Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2005/12/06
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Ah, the joys of minimization. Back when I was taking a course in celestial navigation I wrote a sight reduction program for my HP-11C that took me literally a month to make fit its non-expandable memory. It was, of course, made instantly obsolete when the first dedicated navigational calculators appeared about a month later. But, I made it fit, yes I did! :-) >I have an HP-67 as well with a selection of the little mag-cards for >holding programs. > >It nearly cost me my marriage. I'd left the Navy and was getting at EE >at UC Davis and was sitting at home writing a program to solve some >function or other and, as was the geekiness of the time, trying to get >it down to the bare minimum of instructions (memory was very limited). >So I was working and working in my chair, manual open, debugging and >stepping through the program and finally my wife said "Oh can't you >get that finished? It's time for Louisa's bath!" "Oh," I said, "It >works just fine, I'm trying to make it as compact as possible." The >nuclear detonation could be heard all over the block and I took Louisa >to her bath, story and bed. > >I'm lucky I had a calculator when I returned to my chair! And she >NEVER understood that desire to make programs small and optimum. Of >course it's totally wasted in these days. Ah for the joys of PDP-11 >assembler! > (snip) -- Regards, Dick Boston MA