The Amateur

Computerist

Fall 1991 Volume 4 No. 1

Table of Contents

Computers for the People Part II. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 1

Letters to the Editor. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 9

Ten Commandments – Networking. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 10

Try This Program. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 13

USSR and the Computer.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 14

Command Line Calculator. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 15

Question of Censorship.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 25

Computers for the People - A History

How Hackers Gave Birth to the

Personal Computer

Part II

by Ronda Hauben

(Editor’s Note: On August 12, 1991, newspapers and magazines carried

articles honoring IBM managers or Bill Gates for having introduced the

IBM Personal Computer 10 years ago. But it is not these few "famous

men” who are responsible for the breakthroughs in computers that

represent the personal computer revolution. The serialized history begun

in the last issue [vol.3 no.4] describes how computer hackers and

Webpage: http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/

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hobbyists forced IBM to develop and introduce the personal computer

in 1981. The second part of this 4 part history follows as our effort to

honor the 10th anniversary of the victory of these hackers and hobbyists

and their continuing efforts to develop the personal computer and make

it available to people.)

The history of the invention of the personal computer is a long one

– beginning in the 1600's when the first known mechanical adding

machine was built. But technology then was not at the point where a

feasible design could be developed and produced. It was not till WWII

that technological development had given birth to the components that

would make a working computer possible. As part of the war effort, the

American government was willing to provide the large sums of money

needed to develop and build the ENIAC, the first working computer.

ENIAC was a huge monster of a machine. Stan Augarten, in his book

Bit by Bit, (New York, 1984, p. 128) tracing the history of computers

describes the ENIAC: “It took 2 days to set ENIAC up to carry out a

program. You did not sit down at a computer terminal and type in

instructions, instead you set thousands of switches and plugged in

hundreds of cables [like the cables on an old telephone switchboard -ed]

by hand one at a time and wiring a complicated program could take

months.”

The ENIAC had been developed in 1945. During the 1940's and

1950's there were significant advances in the capability of the computer.

Yet into the 1950's, computers were still the exclusive domain of a few.

Until the 1960's, as Augarten points out, “most of the computers used

were built in the ENIAC’S giant mold. Only the largest institutions –

universities, corporations, research institutes and government agencies

– could afford them.... Big and costly, they were the very symbols of

entrenched and centralized power – haughty, impersonal, inefficient and

inaccessible.” (p. 253)

Why were the computers of the early postwar WWII period inac-

cessible to the average person? John Kemeny, one of the inventors of the

programming language BASIC describes the dilemma:

“For the first two decades of the existence of the high speed comp-

uter, machines were so scarce and so expensive that man approached the

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computer the way an ancient Greek approached an oracle.... A man sub-

mitted his request – then waited patiently until it was convenient for the

machine to work out the problem. Only specially selected acolytes were

allowed to have direct communications with the computer. In the

original mode of using computers, known as batch processing, hundreds

of computer requests were collected by the staff of a computer center

and then fed to the machine in a batch.”

(quoted in Augarten, from Kemeny’s book Man and the Computer,

N.Y., 1972, p. 21)

Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) introduced the first mini-

computer in 1963 – called the PDP-8. It cost only a fraction of the price

of a mainframe computer, but it still cost $18,000. And it ran only one

program at a time. (See Augarten, p. 254-255, and 257.)

By 1971, the market for the mini-computer in businesses and

universities had taken off. In that year Intel, a semi-conductor company

was working on a chip to run a calculator. In the process they developed

the 8008 chip, which was powerful enough to run a small computer.

By the early 1970's, Integrated Circuit (IC) technology had reached

the point where IC’s were sophisticated and inexpensive enough to make

a personal computer possible. Many computer companies, DEC and the

other large mini-computer makers, had the resources available to

develop the personal computer. Technically the task was not compli-

cated, as the logic chips or microprocessors had been developed to the

necessary stage. But the big computer companies were not interested.

In the early 1970's, David Ahl, an engineer, worked for DEC in its

marketing research department. The company had one half of the edu-

cational computer market in 1973 and had $20 million in sales. Ahl

moved into a research and development group. After some investigation,

he suggested to his superiors that there was a substantial market for

small computers in schools and homes. On May 17, 1974, Ahl,

presented a plan to DEC to develop and market small computers. Ken

Olsen, President of DEC, vetoed the plan saying, “I can’t see any reason

that anybody would want a computer of his own.” (John J. Anderson,

“David Tells Ahl-The History of Creative Computing”, Creative

Computing, Nov. 1984, p. 72).

Chris Rutkowski, writing in the 10 year anniversary issue of

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Creative Computing explains that Olsen’s response was typical of

corporate reaction to personal computers. He writes:

“Computers were invented as servants of the biggest organizations

ever conceived; the superpowers and the multinational corporations.

These groups, not exactly known for their accurate vision of the future,

supported and embraced the computer because of its prowess at one

thing, number crunching and between censuses and actuarial tables,

these groups had lots of numbers to crunch.

(Ibid,”The Computer as a Creative Tool”, p. 97)

Rutkowski goes on, “So specialized were the capabilities and so

exorbitant the price of these earliest computers that some nameless sage

at UNIVAC predicted that the total world market for computers was

five.” The writer observes, “How this number was arrived at remains

unclear today, but the magnitude of his error was soon clear.” (Ibid.)

