[rescue] Wang machines

[Dave McGuire]

On January 15, Scott Newell wrote:
> >  Umm, don't even try.  Those Wang terminal interfaces are unlike
> >anything else anyone has ever seen.  Trust me...I've *built* a little
> >rs232 terminal with a keyboard and an LCD display, and I won't go near
> >those Wang interfaces.
> 
> Come on Dave, don't tease us like that.  Give up the nitty gritty nasty
> tech details on just how bad it is.  I could use a good laugh.  (How bad
> can it be?  Manchester encoded current loop, with token passing pasted on?)

  I don't remember the details...I worked on those machines about 12-13
years ago, I was 19 if I recall correctly.  I remember looking into
the interface in the service docs of a Wang VS...it was bit-banged
with TTL, seemed to me it was quite zippy at the time.  Synchronous,
with screen positioning and on-screen form management controls and
such built into the protocol.  Each terminal was connected to the
mainframe with two pieces of coax, which could be quite long, one BNC
and one TNC.

       -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
St. Petersburg, FL         "Less talk.  More synthohol." --Lt. Worf