Old Educational Computer Resurrected As a Spreadsheet 37
An anonymous reader writes "Back in the '60s, Bell Labs created a 'paper computer' called CARDIAC so students could learn the fundamentals of computers. Dr. Dobb's recreates the paper computer in an Excel spreadsheet and hints they will show how it gets ported to an FPGA in future installments."
Blue Screen (Score:4, Funny)
On the CARDIAC the "Blue Screen" STOP error is actually implemented as an ARREST.
FPGA? (Score:3)
Never mind FPGA, we want a PDF version!
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No problem!
Here is the PDF pieces of CARDIAC:
http://web.mit.edu/kmill/www/hardware/hardware.html [mit.edu]
Additionally, you can purchase an original kit for $15 from:
http://www.scientificsonline.com/cardiac-illustrated-computation-aid.html [scientificsonline.com]
I still have mine on a bookshelf at home. It was an amazing little kit to me when I was 15, and still no less impressive today.
Enjoy!
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Cool, thanks...!
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On the CARDIAC the "Blue Screen" STOP error is actually implemented as an ARREST.
If I hadn't blown all my mod points on cheap women and wine I would mod you up sir!
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On the CARDIAC the "Blue Screen" STOP error is actually implemented as an ARREST.
You've only evoked half-hearted laughter from your audience with this.
BARDIAC (Score:2, Informative)
Had a Comp/Sci professor who wrote BARDIAC (~1977), same as CARDIAC but with punch cards. It ran on DataPoint 2000 which was the 8008 instruction set run on decreate componants. Nothing like using elumation software on an elumation computer!
Will have to play with excel sheet, relive OLD times!
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on decreate componants
This is what happens when old computers go to die...
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You missed the elumation typo.
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You missed the elumation typo.
No, this is how English was spelled when he was learning to read and write.
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Cool paper computer. Speaking of old times, imagine a beowulf cluster of these!
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A Beowulf cluster of old times? No I can't imagine how that would work.. I might soon be able to simulate a beowulf cluster of BARDIAC on phone-level hardware though.
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Now you just need to implement CORDIC algorithms for trig, power, log, mult, div, and square root and you would be all set :-0
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CORDIC [wikipedia.org]
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"Numerical Recipes" anyone? Or perhaps the second volume of Knuth?
Digi-Comp one FTW (Score:2)
I still have mine- nice plastic and metal computer.
You can still get CARDIAC paper kits, BTW, somewhere online.
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Wit short rubber bands, I believe. I never figured out where to get replacement rubber bands of the right strength.
-- hendrik
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My kit uses spring-steel to drive the gate positions. No rubber bands required ... until I lost a couple of the springs and had to jury-rig w/ a couple rubber bands. No rubber bands in the original kit.
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I still have mine- nice plastic and metal computer.
You can still get CARDIAC paper kits, BTW, somewhere online.
http://www.scientificsonline.com/cardiac-illustrated-computation-aid.html [scientificsonline.com]
Still have mine (Score:1)
I still have my CARDIAC, which stood for CARDboard Illustrative Aid to Computation. A teacher gave it to me in Junior High, about 1971, and it helped get me interested in computers. I'll have to check out the spreadsheet version.
As an aside, I love old computer names that end in -AC. My Mac Pro is named prozac.
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> My Mac Pro is named prozac.
That's depressing.
I had one of these! (Score:2)
My dad got me a CARDIAC back when I was in third grade.
I'm not sure I picked up much from it, but it inspired me to take a BASIC course on Commodore PETs in fifth grade, and from there on my future was set!
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It is practically impossible to teach good programming to students that have had a prior exposure to BASIC
Hah, it's true, I decided to go into Electrical Engineering. The programs I do write from time to time are pretty ugly :)
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I think it depends on the level of exposure to BASIC. If it is only minimal exposure, the concept of variables, arrays, loops, etc are transferable. If the exposure has got to the point of replacing a DO loop with a series of GOTOs, I agree, all hope is lost
PAPAC (Score:2)
Ah ancient paper computers. There's one that was published in CACM back in the 50's. I remember finding it back in a university library when I was first getting into computers in the 60's. There's a link to it on boingboing: http://boingboing.net/2010/11/18/a-do-it-yourself-pap.html [boingboing.net]. have fun.
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Meh, it's like Brainfuck (Score:2)
Brain Fuck [wikipedia.org]. You can implement this in silicon too.
The mind boggles (Score:3)
Lemme get this straight: Dr. Dobb's is computer simulating a paper simulation of a computer.
Put another way, it's easier to learn about computers using a spreadsheet model of a paper model of a computer, than just a mere paper model of a computer.
Cool, yes. Circular logic loops, yes.
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Brings back memories (Score:1)
Tinkertoy implementation (Score:2)
something done by Daniel Hillis and Margaret Minsky (minsky's daughter?) at M.I.T. in 1977
Just wondering. . . (Score:1)
So, if you use this thing to simulate downloading music and get caught by the RIAA goon squad, does it lead to a CARDIAC arrest?
Thank you, I'll be here all week. Tip your waitress!
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xDIAC (Score:1)
I implemented TARDIAC to simulate BSOD's