[GreenKeys] teletypes and linotypes

[Bryan Brodie]

We had access to an HP2000F - it was funded by a Title III grant to
the Mathematics & Science Center in Glen Allen, Va. Five school
systems shared access to 16 (later 32) dialup ports.

I wrote an IM program in 1975 using a "trick" in the HP2000 BASIC
operating system which was not documented. Yes, we had instant two-way
text messaging between schools long before cellphones (or software
patents). If only I'd known...

The Math Science Center had a "Saturday Morning Explorer's Program"
and "Summer Explorer's Program" where kids from the five school
districts were bused out the the center to take beginning and advances
classes in biology, ornithology, chemistry, physics, mathematics and
BASIC programming. It was a great honor to be chosen to apply for the
classes, and I didn't get computers until the third try.

We took field trips to places like the C&P Telephone main switching
center (eight stories of electromechanical switching gear - again,
quite awesome for a gadget freak), the mainframe room of the Defense
General Supply Center (primary east coast supply depot for military
bases and operations), the VEPCO Surry Nuclear Power Station (visitor
center, nobody got into the reactor areas), Allied Chemical Research
Center and the Philip Morris cigarette manufacturing facility.

One of the guys in my programming class had plugged in an AM radio to
the power rack inside the HP2000's cabinet. He wrote a program that
executed a series of FOR-NEXT loops that would play music over the
radio (how the hell they got that idea, I do not know). I recall
"Daisy (bicycle built for two)" was one of the songs it could play.
Appropriate for the HAL 9000 / 2001 Space Odyssey era.

HP2000 aficionados will recall that the "master user" was A000. One
day the system administrator (Dr. Gilpin Brown) came to our school to
give a demonstration. We had three phone lines in the computer
classroom, with an extension line in a sound booth in the library. One
of the model 33s was on a roller cart so that students could use it in
the library when regular instruction was taking place in the
classroom.

I rolled the TTY to the sound booth and plugged in the phone to the
extension that Dr. Brown was using to give his demonstration, and
turned on the paper tape punch. When he logged into A000 with his
(CTRL key) password, it punched out onto the paper tape in the
library.

After he left I wrote a program to reveal the control characters
punched into the tape and - eureka - I had master access.

Shortly after this a reign of terror began. I shared the code with two
friends from my Explorer's classes. We would decrease available time
and disk space for students we didn't like, causing them to lose their
work. The "HELLO" program which executed at the beginning of each
user's session ws reprogrammed to disable the break key and send
CTRL-L (form feeds) continuously to the terminals on the network as
they logged in. (Dr. Brown could not log in to fix this, and had to
restore the entire system).

We gave ourselves access to the restricted games library and added new
user accounts throughout the system.

I was busted one day when Dr. Brown was monitoring the main console
(ASR35) and saw his user ID log into the system from out in the field.
Since he had never written down or otherwise shared this password with
anyone, he was rightfully curious as to how someone had hacked the
system.

I had been online about two minutes when the school intercom boomed
out "BRYAN BRODIE COME TO THE PRINICPALS OFFICE IMMEDIATELY".

Dr. Brown was on the phone and demanded that I reveal how I had gained
access. I hesitated at first, and he said "unless you want an account
with zero terminal time and zero disk space, you'll tell me right
away".

I revealed my method and that I had shared this with my two cronies. I
was miffed when I found out that he called their schools before mine,
as if they were somehow better hackers than I was. I got off with a
warning because my computer teacher knew how to channel my energy
towards more productive areas - they made me teach the class.

One of my cronies had a brother that attended UVA, which had a much
more sophisticated HP2000 ACCESS model. We got the local phone number
and his college user ID and began accessing THAT system from high
school. My instructor ambled into the computer room one day and while
looking over my shoulder, remarked "Wow - I didn't know that our
system had such powerful commands." I replied "That's because its not
our system".

He shook his head and walked away muttering "I don't even want to know"...

We were very fortunate to have educators that understood that we
really mean no harm, we were just pushing the boundaries of knowledge,
competing against each other for the title of best programmer. Today
in the post 9/11 climate, we'd be send to jail and expelled from
school. It's a shame, really, that curiosity is punished instead of
rewarded. There must be a reasonable middle ground, not sure how to
get back there, though...



On Sun, Feb 12, 2012 at 11:24 AM,  <COURYHOUSE at aol.com> wrote:
 Gotta love iit!!!!
 ok your jr hs had an hp 2000...

 we used to sell time on them, repair them, design interfaces for them...
 we still have our first one  we saved under glass here at the museum
 need the 2883 disc drive  though
 please visit
 http://www.smecc.org/hewlett_packard.htm

 what  was the mini system at  your high school?