 Notice. New forum software under development. It's going to miss a few functions and look a bit ugly for a while, but I'm working on it full time now as the old forum was too unstable. Couple days, all good. If you notice any issues, please contact me. |
Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : PWM Lockdown
  Page 2 of 2 |
|||||
| Author | Message | ||||
thwill Guru  Joined: 16/09/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 4311 |
You'll have to educate me Paul, I thought "Polack" was a derogatory term ? Is it a term that has been "reclaimed" ? Certainly one of my Polish colleagues/friends does confuse me, but that's simply because he is so much smarter than me and everyone else I know. The other Poles I know are all top-notch people too ... I'd say more but the no talking politics police have my house staked out. Best wishes, Tom Edited 2021-08-08 08:41 by thwill MMBasic for Linux, Game*Mite, CMM2 Welcome Tape, Creaky old text adventures |
||||
led-bloon Senior Member  Joined: 21/12/2014 Location: AustraliaPosts: 207 |
Mr thwill. If you had bothered to read the forum guidelines properly, you would have also found the statement: Best wishes .. still led Miss you George |
||||
| thwill Guru Joined: 16/09/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 4311 |
<shakes head sadly> MMBasic for Linux, Game*Mite, CMM2 Welcome Tape, Creaky old text adventures |
||||
| Paul_L Guru Joined: 03/03/2016 Location: United StatesPosts: 769 |
Tom, The word polack is definitely not derogatory -- it literally means an adult male Pole. A polka is an adult female Pole. The suffix of Polish words often refer to gender. My family name is Lepkow, pronounced Wepfkoff. The ski ending makes it male, ska makes it female and skova is an honorific given to grandmothers. This confounded the immigration guys at Ellis Island when my grandparents and great grandparents arrived. My grandfather was Vladimir Lepkowski, his wife was Agnes Lepkowska and his mother was Mariola Lepkowskova. The immigration guys insisted that everyone must have the same last name Lepkowski. Agnes and Mariola were insulted and started a kerfuffle. Like I said, we were put here specifically to confuse everyone else! Pavel Artur Jan Waclaw Lepkowski in NY (Waclaw was a medieval saint. It is pronouced Vatswaff.) (The "W" is not a double "V", it is either a double "U" or a double "F"!) ((Try googling Mikolaj Kopernik!)) Edited 2021-08-08 14:39 by Paul_L |
||||
| thwill Guru Joined: 16/09/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 4311 |
Thanks for the education Paul - I taking my knowledge from Wikipedia and poor American TV dramas. I guess it's a sad fact about the corruption of language and the nature of racism that some people's names (or derivatives thereof) for themselves sometimes get used in a derogatory fashion. Best wishes, Tom MMBasic for Linux, Game*Mite, CMM2 Welcome Tape, Creaky old text adventures |
||||
| Paul_L Guru Joined: 03/03/2016 Location: United StatesPosts: 769 |
Tom, I have often speculated why the states are an above average place to live. During the 35 years when I worked for Pan Am I got around a lot. I'd sooner live where I am than almost any other place in the world. I have concluded that the major part of the reason that it's nice here is that we have no significant native population ... everybody is a recent immigrant, and we mostly get along together, including when we start telling ethnic jokes about each other. The younger people tend to object to the jokes. I personally like telling Polack jokes of my own crafting. Unfortunately they loose a lot in translation since they have to be told in dialect. When youngsters object to the jokes I simply rapidly tell them my name, Pavel Artur Jan Waclaw Lepkowski, several times, then add that most people think us Polacks are stupid. ...... The fact of the matter is that by the time we remember our names we have reduced horsepower left. Paul in NY |
||||
| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
Where would the world be without "reverse Polish notation" and "pole dancing" ? Cheers, Tony. |
||||
Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 7939 |
LOL! (I'll send you the bill for keyboard cleaning. It's got sputtered cornflakes on it now!) [goes off on a tangent mode] I was very interested to read that Reverse Polish notation was what allowed the Sinclair scientific calculators to be designed. The chip had no memory left for the operator, so two values were entered into the two memory locations then the operator operated(!) on them in immediate mode. Also, there was no spare ROM space, which is why the constants are written on the front of the case. :) The chip engineers (TI?) were amazed that a general purpose calculator had been possible with that chip. It hadn't been designed for that. [/goes off on a tangent mode] Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
||||
| Volhout Guru Joined: 05/03/2018 Location: NetherlandsPosts: 5091 |
HP must have had the same memory problem. Although their first handheld calculator is also from 1972 (HP35), same as Sinclairs, their previous desktop calculators (i.e. 9100) also used RPN. Still using an 1983 HP12C with it's second set of batteries.... RPN... Edited 2021-08-10 20:51 by Volhout PicomiteVGA PETSCII ROBOTS |
||||
| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 7939 |
It was a TI chip - the TMC0805 (the Sinclair custom ROM version of the TMS0805). It was originally designed as a simple general purpose calculator with add/subtract/multiply/divide only but Nigel Searle managed to program scientific functions into the ROM. This is brilliant: http://files.righto.com/calculator/sinclair_scientific_simulator.html I have a Sinclair Scientific - the white one - as an unbuilt kit. Only the shrink wrap and the little loop of solder are missing. :) Sings: "Happy birthday to me... Happy birthday to me..." :) Edited 2021-08-11 17:31 by Mixtel90 Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
||||
| Page 2 of 2 |
|||||
 Print this page |
 |
The Back Shed's forum code is written, and hosted, in Australia. | © JAQ Software 2025 |
