On Tue, 2006-11-21 at 10:05 -0800, George Arseneault wrote:
--- Tim <ignored_mailbox(a)yahoo.com.au> wrote:
> On Mon, 2006-11-20 at 10:49 -0800, George Arseneault
> wrote:
> > Actually 'real' debugging was when they ran
> distilled
> > water over the circuits to remove the dead bugs.
> (Back
> > when computers took up their own building)
>
> Hmm, just water?
>
> It's years since I've actually seen a real
> mainframe, though this was a
> transistorised one. Great big metal cabinets, where
> you opened up the
> doors to a rat's nest of wire-wrap, and it used
> water-cooling through
> the doors as well as the rest of the cabinet.
Theoretically, pure water does *not* conduct
electricity. It's the other particles (ions,
whatever) that allow it to conduct. So, it *should*
be safe to run the water over running circuits.
Of course, any contaminants (oil, grease, dust,
whatever) *could* cause a short-circuit.
But, I read somewhere that they did precisely that,
long ago. And, that the reason we call the
abnormal/strange occurrences in programs, bugs, is
that they were often caused by bugs, rodents, etc.
shorting out or chewing through the computer's circuits
The first 'bug' in a computer program was found in eniac (sp).
The system did not do what was expected and the cause was a real bug
between the contacts of a mechanical relay in the machine. The problem
was a literal "bug" in the program.
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