XPost: alt.folkore.computers   
   From: admin@127.0.0.1   
      
   On Wed, 16 Feb 2022 15:26:11 +0000   
   Johann 'Myrkraverk' Oskarsson  wrote:   
      
   > On 2/16/2022 9:40 AM, muta...@gmail.com wrote:   
   > > What is the worst people had to do, presumably on   
   > > early computers, to get a program/OS loaded? Did   
   > > you have to enter a program one byte at a time with   
   > > a set of 8 switches? Did you have another set of   
   > > 16 switches for the address in memory, and then   
   > > press an "enter" switch?   
   >   
   > I wasn't there, so I can't speak from personal experience,   
   > but I believe machines programmable with punch cards could   
   > be bootstrapped by punching in the object code -- sometimes   
   > by hand -- and then feed the cards to the 'puter.  Of course   
   > that means some sort of loader/executor was already there,   
   > either in hardware, or entered through some sort of front panel.   
   >   
   > > Were there lights to see what was already at a   
   > > particular address? And after all that effort, what   
   > > was the mechanism to save the entered data to   
   > > permanent storage, and load it again?   
   >   
   > Some people could read the drum memory, to see what was going on,   
   > by eyeball.   
   >   
   news:alt.folkore.computers   
   is the place to ask; xposted   
      
   --   
   Bah, and indeed Humbug.   
      
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