Chess On The Wire

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Cyberchess
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Chess On The Wire

Post by Cyberchess »

Greetings fellow schachcomputer enthusiasts:

The recent posts on the earliest chess computers brought back some long buried memories of our primordial past; a dark time in which there were no personal computers, no smart phones or even cordless phones, and certainly no schachcomputers. Can you even imagine living for just one day without these aforementioned amenities?

Our only real interface with the rest of the world was the copper-cable wired telephone system, and unlike today, pay telephone booths were ubiquitous throughout the urban and metropolitan sectors of our country. Since there was no way to send text messages, people relied heavily on telephone answering services and tape recorder based answering machines. Being quite youthful at the time, one of our favorite pastimes was to make humorous prank calls to people while secretly recording them. If our local chess club meeting had been cancelled, perhaps due to inclement weather, we would often setup a match via telephone. Since we couldn’t really use a chess clock for this, we were honor bound to limit our response time to one minute or less. While not the best way to play chess by far, at least it was better than a protracted postal (snail mail) match.

Several years later, when PCs became widely available, but before the general public had internet access, we would play something we dubbed “Modem Chess” or “Terminal Chess”. This necessitated that both PCs were equipped with phone modems and terminal emulation software. One PC would then dial into the other (Host Computer), a communication protocol would be established, and the moves would be echoed through terminal emulation in real-time. This was a welcome improvement over phone chess – which was brutal on the ear. People often played at work, as it was possible to walk around and perform other tasks while your opponent was thinking. This was also a great way to breakup the monotony of performing mundane chores around the house. Players were known to have consulted printed opening and endgame references, but since PCs were comparatively slow at the time, there was no need to fret over the possibility of your opponent consulting a chess engine. In those days I kept a medium sized wooden magnetic chess set on a small table adjacent to my computer desk, and much preferred this over trying to concentrate on a tough game with the eye-straining glare of those old CRTs. For intrepid terminal chess players with less sensitive eyes, shareware programs were available on your local BBS which allowed for the moves to be echoed on a simple graphical chessboard. Included was a useful dialog text box, which could be used to request a pause, resign, request adjournment, etc. The software would also allow you the option of saving the game in PGN format, and the PGN file could also be sent to other players via modem.

And Such Was Life In The Slow Lane Regards,
John
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Steve B
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Re: Chess On The Wire

Post by Steve B »

Cyberchess wrote:The recent posts on the earliest chess computers brought back some long buried memories of our primordial past; a dark time in which there were no personal computers, no smart phones or even cordless phones, and certainly no schachcomputers. Can you even imagine living for just one day without these aforementioned amenities?
Hi John
while I do use a PC I do live fairly comfortably without any mobile devices what-so-ever (other then an old fashioned flip-top Cell phone)
no smart phones,iphones,ipads or knee pads
to be honest I laugh at folks who are so addicted to their smart phones that they don't look up even while walking the mean streets of NYC
they are so fixated on their phones that they are staring into their hands even while walking up the stairs ..or they forget to press the button when they get in the elevator..and you can be certain that I do not remind them to do so and they ride up and then down..probably for Hrs before they look up


Luddite Regards
Steve
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Cyberchess
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Re: Chess On The Wire

Post by Cyberchess »

Steve B wrote:
Cyberchess wrote:The recent posts on the earliest chess computers brought back some long buried memories of our primordial past; a dark time in which there were no personal computers, no smart phones or even cordless phones, and certainly no schachcomputers. Can you even imagine living for just one day without these aforementioned amenities?
Hi John
while I do use a PC I do live fairly comfortably without any mobile devices what-so-ever (other then an old fashioned flip-top Cell phone)
no smart phones,iphones,ipads or knee pads
to be honest I laugh at folks who are so addicted to their smart phones that they don't look up even while walking the mean streets of NYC
they are so fixated on their phones that they are staring into their hands even while walking up the stairs ..or they forget to press the button when they get in the elevator..and you can be certain that I do not remind them to do so and they ride up and then down..probably for Hrs before they look up


Luddite Regards
Steve
Greetings Steve:

I owned a clamshell type flip phone for many years, and loved the ergonomic design and how it closely resembled the communicators used on the original (and best) Star Trek. For this reason plus the very reasonable monthly charges, I was one of the last to change over to a smartphone, though eventually required internet access and text messaging for professional reasons.

With smartphones becoming as popular as they are, I’ve had some very close automobile mishaps due to foolish people that use the phone while driving. Also, I’ve seen pedestrians (particularly in Manhattan) walk out into oncoming traffic without looking while transfixed by the smartphone.

There are always certain selfish individuals that are seemingly oblivious to those around them. Spock handled one of these miscreants with his usual Vulcan aplomb in ”The Voyage Home”.

Beam Me Up Regards,
John
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Fernando
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Post by Fernando »

I am on guy like Steven B. on this.
recently I was compelled to change my old style Nokia cel phone for a relatively simple but far more complicated nonetheless touch device full of preposterous services and it has been a nightmare to access to simpe functions as erase messages, erase register etc, BUT you simple cannot get anymore here he old good stuff.
People has got maddened with this, but at the same time is the great invention of all times for scarcely smart people that anyway live his full lives trying to avoid his own presence in this world.

Get them F... regards
Fern
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Jac1Dawes
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Post by Jac1Dawes »

I'd be happy if it was the 70's again.
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