Mastodawn

(This being mastodon, "hey do any of y'all know 1960s-era IBM 7090 Assembly" may not actually be *that weird* of a question, really)

Ozzelot

Mar 2

@clive i expect a positive answer within hours at most around these parts

😂

@clive Ironic thing is, my uncle, who passed away last year in his late 80s, used to install the first computers like this. For decades, he would tell us the stories about how big, heavy, low computing power, etc they were compared to today.

He had his full mental faculties when he passed away. So, a year ago, I probably could've hooked you up.

@paul

ah, drat!

sounds like a cool dude -- must have been fun to hear his tales from those days

Paul Chambers🚧Mar 2

@clive The first decade it was. Got tedious around the 4th and 5th decade. 🤭

Was the inspiration for my decision to enter the field as much as I have.

aha, gotcha

@clive He was cool, though. For someone born in the mid-1930s, he was a mix of George Carlin and George Bailey.

@paul

that is a pretty cool venn overlap

CynBlogger ❌👑Mar 2

@clive
Ummm, I may be the oldest person regularly participating on Mastodon and that’s even before MY time and tech experience.

@cynblogger

Yeah, I'm also reaching out to a bunch of cs folks who specifically work on historical research ... I think that's where I'll need to go

Joan of Contention 😷Mar 2

Ms. Que Banh Mar 2

@clive You're probably going to get several DMs offering to help out 🙂

i hope so!

Ludwig Vielfrass Mar 2

@clive I did 360 assembler back in the day (> 40 years ago) but the 709x was before my time.

it's an old one!

@clive I love that you got, like, a bajillion replies to this. 😄

Yes!!

Joan of Contention 😷Mar 3

@clive It's pure perfection

*|FNAME|*

Mar 3

@clive
LOL! I came here to say this! 😆

lol

Riley S. Faelan Mar 2

@clive I think I have ran into reading some 7090 code, as historic artefacts, when I was into the Space Race hardware, but I haven't had a chance to write any. You can probably find somebody who has written code for it, but if not, ping me, and I'll try to help.

Also, #/retrocomputing.

@riley

thank you, and good call!

thvv Mar 2

@clive @riley

i was a 7094 assembly language user and system programmer for the MIT CTSS operating system. you may enjoy https://multicians.org/7094.html.
you can send me mail via the link at the bottom of the page.
regards, tom

Clive Thompson Mar 3

@riley @thvv

Thank you! I think I’m good right now but I will keep your email on back up in case we need more reality checking on this one, I really appreciate it

thvv Mar 3

@clive @riley

oops, bad url, shd be
https://multicians.org/thvv/7094.html

The IBM 7094 and CTSS

The IBM 7094 computer, and MIT Computation Center's CTSS timesharing system.

Dr David Mills Mar 2

@clive @brouhaha maybe?

@dtl @brouhaha

😅

do you write more modern variants of assembly?

Dr David Mills Mar 2

@clive @brouhaha Z80 is as new and as old as I get with ASM these days.

groff 🇺🇦Mar 2

@dtl @clive @brouhaha

7090 is closer to 6502 assembly, being rather limited. ;)

(I was a 6502 kid. Learning 709 assembly looks fun.)

🇺🇦 haxadecimal 🚫👑Mar 2

@geoffl @dtl @clive
kinda vaguely, if you squint just right.

Laux Myth (aka Martin)Mar 2

Karl Auerbach Mar 2

@clive I used (and sometimes operated) UCLA's 7094 in the late 1960's, but as far as I remember, everyone used Fortran.

Go IBSYS!!

woooo

@clive
Steve Gibson of Security Now writes in assembler. He may be my vintage so only thinking he might know some people who know that variant.

@lauxmyth

aha, super suggestion, thank you!

Ed W8EMV Mar 2

https://www.cozx.com/dpitts/ibm7090.html

Did you find this person in your searching?

https://www.cozx.com/dpitts/

there's an email address there for Dave Pitts who looks like he'd be perfect, and th page was updated within the past year or so.

