Man not Landed On Moon

Noah

Well-Known Forumite
I left a "not" out of a computer program once. It brought the County Council mainframe down.

We once took out a major government computer in Guildford for 3 days. Only wanted it to calculate a fee which had VAT chargeable on part but not all of it. Sort of went into a does not compute sulk. Mind you that was in the mid 1970s when you sent off what you wanted on paper & several days later received a load of printout in a green plasticy folder.
 

BobClay

Well-Known Forumite
I was doing a course in control engineering in Southampton in 1975 and for part of the course we had to write a small program to perform some simple calculation. This was submitted to the computer section and they processed it from there on. At some later time we would return to get our result in the form of a line printer output sheet, you needed this as part of your course credit.

If there was something wrong with your program you would get a printout with various operations listed, then an abrupt long line at the bottom that showed this:

FOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFOFO

I didn't need to ask what this line meant, so went back to the code to find the error. (Even back then geeks had a sense of humour.) :embarrass:
 
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Mikinton

Well-Known Forumite
The fact that it was called a mainframe then tells me how long ago it was
It was about 30 years ago - late 1980s/early 1990s.

Having said that, the Council still had mainframe computers until very recently, though the second one was only there to provide DR for the first. I haven't a clue which applications they were supporting as all of the big corporate systems were running on other platforms by then. 'Twas me that provided the PM support for making the thing Y2K compliant in 1998/99.
 

Bodman

A few posts under my belt
It was about 30 years ago - late 1980s/early 1990s.

Having said that, the Council still had mainframe computers until very recently, though the second one was only there to provide DR for the first. I haven't a clue which applications they were supporting as all of the big corporate systems were running on other platforms by then. 'Twas me that provided the PM support for making the thing Y2K compliant in 1998/99.

The Council mainframe was shut down on the 28th April 2015. The only system that had been using the mainframe prior to that was the in-house Social Care system which was replaced towards the end of 2014. The mainframe was left running after it was replaced that so that the data could be archived off.


Bodman
 

MilleD

Well-Known Forumite
The Council mainframe was shut down on the 28th April 2015. The only system that had been using the mainframe prior to that was the in-house Social Care system which was replaced towards the end of 2014. The mainframe was left running after it was replaced that so that the data could be archived off.


Bodman

Was that the thing you logged on at the 'Owl' screen?
 

Mikinton

Well-Known Forumite
The Council mainframe was shut down on the 28th April 2015. The only system that had been using the mainframe prior to that was the in-house Social Care system which was replaced towards the end of 2014. The mainframe was left running after it was replaced that so that the data could be archived off.


Bodman
Now if I was a betting man, I'd have put my money on the Ciss system, or Ciss data at least. I guess, probably for good reason, the data never got migrated to Pisces.
 

Mikinton

Well-Known Forumite
Was that the thing you logged on at the 'Owl' screen?
Yup.

The logo 'The Owl' was the result of a computer section competition in 1986. I was Facebook friends with the winner until a few years ago when I said something about Cilla Black he didn't appreciate.
 
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PeterD

ST16 Represent.
Yup.

The logo 'The Owl' was the result of a computer section competition in 1986. I was Facebook friends with the winner until a few years ago when I said something about Cilla Black he didn't appreciate.
I have shunned family for negative comments about Cilla. So fully understand this.
 

Glam

Mad Cat Woman
Yup.

The logo 'The Owl' was the result of a computer section competition in 1986. I was Facebook friends with the winner until a few years ago when I said something about Cilla Black he didn't appreciate.
I have shunned family for negative comments about Cilla. So fully understand this.
Apparently she was not the nicest of people when off stage. Especially when flying, said to be vile to the cabin crew.
 
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