[HN Gopher] The Sperry Rand Corporation
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The Sperry Rand Corporation
Author : rbanffy
Score : 36 points
Date : 2024-12-01 13:18 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.abortretry.fail)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.abortretry.fail)
| uticus wrote:
| > the Apollo missions maintained a 48kbps data connection via a
| UNIVAC on the ground
|
| Intrigued by this. Found this [0] with more details, anyone know
| of others?
|
| [0] https://www.zdnet.com/article/to-the-moon-ibm-and-univac-
| app...
| showerst wrote:
| If you want to go crazy deep into the spacecraft side,
| CuriousMarc has a restoration/replication series on youtube
| that explains it.
| Lammy wrote:
| https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/19670009662/downloads/19...
|
| "The data processing system selected for the Apollo remote
| sites is being manufactured and assembled by the UMVAC Military
| System, Division of the Sperry Rand Corporation, located in St.
| Paul, Minnesota. The computer is identified as the UNIVAC 642 B
| Modified and has been designed to meet military specification.
| There will be two identical computing subsystems installed on
| each of the sites of the Apollo Tracking Network. These
| subsystems are identical in every respect with the exception of
| the mission requirements which will be assigned to each
| subsystem. One computer subsystem will be used for the
| processing of telemetry data and will also provide a command
| processing back-up capability. The second computer subsystem
| will be used for the processing of command data and will also
| provide a telemetry processing back-up capability. The purpose
| of the back-up capability is to provide continuous operation
| for the remote site computing requirements should either
| computer malfunction during a critical period of the mission."
| Lammy wrote:
| The quadrate Sperry logo is cool. It was giving me Saul Bass
| vibes, but I looked it up and it was from Gerald Stahl
| Associates. I don't have JSTOR access but would like to read this
| if I did:
| https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/002224296402800102
| https://www.jstor.org/stable/1249219
|
| Also really love that Varian Data Machines logo. Down-Up-G with
| Up interrupted (iykyk)
| https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Varian_Data_Machin...
| MisterTea wrote:
| > Also really love that Varian Data Machines logo.
|
| I am much more familiar with seeing that logo on diffusion
| pumps and klystrons. Never knew they made computers.
| rbanffy wrote:
| > diffusion pumps and klystrons
|
| Companies like Sperry Rand and Honeywell are like that. They
| don't put their logos on the outside boxes, but their logos
| are inside just about everything.
| JamCult wrote:
| The founder of Sperry Corp is this guy
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elmer_Ambrose_Sperry who has an
| incredible dossier of inventions to his name and his son
| Lawerence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Sperry was an
| aviation pioneer and inventor who invented the first guided
| missile, autopilot, and much more, as well as being accredited to
| starting the "Mile High Club". I'm reading the Elmer Sperry
| biography currently and its incredible how many projects they
| worked on in such a short span. Makes you question how productive
| we are in the computer age...
| randmeerkat wrote:
| > Makes you question how productive we are in the computer
| age...
|
| The difference is that modern society isn't optimized for
| productivity, it's optimized for consumption and attention. 30
| years ago you could go days without seeing ads, now companies
| send notifications to the nuisance devices in your pocket and
| on your wrist. It's no wonder we have a harder time focusing
| and accomplishing things. Even being aware of the problem isn't
| enough to fully protect one's attention and intention.
| rbanffy wrote:
| As an additional burden, we've also seen the ascension of
| "bullshit jobs" - rather than increased productivity bringing
| 15-hour work weeks, our society developed pointless, if not
| net-negative-value, jobs, which consume countless hours of
| the lives of people.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullshit_Jobs
| kennethrc wrote:
| Eh? If I spend even five minutes a day (i.e., less time spent
| going to the toilet) looking at ads I'd be surprised.
| freefaler wrote:
| One possible reason is many low hanging fruits, after WW2 with
| all that cheap industrial base and new technologies emerging
| from the war and almost no regulation with cold-war budgets.
| You could use the tech and build it fast.
|
| Check the "Secret history of Silicon Valley" by Steve Blank:
|
| https://steveblank.com/secret-history/
|
| All these are now in the mature stage.
|
| New technologies are built in China now with their large
| industrial base and large markets.
| jmclnx wrote:
| >What little hardware R&D in which the company was still engaged
| was split between AI focused LISP machines for which there was no
| immediate market, and mainframes that were a rapidly shrinking
| market
|
| Sounds familiar, eliminate "LISP machines" I wonder if history is
| repeating itself today for many companies.
| rjsw wrote:
| Sperry were reselling TI Explorers [1] (PDF), they did not
| develop their own Lisp Machine.
|
| [1]
| https://tgsoc.org/papers/SperryUnivacPioneersApplicationofAI...
| GnarfGnarf wrote:
| I worked for Sperry Univac 1974-79, in Halifax, Montreal and
| Calgary. I was an "SA", Systems Analyst at the service of the
| Sales team. It was a lot of fun. The Univac salesmen were the
| cowboys that didn't fit in at IBM. When preparing benchmarks,
| money was no object, we had lavish expense accounts. In the Oil
| Patch I saw $100K deals signed during coffee break.
|
| One of Univac's problems was the proliferation of operating
| systems for the different incompatible architectures. There was
| Exec 8 for the premier 1100 series (36-bit); OS/4, OS/3, OS/7 and
| later VS/9 (formerly RCA's TSOS then VMOS) for the 9000 series
| (32-bit); also the 418 and 494 real-time OS'es (18-bit words).
| Then there was the CADE 1900. All written in Assembler of course.
| We even had Varian in the branch, with salesmen from the
| different product lines competing for business.
|
| All this duplication resulted in overhead and squandering of
| programmer resources.
|
| After the Burroughs merger, the joke was that UNISYS stood for
| "Univac is Still Your Supplier".
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| Ah, the 418! That's something I haven't heard about in a while.
|
| My dad worked for Sperry Univac. He had a laminated list of 418
| assembler instructions, with assembler mnemonics, and time of
| execution. I seem to recall 4 microseconds for addition and 6
| for multiplication, but it's been a while since I saw it...
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