HD sizes increase and prices fall again

[Harrison]

You still actually used punch cards until recently? Sounds like the admin of that system was holding out for one hell of a service pack for the latest OS before taking the plung and upgrading!

[Demon Cleaner]

You still actually used punch cards until recently?

No, of course not. But I still saw the punching machines, as we still have one as showcase in the entry of our administration.

But I'm already working there for almost 12 years now, and the older ones told me how they had to run their jobs.

And of course I also wrote programs in JCL where you have a program that you can call during your own (programs made by IBM), and we had one to print/punch (called IEBPTPCH). WE used it to print, which is the same procedure when you use it to punch like in the past.

[Harrison]

I see. Much like any long running OS, it has it's querky commands due to legacy commands still being used and adapted for modern purposes.

[J T]

It'd be annoying if you put one through at the wrong time and had to start again.

How many cards did it take, on average, to enter a program?

[Demon Cleaner]

How many cards did it take, on average, to enter a program?

Well, in JCL when you write a line of code, it's called a job card, meaning you had 1 card for 1 line of code (80 characters limit). So imagine a program with 100 lines, you have 100 cards!

[Harrison]

Pure madness, but at the time punch card computers were new they must have seemed amazing.

[J T]

What did people do with the data they generated? how did they get the results off and things like that?

Could a punch card based computer do all that much?

I ask becuase I know pretty much sod all about them.