Computing
This is a big interest area for me. I have been using computers of one sort or another for many years, I predate just about all of the commercial small computers, and it was things like the MK14 and UK101 kit computers that were hitting the mainstream magazines. Things changed when Commodore released the PET computer. 6502 based, small memory, small keyboard, built in cassette drive. The PET had one feature that made it an instant hit in industry, the IEE 488 interface (a.k.a HP GPIB) this enabled it to control many different types of test instrumentation. I ended up designing automatic test equipment based around this computer. As luck would have it, I seemed to stick with the Commodore range of computers, I have a small collection, PET, +4, C64, C128D, A2000, A4000. also in the collection are a couple of MK14's and a Jupiter ACE. A few PC's have also entered the shack as well.
For quite a few years I was involved with the magazines Commodore Computing International, and later Amiga User International. I wrote the Amiga Answers pages of AUI. Sadly both publications ceased publication many years ago.
The Amiga still lives on, and it's still got quite a following.
When the Amiga started to die, I decided to move to the Linux system, especially as I was using UNIX and Solaris systems at work, and then later many Linux systems. So using Linux at home was a very good learning experience, and it still is.
I do write the odd lines of code, but I have never released anything commercially. Most of the code that I have produced commercially is used in inbedded / custom systems, which I would think have long since been replaced with more modern systems.
The latest computers to enter the shack, a pile of "Raspberry-PI's" These are doing all sorts of things. One is a station GPS based timeserver, another acts as a local DNS using unbound. Another is a test bed, currently being used to "talk" directly to Lightwave remote power sockets, and the latest is working as a PI-STAR based Amateur Radio DMR Hotspot.