IBM 7090/7094 Page

@w8emv

wonderful -- thank you!

I'm sure you'll find someone just as sure as I hated learning Assembler as a student.

The language hung on as way to save memory space but I preferred COBOL.

#assembler #programming

@srfirehorseart

it is pretty challenging to write, based on the very little of it I've had exposure to!

COBOL, I once spent an afternoon messing around with the emulator package that IBM put together a couple of years ago -- it was fun!

COBOL was my livelihood before web based systems. Years of keeping legacy systems going, like billing systems. Unsexy but reliable.

The only problem was having to move around the country to get the jobs.

I'd consider COBOL again if it was remote work.

@srfirehorseart

I gather banks and governments still need a lot of COBOL help!

not sure how much of it is offered remote, though

Banks and government would be new for me but the work never changes even if the business is different.

I've still got my COBOL and DB2 books in the house, IDMS and flat files before that.

Tagging @cs ?

cs Mar 2

@srfirehorseart @clive Not me, but looks like Clive got an answer.

Firehorseart Lives!Mar 3

@cs @clive

Indeed and I find it reassuring that so many people were willing to help out.

Clive Thompson Mar 3

@cs @srfirehorseart

yeah, people were amazing!!

CheapPontoon Mar 2

@clive
I wonder if my IBM 360 assembler knowledge would help. (from a few careers ago). Oh wow, I just realized where I learned it. COBOL dumps in the 80’s. What’s your question?

Frieke Mar 2

@clive maybe someone in the @homecomputermuseum community?

Marc Véron Mar 2

@clive Maybe you can find some information here:
https://archive.org/search?query=IBM+7090

Internet Archive: Digital Library of Free & Borrowable Texts, Movies, Music & Wayback Machine

HumToTable Mar 2

@clive I might know a guy who at least knows a guy. I'll send him your info. He worked for the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA. Or you could contact the museum directly. They're great folks.

🇺🇦 haxadecimal 🚫👑Mar 2

@clive
I've written assembly for many systems, including relatively old machines like the DEC PDP-1 and PDP-10, and the IBM System/360. I know a little bit about the instruction set of the IBM 704/709/7090/7094, but have not actually written assembly for them.

@brouhaha

that's cool -- thank you though!

It's a pretty old one yeah

@brouhaha

If I wind up going with a snippet of Assembly for the PDP-10 instead, I'll ping you!

InterestingMoo Mar 2

@clive if @nina_kali_nina doesnt know, she might know who to ask

Greg Lloyd Mar 2

@clive
I can’t help on 7090, but learned S/360 Macro Assembler as part of a four course, two semester CS bootcamp taught by Andy van Dam et al. 1967-68.

One suggestion on assembly language of that era: recognize the role of ‘Macro Assembly Language’ as the most important component of the stack used to build large and important program products. Macros created apps, API’s, and programming languages using shared macro libraries. OS/360 used layered libraries to Sysgen an executable binary.

@Roundtrip

that's cool, thank you!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assembly_language

Greg Lloyd Mar 2

@clive
This Wikipedia reference on assembly language and macros may be helpful:

Assembly language - Wikipedia

Clive Thompson Mar 3

@Roundtrip

good call, thank you!

Jean-François Mezei Mar 2

@clive First assembler I learned was of the 360/370 IBM architecture. 7090 predates this by a while.

the 7090 uses "MAP" Macro Assembly Program. But this gets expanded (macros) and translated to actual machine language. However, the assembler will be close to the architecture. In particular you need to understand addressing modes. (in 370, there is a base register containing RAM address, and displacement value which is added to base address). This is seen throughout 370 assembly.

cybervegan Mar 2

@clive Well, I didn't used to *program* it, but in the late 1980's, I worked as a Technical Librarian for a UK government department, and part of my duties were updating a Data Dictionary from Assembly and PL\1 program printouts for the department's IBM 7090SE, so I was kind of familiar with it. It's very similar in format to Motorola 68000 assembly (which I knew because I had an Atari ST at the time), though it had some key differences due to architecture.