Nancy Stern, in her book From ENIAC TO UNIVAC also discusses

the reasons large U.S. companies failed to develop computer technology.

She suggests that it was not just the narrowness of their vision of the

future. She writes:

“Such major industrial firms as NCR, RCA, and IBM were engaged

in small scale research on the feasibility of electronic counters and

electronic digital computers in the early 1940s. During the late 1940s,

these organizations demonstrated an interest in the work of Eckert and

Mauchly [developers of the first post WWII computers like ENIAC and

UNIVAC - ed] and in other groups designing computers. Such firms did

not, however, undertake major computer projects for commercial

purposes during the immediate postwar period.”

(From ENIAC to UNIVAC, Bedford, Ma., 1981, p173)

She goes on to quote from an article by Henry Tropp “The

Effervescent Years” (IEEE Spectrum, Feb. 1974, p. 76) where Tropp

shows how big corporations refused to develop high technology. Tropp

describes what happened:

“The National Cash Register Company offers a particularly

intriguing industrial ‘might have been.’ NCR actually had an electronic

computing device constructed during the late 1930s. It was a high-speed

arithmetic machine which could add, subtract and multiply electroni-

cally, and presumably this machine could have become the first

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commercial electronic computer had the company wished to pioneer in

this field. However, NCR management was not interested in automatic

computing per se, but only in improving its existing line of office

equipment.”

(quoted in Stern, Ibid.)

Tropp cites other examples of major industrial firms that failed to

take any initiative in developing electronic devices:

“If one examines the environment at major U.S. corporations during

the 1940s, there is a striking lack of interest in any aspect of automatic

computing. I have yet to see a publication from that period that reveals

an interest in putting research and development funds into finding better

ways of doing automatic computation. At Bell Laboratories, for

instance, Stibitz’s Model I Calculator might well have been the last in

the series if it hadn’t been for the pressure of wartime needs and the

accompanying government support. IBM was similarly uninterested in

advancing the computer art.... The company seems to have been

primarily interested in improving existing products and building a strong

patent position for possible future applications. I have been able to

discern no evidence of a vision of IBM – or any other corporation -- in

those days that was comparable to that held by Aiken, Maunchly,

Stibitz, Atanasoff, J. Presper Eckert or Wallace Eckert” [pioneers in the

1940s in developing computers - ed].

Nancy Stern observes that “IBM’s failure to undertake any research

projects in this area is particularly surprising, since it was the major

manufacturer of calculating equipment and was the company which

would be most affected by the availability of commercial computers.”

She attributes this anti-high technology policy to the highest levels of

IBM management, the Chairman of IBM, Tom Watson, Sr. She

explains, “Yet no work on electronic digital computers was undertaken

by that organization in the 1940s despite interoffice memos written by

IBM engineers recommending such work.” Two of the inventors of the

ENIAC AND UNIVAC computers, Eckert and Mauchly desperately

needed money to continue their pioneering work. They went to IBM and

asked for financial assistance. Scientists at IBM, Stern notes, were

impressed by the men and their work and recommended the support.

“But,” she reports, “word came uptown from galactic headquarters to

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brush them off. There was [to be -ed], in the words of Watson’s decision

relayed to the Laboratory, no reasonable interaction between

Eckert-Mauchly, and IBM.” (Ibid.)

Gordon Bell, who worked at DEC, and helped develop the first

mini-computer, the PDP-8, and the first commercial time-sharing

system, drew a similar conclusion. The industry, he decided, “was

unconcerned about the `science’ of computing.”

Meanwhile, in 1963, a decision was made at Dartmouth College to

make an introduction to computers a part of the Liberal Arts curriculum.

Two Dartmouth professors, John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz, devised

what is known as the Dartmouth Time-Sharing System (DTSS) so

students could get access to a computer. And they designed the

computer language BASIC so that novices could learn to program.

Kemeny recalling those years, writes: “We designed a few simple

instructions for the lay user to enable him to write his first few computer

programs with very little training.” (Man and the Computer, p. 21)

He goes on to explain the rationale used to develop the program-

ming language BASIC (Beginner’s All-Purpose Symbolic Instructional

Code.)

“The availability of a language as simple as BASIC has made the

learning task so simple that computers have come within the power of

every intelligent human being, and time-sharing has made it possible to

have direct communication between man and machine.” (p. 32)

Thanks to Kemeny and Kurtz, a generation of college students grew

up in the 1960's who were exposed to computers through BASIC and

time sharing and who thus had a realistic assessment of the potential of

the computer and of its limitations.

Ted Nelson was one of these converts. In 1974 he published a book

Computer Lib. He had to publish it himself. In his introduction to

Computer Lib, he wrote: “This book is a measure of desperation, so

serious and abysmal is the public sense of confusion and ignorance.

Anything with buttons or lights can be palmed off on the layman as a

computer. There are so many different things, and their differences are

so important; yet to the lay public they are lumped together as ‘computer

stuff,’ indistinct and beyond understanding or criticism. It’s as if people

couldn’t tell apart camera from exposure meter or tripod, or car from

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truck or tollbooth. This book is therefore devoted to the premise that

EVERYBODY SHOULD UNDERSTAND COMPUTERS. It is

intended to fill a crying need. Lots of everyday people have asked me

where they can learn about computers, and I have had to say nowhere.”

