[Chicago] Good readings on the history of computing

[David Crespo]

Not an article, buy you could try Charles Petzold's wonderful Code: The
Hidden Language of Computer Hardware.

http://www.amazon.com/Code-Language-Computer-Hardware-Software/dp/0735611319

It's not strictly historical (it's more about presenting concepts in the
order that makes it easiest to understand them) but it does cover the
intellectual history of computing in detail. It begins with Morse code (!)
and goes from there to telegraph relays to logic gates to memory to
graphics with incredible clarity.
On Sep 24, 2013 7:59 PM, "Ross Heflin" <heflin.rosst at gmail.com> wrote:

> a client once recommended this to me.
> http://www.amazon.com/The-Soul-A-New-Machine/dp/0316491977
> I enjoyed it much
> and no list would be complete without Steven Levy's Hackers: Heroes of the
> Computer Revolution
>
> http://www.amazon.com/Hackers-Computer-Revolution-Anniversary-Edition/dp/1449388396
>
>
>
> On Tue, Sep 24, 2013 at 6:00 PM, Matt Bone <thatmattbone at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> It's not an article, but here's a really old book I love:
>>
>> http://www.amazon.com/Interactive-Programming-Environments-David-Barstow/dp/0070038856
>>
>> I think it's interesting to see how little stuff has changed with
>> regards to how we actually write programs. This book includes articles
>> from notables like Stallman and Kernighan.
>>
>> I like this thread because earlier today someone sent me an article
>> with this quote:
>>
>> "The lack of interest, the disdain for history is what makes computing
>> not-quite-a-field." – Alan Kay
>>
>> --matt
>>
>> On Tue, Sep 24, 2013 at 5:35 PM, Alex MacKay <chicagomackay at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>> > Again, the 72 is based upon concepts of the 1950's and 1960's.  A old
>> punch
>> > card was 80 columns long.  The last 8 (73-80) was used for line
>> numbering.
>> > If you dropped the deck of cards, you could easily put the program,
>> data,
>> > back in the correct order.
>> >
>> > On Sep 24, 2013, at 5:07 PM, Andy Boyle wrote:
>> >
>> > Continuing the off-topic for a moment, for those who are unaware PEP-8
>> was
>> > recently updated to allow for longer line length:
>> > http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/#maximum-line-length
>> >
>> > "Some teams strongly prefer a longer line length. For code maintained
>> > exclusively or primarily by a team that can reach agreement on this
>> issue,
>> > it is okay to increase the nominal line length from 80 to 100 characters
>> > (effectively increasing the maximum length to 99 characters), provided
>> that
>> > comments and docstrings are still wrapped at 72 characters."
>> >
>> >
>> > Andy Boyle | Chicago Tribune
>> > News Applications Developer
>> > @andymboyle | andymboyle.com
>> >
>> >
>> > On Tue, Sep 24, 2013 at 4:49 PM, Carl Karsten <carl at personnelware.com>
>> > wrote:
>> >>
>> >> On Tue, Sep 24, 2013 at 2:40 PM, Jason Wirth <wirth.jason at gmail.com>
>> >> wrote:
>> >> > Python is a newer language
>> >>
>> >> [citation needed]
>> >>
>> >> It is over 20 years old.
>> >>
>> >> granted pep 8:
>> >> http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/
>> >> Created:05-Jul-2001
>> >>
>> >> But back to your question about why 79 chars, I think because many of
>> >> us (like me) use text based editors in text based environments like an
>> >> ssh shell that defaults to 80 chars.
>> >>
>> >> and back on topic, you may like this
>> >>
>> >> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCwRGHj5jOE "26 years with Erlang or
>> >> How I got my grey hairs"
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> --
>> >> Carl K
>> >> _______________________________________________
>> >> Chicago mailing list
>> >> Chicago at python.org
>> >> https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/chicago
>> >
>> >
>> > _______________________________________________
>> > Chicago mailing list
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>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > _______________________________________________
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>> >
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>>
>
>
>
> --
> From the "desk" of Ross Heflin
> phone number: (847) <23,504,826th decimal place of pi>
>
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