A world without Internet.

[Alex321]

Ta da

Was that supposed to have any meaning?

I never at any time suggested the beginning of the internet did not exist in the 1970s. As I am sure you are well aware.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Was that supposed to have any meaning?

I never at any time suggested the beginning of the internet did not exist in the 1970s. As I am sure you are well aware.

Our school had an Internet connected computer at the end of the 1970s. Yours may have not but that doesn’t make it true everywhere else.

 

[Alex321]

Our school had an Internet connected computer at the end of the 1970s. Yours may have not but that doesn’t make it true everywhere else.

It was probably the only school in the UK which did. I am genuinely surprised there were any.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

It was probably the only school in the UK which did

On what basis do you make that statement?

 

[Alex321]

On what basis do you make that statement?

On the basis that by that time, it was not commercially available (the first ISP did not come along until 1989), and was still really very much in the experimental phase.

VERY few institutions outside universities had any form of internet access before the 80's.

Not very many schools even had computers that pupils could use until the very end of the 70's.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Not very many schools

How many did and what’s your source?

 

[Alex321]

How many did and what’s your source?

I have no idea whether it was 1 or 15, but I would be amazed if it were many more than that.

My source is the fact that I lived trough that time, taking computing A level, and then doing a computer science degree at University.

Plus articles such as these
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-642-55119-2_9
https://klicktechnology.co.uk/early-use-of-computers-in-schools/#:~:text=The activities were limited to,and other more creative applications.
https://www.briansmithonline.com/computing/history-of-school-computers.html

Which all suggest computers in schools were virtually non existent until the early 80's.

My school, which was a well off and fairly advanced direct grant grammar school, was advanced enough to offer computer science A levels, but still did not have a computer. We were in the same position as the poster above, where we wrote out out FORTRAN programs and sent them off, getting the results back for the following week's class. In our final term, we did get one afternoon a month where we went to Lincoln and got to use the county council PDP-8 for an hour. That was in 1977.

Then in Swansea university, doing a degree in Computing (1977-81), we still did not as undergraduates have any internet access. No bulletin boards or email, or anything similar. I presume the research students and professors did, but couldn't swear to it.

I really do not believe that any significant number of UK schoolchildren in the 1970s had internet access available to them.

 

[stephec]

They were shoot

You are the master of the understatement. 😂

 

[Ming the Merciless]

I really do not believe that any significant number of UK schoolchildren in the 1970s had internet access available to them.

Which is different to saying it was one school in the late 70s. Anyway we did and I have no idea how widespread it was. But it doesn’t take away from the fact we had one in a room behind a significant dude under lock and key

 

[presta]

Calculators were not even around when I left school.

I have a feeling that what might have prompted our head of maths to arrange the mechanical adding machine classes was seeing the first calculators appearing in the shops. He was an old guy nearing retirement, and I reckon the thought of people having gadgets in their pockets that would do arithmetic at the push of a button was just too much of a torment. There was only ever one class held, so I assume someone took him to one side and quietly had a word with him.

 

[raleighnut]

I have a feeling that what might have prompted our head of maths to arrange the mechanical adding machine classes was seeing the first calculators appearing in the shops. He was an old guy nearing retirement, and I reckon the thought of people having gadgets in their pockets that would do arithmetic at the push of a button was just too much of a torment. There was only ever one class held, so I assume someone took him to one side and quietly had a word with him.

I had a great Maths teacher at Lutterworth Grammar School for my last 2 years, Mr Thomas was 'Head Of Dept.' and traditionly always took the 2nd highest class (it was a big school with over 4,000 pupils*) He'd always start with 5-10 minutes of random 'mental arithmetic' firing questions out then asking a certain pupil for the answer so everyone had to work it out cos you never knew who he'd expect to answer.
He was a keen Glider pilot (even having his own) and we thought it great to get him talking about this but I worked out that after a couple of minutes he'd be teaching Trigonometry/vectors and speed to distance ratios whilst nattering on about his passionate hobby'

* so big that each year was split in half with about 900 in each split so 4 'Heads of Year' and about 400 'sixth form' with a catchment area that went from the edge of Leicester down to the border with Warwickshire.

 

[Sterlo]

I guess I'm going to find out. My laptop won't do anything, some form of error on starting and says I need to load something or other. Taking it in later today to see what they have to say.

Back in the real virtual world again, new hard drive fitted for £65, which I didn't think was too bad.

 

[matticus]

Google found this:

January 1, 1983 is considered the official birthday of the Internet. Prior to this, the various computer networks did not have a standard way to communicate with each other. A new communications protocol was established called Transfer Control Protocol/Internetwork Protocol (TCP/IP). This allowed different kinds of computers on different networks to "talk" to each other. ARPANET and the Defense Data Network officially changed to the TCP/IP standard on January 1, 1983, hence the birth of the Internet. All networks could now be connected by a universal language.

 

[SpokeyDokey]

Mod note:

To keep the thread on-track I have moved the School Teacher posts to a seperate thread called:

Your Past Schoolteachers - nicknames & memories.

Also in the Cafe section.