonacci numbers. Students were not supposed to even touch it...

In my last year (1979-1980) they acquired a PET2001 to be used by students. One had to reserve one hour slots with the school secretary and would be given a key to the room where it was standing when one's time had come. The school library had some copies of the manual which one could borrow to prepare oneself in advance. There was a lot of demand and I only managed three or four hours with that machine before school was over for me.

(12-03-2017 04:39 PM)DGM Wrote: [ -> ]Oh, I'd have to say my first programming "language" was either the Digi-Comp I or the CARDIAC. I can't remember which one I used first...
Then, FORTRAN IV in high-school, on an IBM 1620 which was one of only two with two hard drives.
For calculators, an HP-25 some years later, when I could afford it.

David Motto

Well, if you're going to include those... I also had a 3-bit (not K or even BYTE!) Digi-Comp I (still do!) and a Digi-Comp II. I also had this cute little "computer" that had miniature punched cards. You put a card on a tray and pushed the tray into the machine. Lights flashed and the answer (A, B, C or D) to the multiple-choice question printed on the card and the came up on a very cool-looking light display after much flashing of random lights. I figured out how to make cards with my own data on them and amazed friends and family that the machine "knew" all sorts of personal information about them! "What's Bobby's favorite hobby?" A - Skiing B - Reading C - Cooking D - Swimming When the answer came up D, Bobby got a little nervous that the machine knew him so well.

David and Tom: May I join your DIGI-COMP 1 club? It's the only programmable computer I know of that uses no electricity, even though it DOES use tubes (!) and its 1 CPS speed can be slightly overclocked (at the risk of jamming).

Applesoft BASIC. I still play around with it from time to time, those were better days.

I understand why computer scientists hate it though, it made programming so easy and approachable.

BASIC in the The BASIC Cookbook by Ken TRACTON,
followed by BASIC on a TRS-80 Model I and III in a TANDY store here in Belgium,
followed by BASIC on a Sinclair ZX81 and Spectrum, along with Z80 machine code and Calculator programming with a Sharp EL-507 calculator

I'm a son of a BASIC

(12-09-2017 10:43 PM)Joe Horn Wrote: [ -> ]... It's the only programmable computer I know of that uses no electricity,

I can't believe Geoff hasn't taken one of those along a trip!

I first cut my teeth on a Bi-Tran Six computer using switches to program the computer. A 12-bit machine language only. Later in college I went to MIX, Fortran, Snobol, but that was many years ago. Got really good with my Cosmac Elf with 1802 machine language.

First TI 57 after Basic Casio FX 702P Sharp PC 1500. At college Basic HP 86 and GW Basic, at home Turbo Pascal with Amstrad CPC 6128.

(12-15-2017 08:40 PM)badaze Wrote: [ -> ]First TI 57 after Basic Casio FX 702P Sharp PC 1500. At college Basic HP 86 and GW Basic, at home Turbo Pascal with Amstrad CPC 6128.

That FX-702p is such a nice little machine. It makes really effective use of its tiny RAM thanks to tokenized BASIC and 10 separate program spaces.

(12-15-2017 10:51 PM)Dave Britten Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-15-2017 08:40 PM)badaze Wrote: [ -> ]First TI 57 after Basic Casio FX 702P Sharp PC 1500. At college Basic HP 86 and GW Basic, at home Turbo Pascal with Amstrad CPC 6128.

That FX-702p is such a nice little machine. It makes really effective use of its tiny RAM thanks to tokenized BASIC and 10 separate program spaces.

In 1983 1680 program steps were almost huge respect to the 50 steps of my TI 57 which btw still works.

Wow, this brings back memories...

1985: BASIC at school on a Commodore CBM 8032 (see attached picture or here http://www.vintage-computer.com/pet8032.shtml)
Then:
1986-1989: COBOL (TSO, JCL), PL/1, Prolog, Rexx
1989-1994: Modula-2, occam, C, VHDL, bash, LaTex
from 1994 onwards: C++, perl, Lisp, VimL
2017: started learning python

BTW, in 1989 I learned typing using the vi editor, later vim. Today, I still use vim every day and I am not programming anymore for a living. My eyes, my fingers and my brain are vim-like hardwired :-)

Recommended reading:
The vi input model
http://blog.ngedit.com/2005/06/03/the-vi-input-model

(12-16-2017 09:32 PM)Alex S Wrote: [ -> ]Today, I still use vim every day and I am not programming anymore for a living.

Who doesn't? Vim is everywhere! Vim is life. Although I have to admit I still use the arrows and not hjkl.

(12-17-2017 09:47 AM)pier4r Wrote: [ -> ]Who doesn't? Vim is everywhere! Vim is life. Although I have to admit I still use the arrows and not hjkl.

Pah! emacs rules!

(sits back and watches a religious war start )

Emacs? Is it even installed somewhere? Although I have to say that there is a "tribute" to emacs for RPL systems.

I am not against other text editors (or calculators, or what not), one chooses the tool that fits his skills and does the job.

(12-17-2017 08:42 PM)pier4r Wrote: [ -> ]Emacs? Is it even installed somewhere? ...

why not? who know it? Also on the Prime :-)

I don't know if this is true, but...

Salvo

(12-17-2017 08:42 PM)pier4r Wrote: [ -> ]Emacs? Is it even installed somewhere? Although I have to say that there is a "tribute" to emacs for RPL systems.

I am not against other text editors (or calculators, or what not), one chooses the tool that fits his skills and does the job.

it still comes on some Linux distros by default, along with vi and others

Mine would have been Commodore (64) basic. Then 6502 assembly as well as 48sx RPL and later Borland Turbo pascal and C and x86 assembly using MASM.

(12-18-2017 12:16 PM)EugeneNine Wrote: [ -> ]it still comes on some Linux distros by default, along with vi and others

It has been on every Macintosh since Apple released Mac OS X in 2001. Together with vi and vim and awk and yacc and everything else :-)

I still use vi some times to edit simple text files ("vim" is for sissies ;-) ). And the "native" C compiler in the Macintosh Terminal for small programs. Mostly not to completely lose old skills. Other times I use the Arduino C/C++ editor and compiler, run the program on an attached arduino board and watch the results in the "serial monitor" window on my Mac. Or on a little display attached to the Arduino. Recently I simulated a small three-body-problem for an amateur astronomer buddy that way. Of course one could also use Matlab (or the free version Scilab) to do that but that would be too easy.

I learned programming on a TI-57. After the 57 I learned 1802 assembly on a Cosmac ELF II. I learned Basic on a home brew 8080 machine and the TRS-80 (level I and II). Z80 assembly on the TRS-80 and ZX Spectrum. Finaly I became a Cobol programmer. I've written a lot of Cobol74 programs on Burroughs B1900 and Unisys A series machines.

Marc.