Open Arena. A game I sometimes play to kill time… and enemies 🙂
100% accuracy
Running low on root disk space
Deleted some old kernel modules, from “/usr/lib/modules”
PDP-1 spacewar
I got it to work on the PDP-10. But this is the one I really wanted to see. The original 1962 video game on the PDP-1 at MIT. The PDP-10 version is cool but not the original, with “the needle” and “the wedge”. It certainly was one of the first video games. It was out 10 years before Pong in 1972, an the Magnavox Odyssey the first consumer video game. I had one, only because I had wonderful parents… not the very first model, but not long after.
I tried to get spacewar to run under an emulated PDP-1 in simh… and I did. But it was so slow that it was unplayable. You basically boot from paper tape, which is a spacewar.rim file. I think I got it here.
I also tried and failed, to get it to run under mame. It took some trial an error to figure out how it expected the directory to be, but I finally came to the conclusion that I needed to put a zip file… containing spacewar.zip (containing spacewar.rim) into /usr/share/games/mame/roms/pdp1_ptp/. Because when I did that it complained about the length of spacewar.rim, so I knew it found it. Where previously before I created the pdp1_ptp subdirectory (I got this info from /usr/share/games/mame/hash/pdp1_ptp.xml) and put the zip file into it, it just said it couldn’t find it.
Actually the only one that would work flawlessly was the javascript one that ran in a browser., that I talk about here.
It seems odd that the best PDP-1 version is a javascript one.
I made a couple videos concerning ITS
Right now they’re just for me although they could be used to create an ITS howto. The first one is startup, login, create directory, create file in that directory and shutdown. The second video was to show the playing of spcwar (Space War). But I also added some basic programming info. I do think I’ll do a quick edit of the first video to compress the exciting 5 minute shutdown.
The Soul Of A New Machine
I guess I need to post this because I keep losing it. It was a great book the best I remember. It was about the Data General Eclipse MV/8000 computer, Data General built. It won a Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction.
Controlling the ship in spcwar on the PDP-10
SpaceWar is actually my primary interest in the ITS on the PDP-10. I talk more about it here. I don’t have much interest in doing actual work on this obscure OS.
I asked the PiDP-10 google group, if anyone knew how to play spacwar running in ITS. And Lars Brinkhoff replied “To play Spacewar, you need to plug in USB game controllers. The now-regular PlayStation type.”
So I dug out my old Logitech WingMan Precision Gamepad, and it seems to work fine!
Directional pad:
Left - Left
Right - Right
Top - thrust
Bottom -?
Buttons
A - Fire
B - Hyperspace
X - Start
Y - ?Running spcwar on ITS
Lars Brinkhoff
2:35 AM (5 hours ago)
to PiDP-10
Forgot to say, you can adjust the number of stars and players. Type ^Z to stop the game, $^K to load symbols and then NSUNS/x or NSHIPS/x to adjust parameters. X is a number, 1-3 for stars, 1-4 for players. Restart with $P.My computer started beeping
I actually fell asleep at the keyboard, and was awakened by beeping. Went to all my virtual desktops and didn’t see anything running. I closed my browser because I wondered if it might be coming from one of the tabs. That didn’t help. I almost re-booted. Decided to look at running processes and saw gnome-clocks. Killed the process and it stopped. Looked at ‘clocks’ app and there was an alarm for 10:15PM. So as a test, I set an alarm for one min past now. Sure enough it started making the same repeating beeping noise. So I set it again and closed the app. Sure enough is started beeping. That’s cool and useful, but I always assumed the app needed to be opened. I know that wouldn’t be nearly as useful, but that’s what I thought. I have other apps that need to run but if I close them thy just go to the system tray where you can see them, so you realize they’re actually still running. But gnome-clocks doesn’t do that so I assumed, it’s not running if you close it. I also realized (now in hindsight) I could have stopped it by responding to a notification in the system tray at the bottom. But I don’t remember setting an alarm. I could have also given it a name like “Go to bed”. But surely I would have remembered doing that. The only logical explanation is I had set it in the past then earlier when I used the “Timer”, which I often do for a short reminder and somehow I turned on the “Alarm”. I use the “Timer” for a quick reminder, for example, to let my dog back in, in 10 minutes. Because I can easily get lost in what I’m doing. I only use the “Timer” for short reminders where I’ll be sitting at my computer, because it’s just one quick tone, and if I walked away, I could easily miss it. Where as the alarm repeats constantly.