Nelson describes the mystification of computer knowledge.

“Knowledge is power and so it tends to be hoarded,” he writes, “Experts

in any field rarely want people to understand what they do, and generally

enjoy putting people down. Thus if we say that the use of computers is

dominated by a priesthood, people who spatter you with unintelligible

answers and seem unwilling to give you straight ones, it is not that they

are different in this respect from any other profession. Doctors, lawyers

and construction engineers are the same way.” (Ibid.) Nelson maintains

this stranglehold on computer knowledge had to be broken. He writes:

“But computers are very special, and we have to deal with them

everywhere, and this effectively gives the computer priesthood a

stranglehold on the operation of all large organizations, of government

bureaux, and anything else that they run. Members of Congress are now

complaining about control of information by the computer people, that

they cannot get the information even though it’s on computers. Next to

this it seems a small matter that in ordinary companies `untrained’

personnel can’t get straight questions answered by computer people; but

it’s the same phenomenon.” (ibid.)

He makes his plea:

“It is imperative for many reasons that the appalling gap between public

and computer insider be closed. As the saying goes, war is too important

to be left to the generals. Guardianship of the computer can no longer be

left to a priesthood. I see this as just one example of the creeping evil of

Professionalism, the control of aspects of society by cliques of insiders.

There may be some chance, though that Professionalism can be turned

around. Doctors, for example, are being told that they no longer own

people’s bodies. And this book may suggest to some computer profes-

sionals that their position should not be as sacrosanct as they have

thought, either.” (ibid.)

The refusal of major corporations to develop personal computers,

meant the task fell to those with a democratic vision – to computer

hobbyists and hackers. For example, Jonathan Titus was a hobbyist who

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had developed a keen interest in electronics and in tinkering and had a

sense of the importance of the microprocessor. (There were previous

attempts to create a home computer by folks like Nat Watsworth with

his Scelbi-8H, or Nelson Winkless, with his Digi-Comp I. See Stephen

Gray, “The Early Days”, Creative Computing, Nov. 1984, p. 12 )

When Intel introduced the 8-bit 8008 chip, Titus studied it and

realized that it was powerful enough to run a small computer. (See

Augarten, p. 269). He ordered the 8008 from Intel. The chip cost him

$120. With it he received a free applications manual complete with

circuit diagrams. He wanted to share his design with other hobbyists. He

decided to write a letter to two well known hobbyist magazines Popular

Electronics and Radio Electronics asking if they were interested in

running an article on Mark-8, his homemade computer. Popular

Electronics wasn’t interested, but Larry Stickler, the Editor of Radio

Electronics was excited by the proposal and flew out to Blacksburg, Va.

to see Titus’s computer. (See Augarten, Bit by Bit, p. 269)

“The machine was about the size of a large breadbox,” writes

Augarten, “...programs had to be entered one bit at a time by flipping a

set of toggle switches on the face of the machine.” And programs were

lost forever when the machine was shut off. But the machine worked.

(Augarten, p. 269)

The article announcing the Mark-8 computer by Titus ran in the

July, 1974 issue of Radio-Electronics. The article was sketchy. If you

wanted more information you could send away for a 48-page instruction

manual written by Titus and published by Radio-Electronics for $5.50.

You could also buy the circuit boards for $47.50 from Technique, Inc.

a small firm in Englewood, New Jersey. All the other components had

to be bought from Intel or other companies. “Altogether, the Mark-8 cost

about $250 to build – in addition to a lot of time and trouble,” explains

Augarten. (p. 270)

But to the 10,000 people who sent for the instruction book or the

2500 who also sent for the circuit boards all the complications were not

important.

A significant event had occurred. The grassroots movement to make

computers available to the American people had exploded. The world

was to be significantly changed.

Page 8

As Ted Nelson had predicted when he published Computer Lib, “I

am ‘publishing’ this book myself, in its first draft form, to test its

viability, to see how mad the computer people get, and to see if there is

as much hunger to understand computers, among all you Folks Out

There as I think.” Nelson realized, “The computer field is its own

exploding universe.”

(to be continued)

Letters to the Editor

Dear R. Hauben:

I’m interested in reading a copy of the Amateur Computerist. I saw

it mentioned by Andrew Ross in his essay, “Hacking Away at the

Counterculture,” collected in his (and Constance Penley’s) recent

anthology, Technoculture.

I’ll be happy to send a fee or donation for the newsletter, either

before or after you send me a copy – just let me know how much to

send.

I’m interested in your newsletter because I’m a computer programmer

committed to sharing my knowledge with my users, in the belief that

such knowledge can lead to a general empowerment. So I’m always

interested in hearing about instances of similar activity.

Pam Rosenthal

(Editor’s Note: Following is the excerpt from Technoculture, By

Constance Penley & Andrew Ross, Editors, Cultural Politics, Vol 3,

University of Minnesota Press, p. 124.)

