% METHOD: Encounter several historical collections of hardware back-to-back

% PDFFIX: 1 \vspace{-4\baselineskip}

% REMEMBER:
% WHAT:
% HOW: This can be done by identifying one or more computer museums and visiting them with little time in-between. Visiting a friend with a large basement and lots of left-over computer equipment can have a similar effect. Seeing and possibly touching hardware from different contexts (state-administration, business, research, ...), periods of time, cultural contexts (California, Germany, French-speaking Belgium) and price ranges allows you to sense the interactions between hardware and software development.

% WHEN:
% WHO:
% URGENCY:
% NOTE: This method offers a perfect opportunity to hear people speak about objects in their contexts, how they worked and did not work and how particular pieces of hardware and software are linked one with another.  It also shows the economic and cultural aspects of softwares.

% PDFFIX: 1 \enlargethispage{4\baselineskip}

% WARNING: **DO NOT FOLD, SPINDLE OR MUTILATE**

% PDFFIX: 1 \newpage


% EXAMPLE: Spaghetti Suitcase

At one point during the demonstration of a Bull computer at the Computer Museum NAM-IP, our museum guide revealed the system's "software" -- a suitcase sized module with dozens of patch cords. She made the comment that the term "spaghetti code" (a derogatory expression for early code that used many "GOTO" statments) had its origin in this physical arrangement of code as patchings.

% SHOW: tgsoimages.svg spaghetticode1 N
% INFO: Spaghetti Codes
% SHOW: tgsoimages.svg spaghetticode2

Preserving old hardware is a means of observing the physical manifestation of software. Operating older computers can result in actually touching software.

% http://gallery.constantvzw.org/index.php/Techno-Galactic-Software-Observatory/PWFU3244
% SHOW: tgsoimages.svg touchingsoftware N
% INFO: Museum guide at NAM-IP touching software.


% EXAMPLE: Play with binary. Create punch cards.

"The highlight of the collection is a recreation of a real punch card workshop of the 1960s."

% http://observatory.constantvzw.org/images/wednesday/P1010145.JPG
% http://observatory.constantvzw.org/images/wednesday/P1010254.JPG
% SHOW: tgsoimages.svg commandpunch N
% INFO: "À la table des manipulations", manually creating punchcards with the EMPUNCH model 80.



% http://observatory.constantvzw.org/images/wednesday/P1040696.JPG
% SHOW: tgsoimages.svg punchcard N
% INFO: TGSO Punchcards

% http://gallery.constantvzw.org/var/resizes/Techno-Galactic-Software-Observatory/IMG_1131.JPG?m=1496916914
% SHOW: tgsoimages.svg bull N
% INFO: Atelier mécanographique Bull

% http://gallery.constantvzw.org/index.php/Techno-Galactic-Software-Observatory/PWFU3273
% http://observatory.constantvzw.org/images/thursday/IMG_20170607_111954_122.jpg
%!SHOW: tgsoimages.svg glitchlogo N

% PDFFIX: 1 \newpage

% EXAMPLE: Collection de la Maison des Écritures d'Informatique & Bible, Maredsous  

The Collection de la Maison des Écritures d'Informatique & Bible was donated to NAM-IP by the _Centre Informatique et Bible_ that was founded in 1979 at the Benedictine abbey of Maredsous. The center was located in the "House of Scripture", a pavilion near the entrance to the abbey, where biblical scholars, linguists and computer scientists applied computer processing to bible-texts and it's references.

The idea of introducing informatics as a method for working with and on the Bible dates back to 1971 when it was done via punch cards and then transferred to the memory of magnetic tape. Then came the step of analyzing texts using computers while at the same time introducing computers to the delights of reading the Bible with the help of Optical Character Recognition. The particularity of this collection lies in the fact that it conserves and presents multiple moments in the life of a text rendered into and analyzed through software,  starting from its initial stages of computerization and going up to contemporary forms of software.

% http://gallery.constantvzw.org/var/resizes/Preparing-the-Techno-galactic-Software-Observatory/DSC05019.JPG?m=1490635726
% SHOW: tgsoimages.svg maredsous N
% INFO: 'Maredsous 89. 15 ans d'Informatique et Bible' ('Maredsous 89. 15 years of informatics and bible')

% http://gallery.constantvzw.org/index.php/Techno-Galactic-Software-Observatory/PWFU3267
% http://gallery.constantvzw.org/index.php/Techno-Galactic-Software-Observatory/PWFU3271
% SHOW: tgsoimages.svg lexique N
% INFO: Continuous form paper with lexical research and a copy of the _Interface Bulletin_, published by the Centre Informatique et Bible: http://www.cibmaredsous.be/cib3000.htm

% RELATESTO: http://pad.constantvzw.org/p/observatory.guide.jean.heuns

% PDFFIX: 1 \newpage

% SOURCE: [Machines à cartes perforées de marque Bull](http://www.histoireinform.com/Histoire/+Infos/jmclcadr.htm)