ITS – directory
:cwd games
*
:lf
KA:GAMES;
2 ADV3DB 1 11 +202 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 ADV3SB 2 3 +908 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 ADV3SB REL 4 +471 4/4/2024 12:14:06 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 ADV3SR 1 12 +647 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 ADV3SR REL 8 +885 4/4/2024 12:14:05 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 ADV4MA 3 17 +390 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 ADV4MA REL 10 +769 4/4/2024 12:14:15 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 ADV4SU 16 6 +868 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 ADV4SU REL 5 +246 4/4/2024 12:14:17 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 ADVENT DAT 3 +960 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 ADVENT DRW 15 +434 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 ADVENT F4 2 +700 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 ADVENT REL 3 +892 4/4/2024 12:13:57 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 ANIMAL (INIT) 0 +889 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 ANIMAL 133 12 +453 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 ANIMAL BARE 0 +7 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 ANIMAL BUGS 28 +556 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 ANIMAL FASL 23 +530 4/4/2024 12:42:38 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 ANIMAL INFO 0 +197 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 ANIMAL NEWS 0 +90 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 ANIMAL ONEWS 0 +440 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 ANIMAL ORIGIN 0 +568 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 ANIMAL RULES 0 +140 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 ANIMAL SAVE 14 +528 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 ANIMAL UNFASL 3 +923 4/4/2024 12:42:38 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 BREATH 1 0 +176 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 CHASE (INIT) 0 +15 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 CHASE 79 2 +554 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 CHASE FASL 2 +557 4/4/2024 12:42:56 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 CHASE INFO 1 +96 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 CHASE UNFASL 0 +248 4/4/2024 12:42:56 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 DOC (INIT) 8 +531 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 DOC 102 8 +591 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 ELIZA (INIT) 0 +15 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 ELIZA FASL 5 +669 9/5/1977 12:43:18 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 FT01 DAT 18 +487 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 GO (INIT) 0 +99 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 GO INFO 0 +600 2/2/1978 22:01:29 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 GO1 FASL 3 +702 2/5/1978 02:30:08 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 GO2 FASL 6 +176 2/5/1978 02:31:20 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 GOBRD FASL 2 +79 2/25/1978 16:19:40 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 GUESS 21 0 +519 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 ITSTER (INIT) 0 +14 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 ITSTER FASL 2 +534 4/4/2024 12:43:04 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 ITSTER SCORES 0 +1 5/20/2018 08:49:09 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 ITSTER UNFASL 0 +393 4/4/2024 12:43:04 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 JOTTO 101 3 +479 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 JOTTO BIN 1 +674 4/4/2024 12:14:51 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 JOTTO DICT 9 +739 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 LSRRTN INSERT 0 +870 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 PARSE 20 1 +280 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 PARSE FASL 0 +729 4/4/2024 12:42:33 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 PARSE UNFASL 0 +202 4/4/2024 12:42:33 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 PATTRN 7 1 +980 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 PATTRN FASL 0 +837 4/4/2024 12:42:34 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 PATTRN UNFASL 0 +134 4/4/2024 12:42:34 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 QB (INIT) 0 +24 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 QB FASL 2 +248 9/5/1977 15:20:18 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 SPROUT RULES 3 +546 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 STONE (INIT) 0 +30 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 STONE FASL 4 +587 12/3/1977 22:42:58 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 THINK (INIT) 0 +29 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 THINK 2 2 +718 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 THINK FASL 2 +891 4/4/2024 12:42:49 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 THINK UNFASL 0 +434 4/4/2024 12:42:49 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 TREK 2 9 +738 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 TREK REL 13 +183 4/4/2024 12:14:26 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 