“A good example is the crucial role of worker technoliteracy in the

struggle of labor against automation and deskilling. When worker

education classes in computer programming were discontinued by

management at the Ford Rouge plant in Dearborn, Michigan, United

Auto Workers members began to publish a newsletter called the

Page 9

Amateur Computerist to fill the gap. Among the columnist and corre-

spondents in the magazine have been veterans of the Flint sit-down

strikes who see a clear historical continuity between the problem of

labor organization in the thirties and the problem of automation and

deskilling today. Workers’ computer literacy is seen as essential not only

to the demystification of the computer and the reskilling of workers, but

also to labor’s capacity to intervene in decisions about new technologies

that might result in shorter hours and thus in ‘work efficiency’ rather

than worker efficiency.”

To the Editor:

“A Brain for Robots has been created on Amiga Library Disk 411.

Join/Stop/Expose the Underground Movement toward a Cybernetic

Economy: Republish this message.”

Authur T. Murray

TEN COMMANDMENTS OF

GOOD NETWORKING

by Novell Network Sysop Mel White

Networks are, simultaneously, one of the biggest blessings for a

company and one of its biggest headaches. At their best, they provide

inexpensive solutions for a workgroup to share critical files. At their

worst, they are cranky fortifications of high tech electronics with

mysterious commands and obscure problems that only a technical junkie

with a masochistic streak (also known as your Local Area Network

Sysop) could love. Here are ten simple rules that will help you get along

with your Network and that deity in power, the Sysop. Although these

commandments are slanted toward users of Novell Netware, they will

apply to most types of networks.

I.– THOU SHALT USE THE NETWORK MENUS UNLESS THOU

HATH PERMISSION TO DO OTHERWISE.

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It’s terribly tempting for someone who has some familiarity with

DOS to drop to the operating system and try to do things on a network

that one does on a PC. But networks aren’t PC’s. And although Network

DOS is similar to PC DOS, system architecture and memory setup can

toss some wrenches in the best-laid plans of the DOS user. Even the

simple change directory DOS command done in a lighthearted moment

can toss you into an area where the network doesn’t recognize any of

your commands-- or even your existence. And the only way out of there

will be to reboot your workstation.

II.– THOU SHALT NOT PUT SINGLE USER SOFTWARE ON

THE SYSTEM.

Single user software may be written in machine code that makes

calls to specific memory hooks or hardware addresses. But Netware

DOS has some different interrupt calls and its hard drive is structured

differently than the standard PC’s. Direct calls to specific addresses can

cause your network station or the network itself to lock up. In one

instance, a single user version of a word processor started writing its

code all over the Network’s operating system files. Needless to say,

Sysop was Not Amused. To be safe, use only network versions of your

software.

III.– THOU SHALT NOT USE PC TOOLS OR NORTON UTILI-

TIES OR ANY PC DISK UTILITIES ON THE NETWORK.

The network’s drive has a different organization structure and

logical architecture. And while these are wonderful packages, they

expect to find the File Allocation Tables and other information in

specific locations. Unfortunately, these are not the places where Netware

is keeping these files (by the way, this is why software with the SUPER-

LOCK type of copy protection security system won’t install on your

network).

IV.– IN BUYING HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE FOR THE

NETWORK, REMEMBER THAT THY VENDOR KNOWETH

BEST.

The cheapest strategy really is to go with the vendor’s recommenda-

Page 11

tion and have them set up under their warranty. Networks can be

squirrely beasts and nothing can be more frustrating than trying to put

a third party PC card on a network and trying to make it work. This

particularly comes into play in situations where you’re trying to connect

the network to several other networks or mainframes. Stick with what

the support staff knows will work. Time is money in a business

environment and it’s not cost-effective to bring a network to a complete

halt while you work for three weeks trying to get a board manufactured

by HomeBilt Hardware to work with your network software.

V.– BE COURTEOUS ABOUT DATA.

These are shared files and shared resources. Be aware of the

limitations of your system. It won’t let you update John Dillinger’s

record at the same time another user is trying to update it. If several

people need to be working in the file at the same time, check to see that

no one is working on the same data.

VI.– THOU SHALT NOT SURPRISE THE SYSOP WITH NEW

SOFTWARE.

You may be madly in love with the latest version of WordWhapper,

but if it’s not supposed to go on the network, then Sysop will not

appreciate finding it there. Sysop will erase the files and send two large

guys from the Personnel Department to explain to you that Sysop does

not appreciate having the network’s disk space eaten up by unauthorized

software.

VII.– THOU SHALT NOT DISCONNECT THY WORKSTATION

FROM THE NETWORK BY THYSELF.

When you share resources through a network, it means that you lose

control of a lot of your individual options. Moving your workstation is

one of them. This has a tendency to either lock up portions of the

network or to crash the network completely; conditions which tend to

irritate your local Sysop. Workstations can, of course, can be moved

around but it must be done properly and that means involving the Sysop

and the folks who did the cabling for the network. Remember, that

because of your building’s architecture, you may not be able to put the

Page 12

machine where you would like it. The ambience of your office furniture

arrangement may therefore suffer--unless you’re a vice president. In that

case, they’ll rearrange the building itself to please you.

VIII.– LEARN TO USE THY NETWORK UTILITIES.

Sysops will teach you to use the “Kill That Print Job” menu. This

is an important one to learn. Sysops get snorky if interrupted in the

middle of a technical glitch with a request to kill off a print job.

