The Elderly Gentleman's Club or Old Farts

[Gogs]

Dan you are more than welcome, and Jim I never thought about the effect anouncing this heading would have on young children, or for that matter, imagine if the "Womans Guild" and local Vicar were round and it suddenly announced this thread.

[Gogs]

...........................I tried to find the original post, which was something like "confused", the one where we all got it so wrong that started this topic. Could not find it. If you know where it is please place a link as I still laugh thinking about it.

I found it, if anyone is interested here it is Confused beginner.

[Gogs]

Discovered another part of this BBS which will cast your mind back.

If you click on "HomeSeer Message Board" at the top of this page, then scroll down to the bottom and click on a user, preferably yourself, there is an option to Find all threads started by.

It allows you to go back to the very first posts you ever made on this BBS, can be embarrassing at times when you read what you posted so long ago.

Just thought I would through that in.

[Bill Brower]

It allows you to go back to the very first posts you ever made on this BBS, can be embarrassing at times when you read what you posted so long ago.

Just thought I would through that in.

"Wow --- X10 is cool. When does X11 come out?" ~Gogs June 14,1998

[HiTech]

Bill, "you make me raugh" (Do you remember the old movie with Tom Hanks?) I always enjoy your humor!

Which reminds me of a time when I was working in the cable company's local origination studio. I was repairing a JVC 3/4 inch Umatic video machine. I needed a part and the service manual described it as a "reaf spring", I called my parts supplier and he laughed so hard... I never heard the end of it, you mean you need a leaf spring, translated from Japanese. LOL

Rick

[The Ol Alfer]

Wow

The collective brain power here, even if some were born before the 60's ( you know if you remember them you wern't there ) is mind blowing. No wonder this board is so good.

Born 1951, turned radios into scrap as an 8 year old trying to figure them out,had an alarm in my room that drove my mother nuts when she could not turn it off, ONLY once. Man did that hurt.

Used an old telegraph key ( ya this was before text msg's via cell ) to control an extension phone in my room. Remote speakers to play Christmas songs outdoors for my mother ( made up for the room alarm )

Been a Ham since don't know when, started HA with relay board I built to run off an Apple II. then moved on to X10. then to HS.

Had the first licenced low powered TV station in Canada, had a satellite TV business, and then alarm co.

Worked the last 20 years out of 30 in a video surveillance unit for a provincial police agency ....

Boy this is fun !!!

[Gogs]

I still have my Sinclair which runs a large model train setup!

I missed this post. Any chance of posting a couple of photographs of your train set?

[ptran0]

Ummm couldn't remember the year, but I start with BSR module, using CP290 hook up to Comondore 64.
Matter of fact I'm still using CP290 for backup incase M$ machine crash. Schedule for turn on the bed room light in the weekday morning.( got to get up make the doughnut)

[Gogs]

In the timespan of computers and "home electronics" a lot of time has passed since HomeSeer first raised it's ugly head, and a lot of changes have happened to it.

When was the first release of HomeSeer to the unexpecting public?

Is there anyone still on this BBS, the two R's excepted (Unless of course they stuck to something like Zeus or Automated Home until someone else tested it ) who installed the original version, and if so how did it go?

This thread has allowed myself, and probably others to have a good laugh at the past, lets try and keep it going.

Thanks to PGRAY007 for the original post that we messed up, and of course to Rupp, Smoothlk and myself for creating the confusion and allowing the "Covered Wagon" to come into existance.

[stevene]

I don't know what the original version was, I purchased homseer in april 1999 for 29.95.

I don't remember the version # but it has changed a lot since then.

StevenE

[Gogs]

Tink,

When was the first release of HomeSeer?

[dcjohnston]

I guess my first "home automation" project was attaching a clothespin relay to a buzzer that attached to my BMX bike outside so that if someone stole my bike it would set off the alarm. That was in 1980 or so.

I remember using a version of Homeseer back in late 1998. I was using "Automated Home" functions for some code also. AH.writelog or something like that.