TS ADV350 32 +8 4/4/2024 12:14:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 TS ADV448 39 +8 4/4/2024 12:14:23 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 TS ANIMAL 90 +8 4/4/2024 12:42:45 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 TS BKG 28 +434 9/5/1979 02:40:10 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 TS C 45 +780 4/4/2024 12:14:40 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 TS CHESS 3 +397 4/4/2024 12:14:34 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 TS CHESS2 9 +73 4/4/2024 12:14:32 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 TS CKR 1 +450 4/4/2024 12:14:45 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 TS DAZDRT 3 +531 4/4/2024 12:33:15 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 TS GAME 6 +691 4/4/2024 12:14:58 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 TS GUESS 0 +458 4/4/2024 12:15:05 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 TS MAZE 8 +635 4/4/2024 12:21:34 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 TS MLIFE 2 +215 4/4/2024 12:33:44 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 TS NIMLIN 29 +8 9/30/1977 14:43:48 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 TS O 17 +996 8/26/1978 20:09:21 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 TS OCM 39 +678 4/4/2024 12:14:36 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 TS SPCWAR 5 +907 4/4/2024 12:33:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 TS SPROUT 24 +344 8/11/1977 02:39:50 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 TS TREK 13 +8 4/4/2024 12:14:30 (4/7/2024) -??-
3 TS TVWAR 1 +289 4/4/2024 12:33:24 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 WA (INIT) 2 +486 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 WA 10 45 +634 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 WA FASL 30 +63 4/4/2024 12:42:51 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 WA PLYRS8 9 +175 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 WA UNFASL 5 +266 4/4/2024 12:42:51 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 WORD 3 0 +891 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 WORD FASL 0 +379 4/4/2024 12:42:36 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 WORD UNFASL 0 +227 4/4/2024 12:42:36 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 WORDS 50 6 +660 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 WORDS FASL 8 +975 4/4/2024 12:42:35 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 WORDS UNFASL 0 +744 4/4/2024 12:42:35 (4/4/2024) -??-
1 WUMPUS 103 2 +422 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 YAHTZE (INIT) 0 +36 5/9/2018 03:05:12 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 YAHTZE 27 1 +547 2/24/1978 10:00:37 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 YAHTZE FASL 1 +746 4/4/2024 12:43:02 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 YAHTZE UNFASL 0 +187 4/4/2024 12:43:02 (4/4/2024) -??-
:KILL
*
:fdir
DSK:GAMES; (61.5% used)
ADV3DB 1 ADV3SB 2 ADV3SB REL ADV3SR 1 ADV3SR REL
ADV4MA 3 ADV4MA REL ADV4SU 16 ADV4SU REL ADVENT DAT
ADVENT DRW ADVENT F4 ADVENT REL ANIMAL (INIT) ANIMAL 133
ANIMAL BARE ANIMAL BUGS ANIMAL FASL ANIMAL INFO ANIMAL NEWS
ANIMAL ONEWS ANIMAL ORIGIN ANIMAL RULES ANIMAL SAVE ANIMAL UNFASL
BREATH 1 CHASE (INIT) CHASE 79 CHASE FASL CHASE INFO
CHASE UNFASL DOC (INIT) DOC 102 ELIZA (INIT) ELIZA FASL
FT01 DAT GO (INIT) GO INFO GO1 FASL GO2 FASL
GOBRD FASL GUESS 21 ITSTER (INIT) ITSTER FASL ITSTER SCORES
ITSTER UNFASL JOTTO 101 JOTTO BIN JOTTO DICT LSRRTN INSERT
PARSE 20 PARSE FASL PARSE UNFASL PATTRN 7 PATTRN FASL
PATTRN UNFASL QB (INIT) QB FASL SPROUT RULES STONE (INIT)
STONE FASL THINK (INIT) THINK 2 THINK FASL THINK UNFASL
TREK 2 TREK REL TS ADV350 TS ADV448 TS ANIMAL
TS BKG TS C TS CHESS TS CHESS2 TS CKR
TS DAZDRT TS GAME TS GUESS TS MAZE TS MLIFE
TS NIMLIN TS O TS OCM TS SPCWAR TS SPROUT
TS TREK TS TVWAR WA (INIT) WA 10 WA FASL
WA PLYRS8 WA UNFASL WORD 3 WORD FASL WORD UNFASL
WORDS 50 WORDS FASL WORDS UNFASL WUMPUS 103 YAHTZE (INIT)
YAHTZE 27 YAHTZE FASL YAHTZE UNFASL
:KILL
*
:cwd ;
*
:fdir
DSK:BILL; (0.4% used)
-READ- -ME-
:KILL
*
ITS – programming
:cwd hello
:lf
Looks like these are the options.
KA:HELLO;
0 -READ- -THIS- 0 +61 5/7/2018 04:40:52 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 AR XFILES 1 +276 4/4/2024 12:32:31 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 HELLO (DUMP) 0 +110 2/22/2021 11:19:15 (4/4/2024) -??-
2 HELLO C 0 +39 2/22/2021 11:19:15 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 HELLO CLU 0 +108 2/22/2021 11:19:15 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 HELLO FAI 0 +153 2/22/2021 11:19:15 (4/4/2024) -??-
0 HELLO FOR 0 +83 2/22/2021 11:19:15 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 HELLO LISP 0 +46 2/22/2021 11:19:15 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 HELLO LOADER 0 +10 2/22/2021 11:19:15 (4/4/2024) -??-
3 HELLO MAC 0 +124 2/22/2021 11:19:15 (4/4/2024) -??-
:print hello for
C Fortran hello world.
C
C Compile the source code with the F40 compiler:
C *:dec sys:f40
C *hello=hello.for
C
C Then load and link the relcatable file:
C *:dec sys:loader
C *hello/g
C
C Finally start DECUUO to dump an executable:
C *45$g
C Command: dump
C *:pdump ts hello
C Unit 5 is the user teletype.
WRITE(5,10)
10 FORMAT(12H HELLO WORLD)
STOP
END
*