IX.– THY SYSOP AND THY SUPERVISOR MUST BOTH BE

TOLD YOUR PASSWORD.

On occasions, you may be out of the office and the Sysop may have

need to test a piece of software from your login id. If the Deities In

Charge Of The Network don’t have your password, they will change

your password (on the Novell system, the password isn’t displayed

under any of the Supervisor’s query menus).

X.– REMEMBER THAT NETWORKING IS SHARING RE-

SOURCES.

Play nicely.

Try This Program

10 FOR T = 1 TO 2

20 GOSUB 201

30 NEXT T

40 FOR X = 3 TO 10

50 GOSUB 200

60 NEXT X

70 FOR L = 11 TO 12

80 PRINT "*******************" TAB(30);"***"

90 NEXT L

100 FOR H = 13 TO 20

110 GOSUB 200

120 NEXT H

130 FOR B = 21 TO 22

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140 GOSUB 201

150 NEXT B

199 END

200 PRINT " ***"," ***"," ***"

201 PRINT "*****","*****","*****"

210 RETURN

(Editor’s note for IBM computers: When you are ready to run this,

press control printscreen and run this from GWBasic on your printer.

Press control printscreen to turn off printing to the printer.)

The USSR and the Computer

Since the 1970's, micro-chips and computers have put on the

world’s social agenda the promise of a better life. From the simple level

like microwave ovens that turn themselves on and off to computer aided

medicine and computer controlled robotic manufacturing, the computer

age promises fewer needed hours of human labor both on and off the

job. This promise is known world wide and desired universally

especially by working people.

In the 1980's, especially after their space ships Phobos I and II

failed, scientist and engineers in the Soviet Union realized technological

innovation and development was hampered by the lack of uncensored

communication and by the slow process of getting innovations tried and

adopted. Thus, to the pressure of people wanting the computer promised

better life, was added the demands of scientists and engineers for more

channels of communication and for the multiplicity of ideas and

directions. These had so far been stifled by the one party ideology and

practice. The result was a greater openness called Glasnost.

The great test of the Glasnost pressured for by the existence of

computers, was the attempted intra-governmental coup in the Soviet

Union in late August 1991. Realizing that openness was being attacked

and thus so was the chance to gain from the computer revolution, the

working people and students of Moscow and Leningrad rallied to protect

Page 14

their gains. Newspapers that the coup leaders attempted to censor,

defiantly distributed calls for resistance and the defense of the uncen-

sored exchange of information. Leaflets were printed with personal

computers and passed out in subway stations and on the streets. These

papers were eagerly taken up and distributed by people on their way to

work. Politicians like Boris Yeltsin in Russia, sensing the strength of the

people, championed resistance to the coup and it was toppled.

The computer revolution held out enough of a promise that the

people of the Soviet Union rose successfully to defend it. The next

challenge to the people of Central and Eastern Europe as well as the rest

of the world is to realize that computer and cybernetic development

requires the types of innovation, hacking and diversity characteristic

only of amateurs in close touch with each other. This requires the

continuing struggle for uncensored and widely distributed communica-

tion. The governments and profiteers of every society want the advan-

tages of the computer revolution for their own purposes. So, in every

society the promise of computer improvements will remain a dream for

workers unless there continues to be the fight for openness, support for

innovation and the challenging of previous authority. This makes the

defense of amateur computing and innovating worth the support of all

working and progressive people.

by Jay Hauben

Command Line Calculator

CCalc.C is a Quick C variation of Michael J Mefford’s

Compute.Com which appeared in the May 29 1990 issue of PC

Magazine. I liked the concept but wanted more functions such as the

elementary trigs, powers & roots.

This program will operate as a command line calculator by entering

the following command: CCalc <expression> <return>

Page 15

Examples: CCalc 24 + 2

CCalc 24 + (tan50) / 2

CCalc -24 + ((TAN(50)) / 2)

CCalc 2 + -3

CCalc 2 + (-3)

As in Mr Mefford’s original, CCalc makes available the results of

the last calculation in the form of the variable “x”. Unlike the original,

the program references a small (8 byte) file called ccalc.dat which will

be created in the home directory of ccalc.exe if it does not exist. To use

this variable, substitute it where needed in the command line, such as:

ccalc 24 + xor ccalc 24 + (X)

Spaces, upper/lower case and added parentheses cause no harm, but

the parents should be balanced, and, of course, follow the accepted rules

of mathematical precedence.

Basically, the program parses a command string assembled from the

user input. Spaces in input cause no harm as the individual arguments

are concatenated into one string. This string is used by Rewrite() as the

source a modified version called achWorkstr. The changes made here

include changing all uppercase to lowercase, replacing any trig

references such as Sin by a hi-ASCII substitute (char 224 thru 229),

replacing any {} or [] by (), checking parentheses balance, and substitut-

ing a placeholder for any references to the variable X.

Getparents() is recursively called to identify and send to Parse() the

substring consisting of the innermost, last set of parents for subsequent

evaluation by eval_string(). After each string is evaluated, it’s value is

stored in adReal[] and a placeholder consisting of an Uppercase Ascii

char is placed in the string. After all parentheses are evaluated in this

fashion, the complete string is sent to Parse() for one final go-round.

