The Lemon Fool

A somewhat curious hybrid,

After many centuries of using the reliable soroban (Japanese abacus), many Japanese were skeptical when the newfangled calculators were introduced. They did not fully trust the calculator and would use the abacus to check their results!

https://retrocalculators.com/digicus.htm

Julian F. G. W.

Fascinating!

The website really lives up to its 'retro' name. Loading the home page takes many minutes, with each picture downloading a line at a time. It was like being transported back to 1995!

Watis

I have only recently ditched my trusty yellow metal log-log slide rule* in its posh leather case.
It was a wrench to lose it as it called to mind all sorts of fond memories (hmm..) of college life.

* - slipstick for US readers

I still have my slide rule form O-level maths days... and it seems my brother's as well!

I never use it, but every so often I play with it to relive that bygone era. And reaklsiehow pathetically unspecific it is! LOL

Why have 2 dp when you can have 7 ?

(compared to calculators!)

didds

didds wrote:I still have my slide rule form O-level maths days... and it seems my brother's as well!

I never use it, but every so often I play with it to relive that bygone era. And reaklsiehow pathetically unspecific it is! LOL

You were looky. We 'ad to go out into t'woods and cut down t'trees so we could have our very own log tables. And after we'd finished eating our lunch on them, we had to do calculations on them.

Back in 1964, a sage-green and white Faber Castell slide rule was a sleek and very coveted reminder that it was possible to make things of real beauty that also did something useful. I still have mine.

Mind you, our maths teacher (a proper old-time sadist, with a mortar board and a fearsome reputation for classroom violence) would never let us even attempt a calculation, with either a slide rule or a log table, until we'd "roughed out" the result we expected to achieve - at least to the point of getting the decimal points in the right places. I hated the old bastard more than almost any of my other teachers, but at least I'll never be the checkout assistant who tries to bill a customer for £3,543 for a bag of courgettes and a couple of lemons.

BJ

Ooo... log tables.... lost mine ages ago, but for some reaso0n my wife's log tables are available ... the irony being is that she alwatys found maths a challenge and I doubt (bless) her she ever understood how to use them (but that's not a light hearted reminiscence and is for another less pleasant thread on another day... maybe...)

didds

stewamax wrote:I have only recently ditched my trusty yellow metal log-log slide rule* in its posh leather case.
It was a wrench to lose it as it called to mind all sorts of fond memories (hmm..) of college life.

* - slipstick for US readers

* 'Guessing stick' for UK readers.

Why would you want to slide a rule?

(Only joking, we had white plastic ones and I remember slide rule lessons in the 70s).

https://images.app.goo.gl/HDDkZFAuTLSeBJCR8

I wonder if this actually works?

https://images.app.goo.gl/pnyD1EBJ6Dn3XxWj6

monabri wrote:Why would you want to slide a rule?

(Only joking, we had white plastic ones and I remember slide rule lessons in the 70s).

https://images.app.goo.gl/HDDkZFAuTLSeBJCR8

I still have one somewhere. My sister bought me one for Christmas and, although they were taken over by calculators before I would have used one at school, I found it quite interesting learning how to use it. I remember seeing a range of different ones on sale in W. H. Smith when I was in my teens.

monabri wrote:I wonder if this actually works?

https://images.app.goo.gl/pnyD1EBJ6Dn3XxWj6

It has a hole in the top for the coffee and there is a handle so you don't burn your hands picking it up so the answer is probably yes, it works. It looks like just a printed mug, though, with no moving parts.

Julian F. G. W.