.MIND OVER MATTERS
Life’s full of little problems.
Everyone faces them… the business-man trying to figure out current inventory or accounts receivables. The home cook who wants to cut down a recipe for 8 to serve only 5. Or the language student trying to learn the difference between “gesundheit” and “gemutlichkeit.”
This is a veryforward thinking article. It talks about a lot of things that are only getting widespread adoption now including image recognition, parallel processing and mainly general purpose problem solvers like Siri, Wolfram Alpha and Google’s new (and very impressive) Voice Search. I think that what the authors, nor really anyone else at the time, didn’t anticipate just how much more complex and miniaturized computers would become and just how much processing power and data storage would be necessary to perform these tasks.
.Problems, Too, Have Problems
by John Pfeiffer
A dialogue, perhaps to become one of the most fruitful in history, has begun between the men who study the human brain and those who design computers. Point of agreement: the brains and the computers need each other desperately.
Ever since man started making tools to tinker with nature one to two million years ago, he has been getting into—and, so far, out of—more and more elaborate kinds of trouble.
.QDP-300 The Peace of Mind Computer
Introducing our third generation computer… the all-new QDP-300. Now, you can rest assured you’ve found the most advanced microcomputer on the market today The QDP-300 is a user-friendly system – its on-line “Help” system gives even untrained operators access to its full power.
.Compute—With Pots
How to MULTIPLY, DIVIDE, ADD and SUBTRACT with simple potentiometer circuits.
WHEN we think about arithmetic, we think about addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. Algebra extends the usefulness of arithmetic by employing symbols for quantities. Trigonometry brings into play the relationship between sides and angles of triangles. Using one or more of these three mathematical approaches, most of the design problems encountered in electronic equipment can be solved.
I’m sure the RIAA might have had a bit of an issue with telling people it’s ok to tape albums and then return them, but I do love the idea of a non-profit record store with the goal of providing cheap music to the masses. File this under “things that work way better on the internet”.
The patent on the bottom of the first page is, I think, probably referring to Jack Kilby’s original patent for the manufacture of microprocessors, making it essentially the foundational patent of the modern computer industry.
I also think it’s kind of funny that they mention that Hugo Gernsback was inducted into the NEDSA hall of fame, just before going on to list who the winners of the 1974 Gernsback Scholarship for home-study electronics were. Incidentally there is another, slightly more prominent, set of awards named in his honor. The Hugo Awards.
.new & timely
Low-priced music for the masses supplied by “anti-profit” shop.
Because they “didn’t want to see a society without music,” four Washington women have opened what they call “an anti-profit enterprise” to sell phonograph records at phenomenally low prices, reports the Washington Post/Potomac.
Named “Bread and Roses” after a line in an old worker’s song, the new establishment markets records of African music, blues, folk and rock at about a 9 per cent markup.
.A Personal View of the Atari 800
by Roger H. Edelson
While the model 800 computer by Atari (Sunnyvale, CA) can be used in a small-business environment, this role is now being de-emphasized. In this system, Atari has managed to produce more of a personal computer, excelling as a combination game machine, interactive educational device, home information management system and fully programmable, general purpose machine. It is, primarily, a consumer-friendly system.
.PERSONAL COMPUTING ’78
Good bye, Atlantic City Hello, PHILADELPHIA
PHILADELPHIA CIVIC CENTER
AUGUST 24, 25, 26, 27
FOUR FULL DAYS
.OUR OWN SOFTWARE – OUR OWN HARDWARE – A perfect team from the Digital Group
Something new has been added to our great line of Digital Group hardware: DIGITAL GROUP SOFTWARE!
With all new languages, enhancements to existing languages and new sophistication designed to give the Digital Group system user the greatest capabilities yet available in a microprocessor.
Most importantly, you can rest assured that the same painstaking attention we devote to quality in our hardware has gone into Digital Group Software. Our software works — as simply as that.
.HOW TO FIND TIME TO THINK
MOST EXECUTIVES recognize the crucial, long-range problems that will affect the future growth of their companies. They know how to handle them, too. Their knottiest problem is to find the time to tackle them after grappling with a daily host of routine problems.
AN IBM MANAGEMENT OPERATING SYSTEM (MOS) can help you find the time. With this new management tool, you can program an IBM computer to collect and analyze business information and to initiate action on predictable questions involving inventory, reordering, shipping, production scheduling. The system will automatically print out exception reports when executive action is required.
.Your Computer is Wasting Time and Money!
[unless it's asynchronous]
Save money with the Philco 2000 Series
In other computers the master clock breaks time into cycles tailored to the longest operation. Shorter operations are also completed within these same time limits. Time is wasted… waiting.
In the asynchronous Philco 2000 Series, there are no clocks. Each operation triggers the next. Time is spent working… not waiting. More operations accomplished in the same time.
