Hi!
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Hi! Can we entertain each other with our fun stories about the oldest or weirdest tech we've come across?
Please boost for science or cows or something. TELL US YOUR COOL STORY!
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Hi! Can we entertain each other with our fun stories about the oldest or weirdest tech we've come across?
Please boost for science or cows or something. TELL US YOUR COOL STORY!
I'll start. It's the story that triggered this question
It's about the time a new technician at work did something stupid.
We received an industrial computer controlled machine with fire damage. Goal was to restore it to the state it had a seconds before the fire started.
The new tech got a simple task: disassemble the included PC (which only had minor smoke damage) and label the parts. Procedure is that we replace parts where it makes sense.
So he discarded the 3½-inch floppy drive.
1/3
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I'll start. It's the story that triggered this question
It's about the time a new technician at work did something stupid.
We received an industrial computer controlled machine with fire damage. Goal was to restore it to the state it had a seconds before the fire started.
The new tech got a simple task: disassemble the included PC (which only had minor smoke damage) and label the parts. Procedure is that we replace parts where it makes sense.
So he discarded the 3½-inch floppy drive.
1/3
FYI: we have good procedures, and peer checks etc etc. We also employ humans. And humans need to learn, and make mistakes.
To continue:
Our procedure on replacing parts has long been: store the old one for a year after project conclusion.
Our new tech just whacked it with a hammer before discarding it. He couldn't explain why.
Turns out it was something called a UHD 144 drive. It took a full day to find a new-old-stock one. At a cost of around 5000 euro. 🤭
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caleb_UHD144
2/3
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FYI: we have good procedures, and peer checks etc etc. We also employ humans. And humans need to learn, and make mistakes.
To continue:
Our procedure on replacing parts has long been: store the old one for a year after project conclusion.
Our new tech just whacked it with a hammer before discarding it. He couldn't explain why.
Turns out it was something called a UHD 144 drive. It took a full day to find a new-old-stock one. At a cost of around 5000 euro. 🤭
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caleb_UHD144
2/3
fallout:
-We still have the remains of the drive the tech whacked to death with a hammer. It's used during onboarding.
-tech has been happily working with us for many years. He's over the embarrassment (or acts that way).
-the client thought it was HILARIOUS. They also figured out a way to upgrade the system to work with SD cards
.-costs were 4800 euro. An exact 4000 for the drive, and 800 for "one-day delivery" (seller drove from DE to NL on a Sunday).
3/3
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Hi! Can we entertain each other with our fun stories about the oldest or weirdest tech we've come across?
Please boost for science or cows or something. TELL US YOUR COOL STORY!
@Pepijn how about, my 87-year old dad uses software he wrote himself on a BBC micro, and hardware he soldered himself, to make the church pipe organ play tunes that are too difficult for him to master. He's been doing it for over 20 years. If you want the full story, it's here, in 3 parts! https://cazmockett.com/?s=Ernie
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Hi! Can we entertain each other with our fun stories about the oldest or weirdest tech we've come across?
Please boost for science or cows or something. TELL US YOUR COOL STORY!
@Pepijn Yes! not weird tech but a sweet story. Here goes:
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@Pepijn how about, my 87-year old dad uses software he wrote himself on a BBC micro, and hardware he soldered himself, to make the church pipe organ play tunes that are too difficult for him to master. He's been doing it for over 20 years. If you want the full story, it's here, in 3 parts! https://cazmockett.com/?s=Ernie
@cazmockett o m g I actually read your story a great many years ago, way before we connected here!
Is he still doing it?
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Hi! Can we entertain each other with our fun stories about the oldest or weirdest tech we've come across?
Please boost for science or cows or something. TELL US YOUR COOL STORY!
When I worked on maintenance team for senior homes, we had this in one of the boiler rooms (I am short and the wire is exactly at neck height for me - so I always had to beware of it.
But there is good reason for it being present, there's a lead link at one end and a pulley and weight ; if a fire starts the lead would melt, and then the weight pulls down the lever and shuts off the gas supply to the building (to prevent gas feeding the blaze)
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@Pepijn Yes! not weird tech but a sweet story. Here goes:
My dad was a techy, he was part of the team that built the radiotelescopes in Westerbork in Holland. So his work was already amazing. (Picture: him at his work, a place of magic for me.)
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My dad was a techy, he was part of the team that built the radiotelescopes in Westerbork in Holland. So his work was already amazing. (Picture: him at his work, a place of magic for me.)
