[TUHS] Line Terminators in Text Files [Was: Re: Why Pascal is Not My Favorite Programming Language - Unearthed!]

Clem Cole clemc at ccc.com
Wed Sep 6 01:37:24 AEST 2017


On Tue, Sep 5, 2017 at 11:23 AM, Paul Winalski <paul.winalski at gmail.com>
wrote:

> On 9/4/17, Pete Turnbull <pete at dunnington.plus.com> wrote:
> >
> > I don't doubt it's possible, just not on an ASR33.  Apart from the
> > timing issue, the carriage return mechanism on Teletype 33s inhibits
> > printing while the carriage is moving back, until it stops at the left
> > margin.
>
> I could swear I saw our old ASR33 at college do this (print characters
> in the middle of the line while the carriage is moving back).  But
> maybe my memory is faulty and it was another printing terminal of that
> era.  Or maybe our ASR33 was broken.

I agree with Paul, maybe later models worked this way, but the first ASR33
I used definitely did print at strange times.   I have the same memories
from 1967 on a GE Mark III with Dartmouth Basic using an acoustic coupler,
where line noise was definitely a problem.   It would print random
characters, particularly during carriage motion.   Since the only way to
get a copy of your program was with the LIST command, it was rare to get a
clean copy.   If the program was of any length, there was usually a random
character or two overprinted in the middle of listing.

Clem
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