Touring TNMOC with a living legend
Computer Science geek history openuk · 600 words
This is a retropost. It was written in 2022, but published later.
Well, that was the most bizarre day. A few days ago, Amanda Brock - the CEO of OpenUK - asked if I'd be on a podcast. I agreed, and offered up my office's media studio for the recording. Then she asked if it was OK if Bruce Perens came to record an episode.
Errr... OMG, yes!
So I got to spend 10 minutes showing Bruce around the GDS office, gushing about how much open source stuff we did - then got to watch him record a podcast.
Amanda - who has has a canny eye for when people are slightly star-struck - asked if I'd like to interview Bruce at the weekend. At the National Museum of Computing. For a new exhibition.
Errr... OMG, yes!
So me and Lowena Hull got to spend some time chatting to Bruce on camera about his involvement in open source, the early days of Debian, and why OSS is still relevant today.
Doing some filming with @BrucePerens & @LowenaHull for @openuk_uk. Thanks to @tnmoc for the great location! pic.x.com/nk4ihohh0t
We had a good rambling chat - the majority of which never made it off the cutting room flaw. He was such an eloquent speaker - always taking a moment to marshal his thoughts and knowing exactly when to finish his soliloquy.
It was a fairly long and tiring afternoon. But we had just enough time to take a wander through TNMOC. Bruce - like lots of elder-statesgeeks - seemed to be in 7th heaven. I got a running commentary of "Wow! You know, I had an early one of these..." and "I think I've still got the original one in my attic..." and "When I worked at Pixar, I was chatting to Steve [Jobs] about this and we both thought it was pretty nifty..." along with the obligatory "Why is a slide-rule in a museum?"
I watched him go toe-to-toe with the geeks who maintain Colossus - discussing the intricacies of synchronising tape speeds, various Baudot codes, and where valves / tubes could still be acquired from.
I saw him in a spirited discussion about various flavours of ALGOL and the mechanics of repairing a filesystem on hard-drives the same height as a man.
We had an interesting chat about IBM and their complicity in the Nazi regime's use of Hollerith cards. And I got to give him a précis of the BBC Micro's impact on the UK.
He asked me to take a few photos of him standing by ancient monuments of technology
1/2 Somehow I walked all of the way through @bletchleypark today without noticing any mention that the machines they talk about are actually operating next door at @tnmoc, due to the effort of incredibly skilled volunteers. And there is no flow between the two museums. Please ... pic.x.com/w11orscof9
And, at the end of the day, he shook my hand and thanked me for showing him such a great time.
What a delightful person.