My first true automation was with a free app that I got with a sound card I bought called "Peety Parrot." The application allowed you to execute applications using voice control. I then learned that I could attach a CM-11a and send command line commands to control my lights.

Up went my microphone in the middle of my one bedroom apartment in Huntsville Alabama. So when ever I went into the room I told Peety to turn on the bedroom light and there it was. Then Peety would talk back in this really bad parrot voice, "Lights are now on Dave." Today I use less VR and more Motion sensor, but have always been intrigued by VR. After seeing Ironman the movie, I am now inspired to use some VR in the house but not sure of how to get started.

About two months of this passed and a quick search led me to a site that had some automation software, Keware, as they were called, had this application called Homeseer that I downloaded and went on trial to use and the rest is history.

[neiltimms]

A quick search of the web reveals that HS version 1.2 (posted April 15th 1999) is still available to download here! http://www.freedownloadscenter.com/A...ogies_LLC.html

[completelyhis]

OK Gogs, YOU ASKED FOR IT!


I first begin messin' with electronics when I was in the second grade ('82, so I'm probably a "young 'un by some standards). I remember stealing all the electrical toys I could get away with stealing from my brothers. I would sneak them up to my secret labratory in the attic where they would promptly be completely dissassembled and sorted into parts bins. My friends and I spent all recess at school assembling our own creations, most of them motorized vehicles, but I remember the one I was most proud of was a battery powered pencil sharpener. Doesn't sound that impressive, but I was a second grader, and it was a contraption that loaded pencils into a manual sharpener, sharpened them for 10 seconds, then removed them from the pencil sharpener. the footprint on this thing had to be over 1' foot. it used a big 6v battery and would take a whole pile of dull pencils and put them into a new pile of freshly sharpened pencils. When I unveiled my masterpiece during recess there was a huge line of people with their dull pencils wanting to see this thing work.

My son (10) has recently been coming to me with drawings of "crazy" ideas of things he wants to build. We've had a lot of fun turning those ideas into reality (the hardest part is to get him to make his ideas more reality based...he seems more interested in pokemon and lazer beams than pencil sharpeners!)

anyway, when my mom found out i was cannabalizing all my siblings toys, she, being a single mom, took me to her dad, whom all of us grandkids had a healthy fear/respect for. I remember sitting in the parlor of his house, staring at all the nicknacks my grandma collected, hoping he wouldn't be too mad at me. I could hear voices in the other room, but I couldn't make out what they were actually saying.

After what seemed like an eternity mom and grandpa came out, she went in the other room to spend some time with my grandma, and then a life changing event took place: My grandpa, a man who did not especially enjoy the company of young children, told me to follow him. As we walked down the hallway my heart began to race. Was I going to get spanked? I was shocked when he grabbed the door handle of his computer room and turning to me, he said, "why don't you come in with me for a while and we'll have a talk."

You need to understand, my grandfather was a retired IBM service technician. He had not been retired for too horribly long at this point, and had served as a repair man for decades. He used to work on computers when you would walk into them, because they were stored in a seperate building!

He NEVER allowed ANY kid in his computer room! I could not believe he was inviting me to go with him. It felt surreal. What followed was a wonderful journey not only of learning about computers from him, but I learned so much about my grandfather himself, his childhood, his experiences, his joys. I got to know him in that 10 x 20 room filled with at least 8 whole computers and who knows how many parts. He taught to be a master of every DOS command and process known. He taught me every GUI OS available at that time - OS2 warp and Atari (the PC, not the game platform) being the two more memorable.

He taught me about every component of a PC - what it did and how it did it. He taught me how to assemble and trouble shoot pcs (I remember he and I standing there with smiles on our faces counting trouble code beeps (long and short) and looking up what the trouble code was. Man those were good times.

Every now and then I call him up and ask his advice on a problem I'm working on. And he does the same for me. He loves to come over and explore "Alfred" (our home automation PC). He gets such a look of pride on his face...I can't really explain it.

I have a picture of me in his computer room as a young teenager somewhere...I'll see if I can find it and post it here, just for fun.

[jay]

That is one wonderful story!