US nuclear force still uses floppy disks

[lesmw0sec]

Originally Posted by Radio Wrangler

Oddly enough, I find this easier. The codes are logical as are the structures and the hardware it operates. What drives me loopy is fighting all the high level stuff like which menu someone chose to put which settings into.

David

I tend to agree. The greatest efficiency is reached when the code & hardware is designed to work as a team - a simple example being to use a hardware monostable to derive a time, rather than a loop or interrupt. I do a bit of work with PIC's. I find the machine code far easier to follow than what passes for 'C' these days!

[paulsherwin]

I think we are confusing machine code and assembler code here. Assembler translates directly to machine code but is symbolic so comprehensible to humans. Machine code itself is just binary data. It's possible to program in machine code directly without using an assembler but it's not for the faint hearted and very difficult even for a simple algorithm.

[davegsm82]

Originally Posted by lesmw0sec

I tend to agree. The greatest efficiency is reached when the code & hardware is designed to work as a team - a simple example being to use a hardware monostable to derive a time, rather than a loop or interrupt. I do a bit of work with PIC's. I find the machine code far easier to follow than what passes for 'C' these days!

I tend to disagree with this, I find C a lot easier. I've written in both, my first project(s) was exclusively in assembly on an 16F877, while you can 'get the hang' of it, C tends to be faster to troubleshoot and a nicer structure. C these days seems to be somewhere between C and C++. Conversely a couple of my projects written in C are relatively simple, yet have managed to take up 90% of an 18F2520, which is a lot of codespace.

Back on topic though, I'm not at all surprised that some stuff still runs on floppies and the mantra of 'it still works so why replace it' is prevalent in all areas. The electronics manufacturer I used to work for was still using floppies and an old 386 laptop with hardware serial to program controller boards until I ported it out to a modern laptop with home made full standards compliant USB-RS232. The company would never have paid anyone to do this, I had to do it myself because I knew that one day the doo-doo would hit the fan and it would be my production line that would halt.

The particle accelerators I work on are based on 1970/80's hardware which has been trickle-updated to plug-in replacements that are functionally the same but based on currently available Micro's etc.

I'm all for keeping hardware where possible as long as you know you can replace the moving bits and 'wear items' such as CRT's. Old processors generally don't wear out.

As far as I know (only from what I've read in some NASA papers), much of the off-earth US space program hardware still uses old LSI hardware for mission critical applications such as 286 level processors because they are less susceptible to Cosmic/X-ray bombardment flipping bits or smashing through the die and causing physical damage at the atomic level.

Dave.

[GMB]

I think that when most people say "machine code" they mean assembly language code.

Sadly the art of writing such code is dying out. The "old school" system programmers of my vintage had to as operating systems were written like that. I was one of the first to move to using high level language for operating systems, by writing a compiler for the purpose.

I think some of the latest CPU designs don't lend themselves to hand coding any more because there are awkward interactions between instructions due to complex pipelining. Old processors were design to keep their clever tricks hidden from view but the modern approach is "why bother" when the compiler's code-generator can work round the details.

[lesmw0sec]

Originally Posted by GMB

I think that when most people say "machine code" they mean assembly language code.

Yes - I was referring to assembler. I did quite a bit of Z80 work working directly in hex. Surprising how soon you remember the commands. I seem to recall that 21.xx.yy was load HL with xxyy.

I remember my first assembler (ZEAP) - oh the luxury of not having to calculate the relative jumps!

[Dave Moll]

Although quite a lot of my programming back in the day was done in assembly language, I think the only time I coded directly in machine code was creating code patches for existing executable files, and using a utility called SUPERZAP for applying them.

[TonyDuell]

Originally Posted by lesmw0sec

Yes - I was referring to assembler. I did quite a bit of Z80 work working directly in hex. Surprising how soon you remember the commands. I seem to recall that 21.xx.yy was load HL with xxyy.

No, it's 21 yy xx. On the 8080 and processors derived from it (8085, Z80, etc) you put the low byte of a 16 bit operand first.

I modified the bootstrap ROM of one of my PDP11s by hand-assembling the few instructions I needed and then soldering the right pattern of diodes onto a PCB. Yes, the boot ROM (M792 module) is a 32*16 diode matrix.

[SiriusHardware]

Hmph, for those of us who started with the MK14, writing programs in raw hex was not only normal, it was the only way to do it. It was the only 'computer' we had, so there was no handy 'other' machine on which to write the code in assembly language and assemble it into code. We had to use a pencil and paper for that.

