h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I fell over you a couple of times at the "ask H2G2" forum so I thought I'd drop by and say Hi!

So here I am.

I started out on a Commodore PET 3032, and had to post my CESIL coding sheets to the computer centre for my school stuff. I'll never forget the printout from my first logic error - an endless loop.

Weren't those the days?

I liked the asteroids article, and even left a reply which you might find interesting. But can I suggest you put a link in from your homepage where it's in big bright letters?

I'll read the Florida article another time - I may be heading down that way as AT&T's technical department are in Tampa and not returning 'phone calls. They've even inspired a new award - details at http://www.h2g2.com/A184637

I'd like to extend to you the first invitation to visit.

see you there

chris

Many coincidences! Although I did a few spells over the phones with the BASIC-speaking computer in Milton Keynes during university, my first face-to-face experience was with a Commodore PET-32. And when I went back to school, MY handwritten BAL-370 coding sheets went to Liverpool by courier, got key-punched and turned into job decks up there, and then the results were sent back. Three-day turnaround!

Good idea about inserting the link: I wrote that before I knew how to do all those GuideML tricks.

I'll check out the website after I reluctantly depart this place...
Lil

I didn't want to start a new thread just to say "hi", so I'll just use this one. It appears to have only been driven on Sundays anyhow.

Nice home page. Like you, I get somewhat cantankerous when folks here haven't bothered to add any personal decor to their quarters. So I was delighted to find someone who even went so far as posting a CV. (You can get to my resume from my home page, but you might have to hunt around a bit...no point in making things too easy!).

Anyhow, thanks for making H2G2 a more interesting and literate place.

Thanks, chicken raiser.

I don't know whether there are discernible phases to
h2g2 usage, but I'm doing a lot of homepage visiting
just lately. It's so hard to get a feel for the size
and scope of this community, and finding blank walls
instead of friendly graffiti is just, well, disgruntling.

I envy you your home. I bet you don't have any light
pollution. Do you know how many years it's been since
I saw the Milky Way?

Lil

Yes, you're a true H2G2 addict...replying in 15 minutes to random visitors

I find that I do a lot of surfing here by a sort of sawtooth method: read a thread, pick one researcher from it and go to their home page, go to a new thread from there, go to a new researcher, etc. I'm becoming convinced that there are little subcommunities that are tightly linked within themselves but not linked to one another. Not surprising, really.

As for light pollution...well, actually, it's rather bad. You see we have those rural things called "security lights" out here -- great bright yellowish lights, one per home, up on the power poles and not controlled by any switch. They automatically come on dusk till dawn. I believe they were a selling point for rural electrification when the co-op came through.

In any case, although I can see the Milky Way from here, it requires getting out behind the barn and into the barn's shadow to really get a proper look at the sky, and even then some of that nasty light leaks through.

Probably a lot better than civilized Florida though.