At home he made us into techies as well. I have fond memories of the ZX Spectrum with the rubber keys. I felt so cool writing basic! (Ok copying it from a magazine).
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@cazmockett o m g I actually read your story a great many years ago, way before we connected here!
Is he still doing it?
@Pepijn yep! And that's WILD!!
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When I worked on maintenance team for senior homes, we had this in one of the boiler rooms (I am short and the wire is exactly at neck height for me - so I always had to beware of it.
But there is good reason for it being present, there's a lead link at one end and a pulley and weight ; if a fire starts the lead would melt, and then the weight pulls down the lever and shuts off the gas supply to the building (to prevent gas feeding the blaze)
@vfrmedia@social.tchncs.de @Pepijn@mastodon.online Simple, yet clever - and fail proof. I wonder why they hang it at neck height, because in case of fire the temperature would be the highest closer to ceiling. But maybe the purpose was a natural selection of careless maintenance operators
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When I worked on maintenance team for senior homes, we had this in one of the boiler rooms (I am short and the wire is exactly at neck height for me - so I always had to beware of it.
But there is good reason for it being present, there's a lead link at one end and a pulley and weight ; if a fire starts the lead would melt, and then the weight pulls down the lever and shuts off the gas supply to the building (to prevent gas feeding the blaze)
@vfrmedia Interesting! And thanks for the photos as well!
I love it when complex "if and then" situations are solved down to a solution that is as minimal as that. -
@vfrmedia@social.tchncs.de @Pepijn@mastodon.online Simple, yet clever - and fail proof. I wonder why they hang it at neck height, because in case of fire the temperature would be the highest closer to ceiling. But maybe the purpose was a natural selection of careless maintenance operators
maybe because you *have* to keep an eye on it, and it encourages maintenance staff to check that its usable (and not block the wire with any items).
The same area is shared with the 400V three phase incoming service cable (which isn't as common nowadays - instead the gas and electricity supplies are in different parts of the building)
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Hi! Can we entertain each other with our fun stories about the oldest or weirdest tech we've come across?
Please boost for science or cows or something. TELL US YOUR COOL STORY!
@Pepijn I’ve been inside a Soviet submarine. There were a lot of valves and zero screens (that I could see). I discovered that Soviet submarines were not built with 2m tall Dutch girls in mind.
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At home he made us into techies as well. I have fond memories of the ZX Spectrum with the rubber keys. I felt so cool writing basic! (Ok copying it from a magazine).
In our garden we had some huge antennas. Probably about 10 meters high, next to our house. It was the era of illegal radio stations, so every once in a while a special police car would slowly drive past our house.
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In our garden we had some huge antennas. Probably about 10 meters high, next to our house. It was the era of illegal radio stations, so every once in a while a special police car would slowly drive past our house.
The joke was that we were only receiving, not sending. So we laughed a lot. And the best part is that the antennas had such a small task: we received data from weather satellites that would tell us if we needed to pack our raincoats to school.
We had a weather app before there was proper internet! He is dead now, but sometimes I still hear him laughing.
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Hi! Can we entertain each other with our fun stories about the oldest or weirdest tech we've come across?
Please boost for science or cows or something. TELL US YOUR COOL STORY!
While starting Uni (2006!), I was a part-time IT labourer at my former school. There were computers for programming classes, and I think they had 32 MB RAM at that point. Sometimes Windows OS would stop booting on them, and I would come with my personal handy LiveCDs collection. Linux LiveCDs (Knoppix, Slax) were cool, but didn't boot on 32 MB as I remember. But FreeBSD one, called Frenzy, booted, and I could inspect the hardware condition, mount disk, repair filesystems (FAT and NTFS).
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@Pepijn I’ve been inside a Soviet submarine. There were a lot of valves and zero screens (that I could see). I discovered that Soviet submarines were not built with 2m tall Dutch girls in mind.
@venite I've visited a Dutch navy submarine, am just 190cm and had a similar feeling. I'm amazed people working in these things don't end up wearing full body armour.
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While starting Uni (2006!), I was a part-time IT labourer at my former school. There were computers for programming classes, and I think they had 32 MB RAM at that point. Sometimes Windows OS would stop booting on them, and I would come with my personal handy LiveCDs collection. Linux LiveCDs (Knoppix, Slax) were cool, but didn't boot on 32 MB as I remember. But FreeBSD one, called Frenzy, booted, and I could inspect the hardware condition, mount disk, repair filesystems (FAT and NTFS).
