Tape containing UNIX v4 from Bell Labs (c. 1973) found in a storage room at the University of Utah – potentially the only complete copy

a year ago by Novi Sad to c/unix

Attached: 1 image While cleaning a storage room, our staff found this tape containing #UNIX v4 from Bell Labs, circa 1973 Apparently no other complete copies are known to exist: https://gunkies.org/wiki/UNIX_Fourth_Edition We have arranged to deliver it to the Computer History Museum #retrocomputing

Zachariah 98 points a year ago

While cleaning a storage room, our staff found this tape containing #UNIX v4 from Bell Labs, circa 1973

Apparently no other complete copies are known to exist: https://gunkies.org/wiki/UNIX_Fourth_Edition

We have arranged to deliver it to the Computer History Museum

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Fmstrat 11 points a year ago

If you ever get a chance to goto the CHM, do it. Super cool.

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BartyDeCanter 5 points a year ago

Instructions unclear, goto considered harmful.

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Zachariah 8 points a year ago

10 PRINT "HELLO WORLD"
20 GOTO 10

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krooklochurm 7 points a year ago

That's the most functional and elegant code I've ever seen.

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orbituary 64 points a year ago

I hope they're able to extract the data. I'd love to see it boot up.

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neidu3 16 points a year ago

Magnetic storage is pretty much the gold standard when it comes to massive amounts of long term offline data. Sure, it doesn't last forever, but proper quality tape lasts for many decades.

Source: I work with tape drives, and the amount of data I've written to tape and sent off for long term storage is measured in petabytes.

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Crashumbc 2 points a year ago

I have a box of 5-1/4" floppies from mid eighties. Over 95% still worked fine a couple years ago.

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GenosseFlosse -20 points a year ago

I don't think magnetic storage lasts that long. Even floppy disks become unreadable after sitting for 10 years in a box.

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sexual_tomato 40 points a year ago

Magnetic tape can last multiple decades. There's no telling whether THIS magnetic tape lasted that long, but the medium is pretty hardy.

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HugeNerd 2 points a year ago

Keep 'em in a salt mine.

https://www.deepstore.com/about-us/

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LumiNocta 14 points a year ago

I recently dug up my father's floppy disks. Stored in a dark dry attic. Each one contained about 10 photos of him on holidays and my birthday when i was 7. I had about 10 usable disks.

The disks are at least 25 years old. He died about 20 years ago.

It is true. Not all photos were saved but the disks held op really well!

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kalpol 5 points a year ago

Yeah if climate controlled they last a surprisingly long time. I've had 20-30 year old disks read ok. Honestly at this point I cant find a drive anywhere.

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LumiNocta 1 point a year ago

Yeah, I'm lucky nobody threw them out it the mean time.

It's not a very desirable or trendy way of keeping data.

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piccolo 2 points a year ago

The thing about floppies is they were mass produced with pressure to be the cheapest on the market for consumers. The newer the floppy, the more shit quailty it is and less likely to retain data. Tapes meant for enterprise storage meant for long term backups will be high quailty and has a pretty good chance of lasting decades.

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qjkxbmwvz 9 points a year ago

I suspect that if you throw resources at the problem, you can tolerate much more degradation than standard tape readers.

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HugeNerd 7 points a year ago

No they do not. Where did you get that piece of crap info from?

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buddascrayon 2 points a year ago

Most likely they're thinking of VHS and audio tapes.

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HugeNerd 2 points a year ago

Where do people store these things? In a swamp?

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GenosseFlosse 1 point a year ago

From my box of floppy disks that where sitting in shelf since ~2000.

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HugeNerd 8 points a year ago

Good for you, I can find 40 year old disks that read fine.

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Crashumbc 2 points a year ago

Were they sitting next to a bookshelf speaker?

Almost all my mid eighties floppies still work...

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bdonvr 7 points a year ago

Magnetic tape can be pretty good. This specific tape I don't know, but there's a reason enterprises to this day STILL widely use magnetic tape to store archives.

Though, that may be because a single tape cassette can hold way more than a hard drive, and is cheaper. But I imagine they'd need to have longevity too.

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TropicalDingdong 3 points a year ago

Magnetic tape storage is pretty standard. depends on many factors but might read just fine.

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ThePantser 52 points a year ago

And it is still better than Windows 11

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snausagesinablanket 19 points a year ago

And it is still better than Windows 11

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ozymandias 6 points a year ago

And it is still better than Windows 11

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SanctimoniousApe 18 points a year ago

Is it tho? That's a LONG time for magnetic bits to remain stable.

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4am 12 points a year ago

You could erase that tape and it’d still be better than Window 11

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bhamlin 2 points a year ago

And it is still better than Windows 11

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moopet 3 points a year ago

Still a better love story than Windows 11

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Ioughttamow 24 points a year ago

And my wife scoffs at my mild hoarding

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HugeNerd 1 point a year ago

I can play Sokoban IRL with all my stuff. I meant "have to".

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reallyzen 14 points a year ago

What does "700 GP 3200 FCI" means ? One should be the length of the tape I guess.

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Cort 35 points a year ago

3200 fci is flux changes per inch, so basically the number of bits per inch of tape.

700GP is the style of tape. 1/2 inch, 9-tracks.

The length of the tape depends on the size/diameter of the reel it's on. Going by the markings on the left it's about 1000ft of tape.

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Ersatz86 4 points a year ago

Well done

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ralakus 1 point a year ago

Using those measurements, that's about 38.4MB of storage on that tape

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homesweethomeMrL 13 points a year ago

That is awesome. I guess there’s no way to clone it? Is there a virtual PDP-11/45?

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AngryCommieKender 31 points a year ago

I own a PDP-11 that still works. I'll have to contact the museum to see if they want it. I bought it off of NYIT in 1999 for $200

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gwl 5 points a year ago

They'll want it I think!

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massacre 5 points a year ago

Ping Usagi on Youtube

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AngryCommieKender 1 point a year ago

Thanks!

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dbtng 3 points a year ago

Downgrade today!

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Devjavu 1 point a year ago

Torrent it. I dare you.

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@sh.itjust.works

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This is a community that is only for nerds jk. everyone who doesn't scare when seeing UNIX terminal welcome! rules:

don't make comments that branch out from the main topic too much, at least please somehow relate to it.
retro operating systems, e.g. discussion about them, is strictly forbidden, please make a retro community instead.
please be nice for others.

go to feed...