The oldest tech I still use regularly:

-My 1980s era audio separates (Pioneer Tuner, Kenwood Amp, Sony CD Player, Denon Cassette Deck) - still my main audio system. Only the speakers are newer, as the woofer foams failed on my original speakers. This is all still in daily use. Curiously, I was never a vinyl fan, so never owned a record deck.

-Various CB radios circa 1982 - I normally select one from my collection and take it with me on my (UK) summer holiday.

-My oldest PC, a self built DOS / Windows 3.1 machine, still used to run various items for which only DOS support software is available, ie, eprom programmer. c. 1991?

-Various retro computers and their support infrastructure (mainly Sinclair, Acorn, Atari). The Ataris are still used regularly for mucking around with my small collection of Roland and Yamaha music synthesisers, also dating from the late seventies through eighties.

Really, this was a fatal question to ask here as, by the very nature of this website and its membership, every one of use probably has a shedload of old things which we still use, making us very untypical of today's general population.

I'm sure that one reason why the military continues to use old tech is because of the security risks associated with letting anyone near it to do updates or modifications.

[paulsherwin]

Partly it's down to the usual defence paranoia. During my brush with the UKADGE I learnt that the MOD had built a facility to do component level repairs to DEC Unibus interface cards, because they didn't trust DEC or the Americans generally to supply replacement cards or fix faulty ones (maybe this was a legacy of Suez, still seen as a betrayal in the MOD even today). This meant that they were obliged to buy DEC Unibus based computers, which by the time of my involvement were obsolete. I've no idea what they finished up doing (I didn't have sufficient security clearance to learn any details, and this was 20 years ago).

[PJL]

I am another who spent too much time writing assembly code for early microprocessors.

On topic, I indirectly get to see some factory systems and its not uncommon to see working kit that was made before windows existed.

[Radio Wrangler]

I'm very glad they're sticking with good solid software running on thoroughly understood hardware.

"Hey lootenant, a window's just opened up congratulating us on upgrading Cheyenne Mountain to Windows 10 and asking if I would like to nook Moscow? There's only a button for accept, and the X to close the window...There's nothing in the manual about this..."

How do I bags the film-rights?

David

[bikerhifinut]

If you don't David, somebody's already either done it or is about to I figure!

Shades of Dr Strangelove at times?

[Jonster]

A lot of POS (point of sale) terminals still use Windows 2000, as do information screens at airports. If it still works then why not?

[cashaw1972]

I am not sure how apocryphal this is, but I was once told that some of the back end systems used in banking still convert decimal currency to £sd during calculations, as some of the original code was written back in the 60's.

As it is one of those things that just works, then the current programmers don't touch it. I can believe this part as I work with some code which is over 20 years old, been added to by many different programmers over the years with varying levels and quality of documentation. Some of the algorithms are so complex that it is often better to leave them alone rather than tinker with them.

[emeritus]

I think there was something on a BBC programme few months ago about how there are still a large number of businesses (including MOD) that are still using COBOL programs written several decades ago.

[Dave Moll]

Quite right, too! Having programmed in COBOL myself, I find it produces good efficient code. If it continues to do the job, I'm all in favour of leaving it well alone.

I'm sure some of the code I produced back in the 1970s and '80s would still be doing good work, were it not for that fact that both the software company and the car manufacturer it supported have both long passed away.

[AC/HL]

Data's Data. It's only us mortals that need GUI front ends. And I'd think the further it is from modern programs, the safer it is from (most) teenagers in bedrooms.

[bluepilot]

If it ain't broke, don't fix it. I can't remember the details but I remember reading some time ago about a meeting between US and Russian air forces. The Americans laughed about Russian aircraft which still used valve equipment until the Russians pointed out that in the case of a nuclear EMP the American aircraft with all their microelectronics would fall out of the sky whilst the Russian ones would keep on flying.

[Pilot Mariner]

Back in the 1980s I worked for Thorn Automation in Rugeley designing the hardware and writing the software for various systems for the Royal Navy. Imagine my surprise when on a recent episode of "Davenport" on Quest, they showed the inside of the ops room and the Bridge of a Type 23 frigate, and there was my equipment still functioning with the circuit breakers set to on, control panels with their flashing indicators and knobs.
All this designed, coded and set to work over 30 years ago.

Mark

[lesmw0sec]

I had a similar deja-vue incident when our local radio club had a most enjoyable visit to an RAF base. They were showing us some flying kit and I beheld an initiator, the electronics for which I designed in the 80's. Still standard flying kit!

Les.