Any time during the evaluation process that an uppercase (A..Z)

character is encountered, the corresponding value is used from the

adReal array in calculations.

Error checking is modest, limited to divide by zero and parent

balance but the program is relatively robust and does not hang even

when sent some nonsense like CCALC 3+-*/sin20. Also, I have

attempted to use a variation of the “Hungarian Notation” as presented by

Charles Petzold in his column in the March 14 1989 edition of PCMag.

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I find it useful when the pointers and arrays begin to overwhelm me. The

program name can be changed (at least in MS-DOS 3.x) and the “dat”

file will change to suit and stay in the directory where the “exe” lives.

Comments, suggestions appreciated to Larry Ritzert, CIS 72317,

1061

/* CCalc.c 1.01 Command-line calculator like PC Magazine’s

“Compute.Com”. Larry Ritzert, 28686 Swan Island, Grosse

Ile, MI, 48138, May 31 1990

This Quick C variation offers several additional math

functions such as common trigs, powers & roots & float

mod. Also creates (if necessary) a tiny data file in the

directory where CC.exe is located for storage & retrieval

of previous result. */

iPerformed = 1; }

int is_math_operator(char ch)#include<stdio.h>

#include<string.h>

#include<math.h>

#include<ctype.h>

#include<stdlib.h>

#define PI 3.14159265359

#define deg(x) 180*x/PI

#define rad(x) PI*x/180

#define MAXSTR 256

char *pchInstr, achWorkstr[MAXSTR];

char *pchStr_Begin, *pchStr_End;

/* global begin & end of string */

double adReal[26] = {0.0};

/* to store intermediate calcs */

double dValue, *pdVal;

int iR_Ctr = 0, iWS_Len, iPerformed;

FILE *fp;

main( int argc, char *argv[])

{ int iCtr;

char achPathf[_MAX_PATH],

achDrive[_MAX_DRIVE],

achDir[_MAX_DIR], achFName[_MAX_FNAME],

achExt[_MAX_EXT];

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pdVal = &dValue;

if (argc < 2)

{ say_hi();

help();

exit(0); }

else /* gather the command line string */

{ say_hi();

pchInstr = argv[1];

for (iCtr = 2; iCtr < argc; iCtr++)

strcat(pchInstr, argv[iCtr]); }

iCtr = 0;

strcpy( achPathf, argv[0]);

/* find "exe" file and make "dat" file */

_splitpath( achPathf, achDrive, achDir,

achFName, achExt );

_makepath( achPathf, achDrive, achDir,

achFName, "dat" );

if((fp = fopen( achPathf, "r+b")) ==

NULL)

fprintf(stderr, "\n\aCan’t read Data

File, \"x\" invalid");

else

if(!(iCtr = fread(pdVal,sizeof(double),

1, fp)))

fprintf(stderr, "\n\aBad Read -Data

File, \"x\" invalid");

rewrite_string();

getparents();

pchStr_Begin = achWorkstr;

pchStr_End = pchStr_Begin + iWS_Len;

parse(pchStr_Begin,pchStr_End);

printf("\n%s = %7.7f",pchInstr,

adReal[iR_Ctr-1]);

*pdVal = adReal[iR_Ctr - 1];

rewind( fp );

if (!(iCtr = fwrite(pdVal,

sizeof(double),1,fp)))

fprintf(stderr, "\n\aERROR - No write

of \"x\" to data file");

fcloseall(); }

rewrite_string()

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/* cleans up orig input, spaces it *

* rewrite curly, square brackets */

{ char *pchLocalWS;

char *apchTrig[6] =

{"tan","sin","cos","atn","asn","acs"};

int iCtr, iLefts = 0, iRights = 0;

strcpy(achWorkstr, pchInstr);

strlwr(achWorkstr);

for (iCtr = 0; iCtr < 6;iCtr++)

/* replace "sin", etc w/ hi-ascii char */

{ while(pchLocalWS = strstr(achWorkstr,

apchTrig[iCtr]))

{ memset(pchLocalWS, 224 + iCtr, 1);

/* ch 224 = tan */

memmove(pchLocalWS+1, pchLocalWS+3,

strlen(achWorkstr) - 2); } }

pchLocalWS = achWorkstr;

while (*pchLocalWS != '\0')

/* dump squares & curlies */

{ if (*pchLocalWS == '{' || *pchLocalWS ==

'[' || *pchLocalWS == '(')

{ memset(pchLocalWS,'(',1);

iLefts++; }

if (*pchLocalWS == '}' || *pchLocalWS

== ']' || *pchLocalWS == ')')

{ memset(pchLocalWS,')',1);

iRights++; }

pchLocalWS++; }

if (iLefts != iRights)

/* check for parent balance */

{ fprintf(stderr,"\n\a%s Unbalanced

Parentheses", pchInstr);

exit(0); }

while (pchLocalWS = strchr( achWorkstr, 'x'))

/* using prev answer? */

{ adReal[iR_Ctr] = dValue;

/* assign value to float array member...*/

memset(pchLocalWS,iR_Ctr + 'A',1);

/* create a placeholder in string */

iR_Ctr++; } }

getparents()

