Posted by doc on 09/25/05 04:15

me too. the people were great and interestingly many didn't care about who
knew what, or who got the credit, as long as we all figured out how to do it
:o)

i remember working on this really big basic formula project that we wanted
whcih involved trying to get a non linear natural (log) and thus we couldn't
get the basic code to produce anything other than a pure natural log and
thus a straight line, when in fact the curve had two opposing slopes and i
was at one of my son's ball games and it dawned on me to CHEAT the computer
and make it do a "STEP" and "RISE" (we called it) and each step and rise
would be sqaured by some constant value that was determined by the beginning
value of the operation and upon putting this code in it worked!

the company that we were trying to do this for rented the whole top floor of
the holiday inn in lorain, oh, so that we could walk around from room to
room, pass ball in the hall, and just feel like we were important and the
net result was that we patented the process, called it diarc (for Dynamic
Incremental Adaptive Reagent Calculation) and made an absolute fortune from
it over the next 7 years (7 yr royality contract) and since the program was
in basic and we didn't want anyone to copy pirate it, we compiled the result
and key coded it and thus, wah lah it was ours (actually mine since i was
the only process programmer working on the project :o)

geez, i was like a god in those days. working with engineers, programmers,
and really influential top brass. it was absolutely fabulous. now what? a
little code, a powerful computer, and it's just like learning the alphabet
:o(

doc

"TonyP" <arpierre@hooptonline.net> wrote in message
news:8vmZe.12691$i%2.9693@fe10.lga...
> AnthonyR wrote:
>
>> "TonyP" <arpierre@hooptonline.net> wrote in message
>> news:2HUYe.31405$TA2.15828@fe09.lga...
>>
>>>doc wrote:
>>>>wow! a 5 mb drive. that is soooooo cooooool :o) i rememember those
>>>>big ole floppys that i used in my trs80 (that's the way i went, my son
>>>>went the c64 route) and to think that that 5 1/4" could hold a whopping
>>>>160kb and when i got converted to dual sided it was 320kb. eGADS! i
>>>>now have pictures that wouldn't fit on the dual sided one :o)
>
>>>Yes, 5megs when the 5.25" floppies held like 170k. The cost for the 9060
>>>(which wasn't new) was $450.
>
>> ah memories of outdated technology. :)
>> That's why I try not to get to tied down to stuff nowadays be it either
>> hardware or software, cause
>> a new product can come along that does the job better and at a quarter
>> the price, so you can't live
>> with blinders on. I learned to always look around for new stuff coming
>> out, sometimes what they advertise
>> is just too good to be true, yes. But you never know for sure until you
>> try stuff.
>
> Back then, this was "cutting" edge stuff for the C64. I was using IEEE
> with SFD1001's, modded 1541's with all sorts of toggles and digital track
> read along with 1581's and of course, the ram expander (128k). It was an
> adventure in computing. Learning BASIC and typing in all those programs to
> just have to debug it later. It was great! The C64, and later the Amiga
> community was tremendous. Those involved with the soft/hardware were
> always easily accessable and willing to help.
>
>> TonyP and Doc
>> I enjoyed reading this thread you guys wrote, a trip down memory lane.
>> Thanks for allowing me to interject.
>>
>> AnthonyR.
>
> No problem! I sometimes think back on those days with fondness. I met a
> LOT of great people and had a great time.
>

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