/*-----recursively called to evaluate each set of

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parents---*

*--starting with the last, innermost set----*/

{ char *pchLocal;

iWS_Len = strlen(achWorkstr);

if((pchLocal = strrchr(achWorkstr,'('))

== NULL)

return(0);

/* there are no (longer) any parentheses */

else

pchStr_Begin = pchLocal;

pchStr_End = strchr(achWorkstr +

(pchStr_Begin-achWorkstr), ')');

*pchStr_Begin = ' ';

/* dump this set of parents */

*pchStr_End = ' ';

parse(pchStr_Begin,pchStr_End);

/* send substring prev in parents */

getparents();

/* keep checking for parents */ }

parse(char *pchStr_Begin,char *pchStr_End)

/* check each (sub)string in *

* math precedence order & from left *

* to right for math operators *

* store intermediate results in *

* "real" array */

{ char ch, *pchOper_Pos;

int iIndx, iStrLn = pchStr_End -

pchStr_Begin, iTest;

iPerformed = 0;

iTest = 0;

for(iIndx = 224; iIndx < 230; iIndx++)

while((pchOper_Pos =

memchr(pchStr_Begin, iIndx, iStrLn)))

eval_string( pchOper_Pos );

while ((pchOper_Pos =

memchr(pchStr_Begin, '^', iStrLn)))

eval_string( pchOper_Pos );

for (iIndx = 0; iIndx <= iStrLn; iIndx++)

if (((ch = *(pchStr_Begin + iIndx)) ==

'*') || (ch == '/'))

{ pchOper_Pos = pchStr_Begin + iIndx;

eval_string( pchOper_Pos );

iIndx = 0; }

Page 20

while ((pchOper_Pos =

memchr(pchStr_Begin, '%', iStrLn)))

eval_string( pchOper_Pos );

for (iIndx = 0; iIndx <= iStrLn; iIndx++)

if (((ch = *(pchStr_Begin + iIndx)) ==

'+') || (ch == '-'))

{ pchOper_Pos = pchStr_Begin + iIndx;

eval_string( pchOper_Pos );

iIndx = 0; }

if (!(iPerformed))

/* no operator or function in string */

{ for(iIndx = 0; iIndx < 26;iIndx++)

if (strchr(pchStr_Begin,65 +

iIndx))

{ iTest = 1;

/* don't convert lonesome placeholder */

break; }

if (!(iTest))

{ adReal[iR_Ctr] =

atof(pchStr_Begin);

memset(pchStr_Begin, iR_Ctr + 65,

1);

iR_Ctr++;

memset(pchStr_Begin + 1, ' ',

iStrLn - 1); } }

return(0); }

eval_string( char *pchOper_Pos )

{ int iTest, iCh, bUnary;

unsigned char uchOperator;

char *pchLeft, *pchRight;

double dFirst, dSecond;

pchLeft = pchOper_Pos;

/* set left pointer and... */

/* backtrack until something found */

uchOperator = *pchOper_Pos;

if((uchOperator == '+') || (uchOperator

== '-')

&& ((*(pchOper_Pos + 1) == '+') ||

(*(pchOper_Pos + 1) == '-')))

bUnary = 1; /* two +- in row, assume

unary */

Page 21

while (!(is_math_operator(*(pchLeft-1)))

&& (pchLeft > pchStr_Begin))

pchLeft = pchLeft - 1;

while (isspace(*pchLeft))

/* in case over shot into space */

pchLeft = pchLeft + 1;

iCh = (int)*pchLeft;

if (pchLeft == pchOper_Pos)

dFirst = 0.0;

/* got to start, must be unary value */

else

if (isupper(*pchLeft))

/* is upper, must be placeholder */

dFirst = adReal[iCh - 65];

/* use it's stored value */

else

dFirst = atof(pchLeft);

/* else convert the substring */

pchRight = pchOper_Pos + 1;

/* now to the right */

iCh = *(pchRight);

while ((isspace(iCh)) && (pchRight <

pchStr_End))

iCh = *(pchRight + 1);

if (isupper(iCh))

/* now for second operand */

dSecond = adReal[iCh - 65];

else

dSecond = atof(pchOper_Pos + 1);

if (bUnary)

pchRight = pchRight + 1;

while (!(is_math_operator(*pchRight)) &&

!(isspace(*pchRight))

&& (pchRight < pchStr_End))

pchRight = pchRight + 1;

/* find right end of operand */

memset(pchLeft, iR_Ctr + 65, 1);

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/* create a placeholder */

iTest = pchRight - pchLeft;

/* ...insert it in the string */

memset(pchLeft + 1, ' ', iTest-1);

/* overwrite w/ spaces */

store_value(uchOperator, dFirst,

dSecond); }

store_value(unsigned char uchOper, double

dFirst, double dSecond)

{ /* store a float value for each placeholder created in

the string */

int iTest;

switch (uchOper)

{ case '+': adReal[iR_Ctr++] = dFirst

+ dSecond; break;

case '-': adReal[iR_Ctr++] = dFirst

- dSecond; break;

case '*': adReal[iR_Ctr++] = dFirst

* dSecond; break;

case '^': adReal[iR_Ctr++] =

pow(dFirst,dSecond); break;

case '%': adReal[iR_Ctr++] =

fmod(dFirst,dSecond); break;

case 224: adReal[iR_Ctr++] =

tan(rad(dSecond)); break;

case 225: adReal[iR_Ctr++]

=sin(rad(dSecond)); break;

case 226: adReal[iR_Ctr++] =

cos(rad(dSecond)); break;

case 227: adReal[iR_Ctr++] =

deg(atan(dSecond)); break;

case 228: adReal[iR_Ctr++] =

deg(asin(dSecond)); break;

case 229: adReal[iR_Ctr++] =

deg(acos(dSecond)); break;

case '/': if (dSecond == 0) {

printf("\n\a%s Divide by Zero

Error",pchInstr);

exit(0); }

else

adReal[iR_Ctr++] = dFirst /

dSecond; break;

default : {

Page 23

printf("\n\aUndefined Error");

exit(0); } }

i /* Pascal's "set" would be nice */

{ int iCtr;

char legals[] = {'+','-','*','/','^','%','α','ß','Γ',

'π','Σ','σ'};

for(iCtr = 0; iCtr < 12; iCtr++)

if(ch == legals[iCtr])

return(2);

return(0); }

say_hi()

{ printf("\nC-Calc 1.01 by L W Ritzert,

Grosse Ile Mi CIS 72317,1061"); }

help()

{ printf("\nSyntax: C-CALC <arithmetic

expression>"

"\nOperators: x () {} [] + - * / % ^

tan sin cos atn asn acs 0..9"

"\n\t'x' = previous result"

"\n\t'%%' = modulus operator for

integer or real value"

"\n\t'^' = power operator, use

fraction for root"

"\n\tSpaces, upper/lower case

optional"

"\n\tAngles in degrees\n"); }

/******CHANGES*********************

JUN 3 90 Changed fopen( fp ) to r"r+b"

to correct bug in file read (binary).

Also modified fread (fp) verify, both

chgs n MAIN() */

Page 24

The Question of Censorship

by Michael Hauben and Ronda Hauben

(Editor’s Note: This article is available to readers censored or uncen-

sored. If your newsletter contains the censored version, send a Stamped

Self Addressed Envelope to R. Hauben, P.O. Box 4344, Dearborn, MI

48126 and the uncensored version will be mailed to you.)

It is hard to believe censorship of the Amateur Computerist is now

happening when the Amateur Computerist was originally started to

oppose censorship. The article itself began with a discussion of censor-

ship and government censorship.

Censorship is a tool that reminds me of the past. Censorship is a

form that squelches opinions. Of all publications, I would never con-

ceive the Amateur Computerist could censor. In our previous issue, vol.

3 no. 4, there was an article titled “Computer BBS Discussion On The

War.” The members of the Amateur Computerist agreed to print it

because it was representative of the debate about the war against Iraq on

computer BBS’s, and it presented many different views and opinions.

However, there was one discrepancy. One half of the staff members of

the Amateur Computerist objected to the included profanity. This led to

an internal discussion. The members of Amateur Computerist in

opposition to any form of censorship tried to have a debate where we

presented our side of non-censoring of ideas.

The side that censored the article identified certain words in the

discussions that they considered profane and since the Amateur

Computerist is available for all ages to read, they felt we shouldn’t print

those “obscene” words. The side opposed to censorship felt that the

words weren’t being used as obscenities, but rather to convey ideas or

to recount what had occurred. To omit these words thus was to censor

the ideas or the details of what was being described.

Finally it was agreed that the article would be published, but with

the words in question asterisked out. However, a note was included

indicating a difference of opinion concerning the censorship and this

Page 25

article was the result. We at the Amateur Computerist would still

appreciate our reader’s opinions on this subject matter. So feel free to

write.

The references in question are as follows:

8. Well, I listened to some of the speakers, and I listened to the a******

standing next to me.

19. They all said they were p***** off and worried about the protests...

Their result will just freak the troops out, they think they will be spit at.

This is such b*******.

20. ...this is the same b******* that protestors heard in the 60's & 70's.

21. Read the accounts of the troops who returned home to cries of

“baby-killing m************.”

22. ...they would not have been called baby-killing m************.

37. ...and she got in a lot of s*** for it too ....

39. ...she got is s*** from the Hayden/Fonda crowd

Where m*********** is used, the people aren’t saying it, they are

repeating it as part of an idea. Elsewhere people are expressing

themselves and for the most part it is small compared to the whole

discussion. We didn’t highlight the profanity until we censor it with the

asterisks. When I first read the article I didn’t even notice the profanity.

The opinions expressed in articles are those of their

authors and not necessarily the opinions of the

Amateur Computerist newsletter. We welcome sub-

missions from a spectrum of viewpoints.

Page 26

EDITORIAL STAFF

Ronda Hauben

William Rohler

Norman O. Thompson

Michael Hauben (1973-2001)

Jay Hauben

The Amateur Computerist invites submissions.

Articles can be submitted via e-mail: [email protected]

Permission is given to reprint articles from this issue in a

non profit publication provided credit is given, with name

of author and source of article cited.

ELECTRONIC EDITION

ACN Webpage:

http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/

All issues of the Amateur Computerist are on-line.

Back issues of the Amateur Computerist are available at:

http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/Back_Issues/

All issues can be accessed from the Index at:

http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/NewIndex.pdf

Page 27