Rick's b.log - entry 2025/07/10

Retro blogging

For everybody else, enjoy!

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jgh, 10th July 2025, 20:42

Have you tried mdfs dot net slash tty. Very carefully crafted to replicate that non-perfect impact reproduction and worn print head experience. An inadvertange click-wheelscroll will give you that mis-fed paper feeling as well.

jgh, 10th July 2025, 20:45

When I got my first typewriter when aged 8 I learned and practiced by typing up nursery stories from memory. The earliest I can remember was the Three Little Pigs. I then graduated to transcribing a list of Dr Who episodes I'd got so that I could continue it with additional episodes as they were transmitted.    I started writing school projects before graduating to EDWORD.

C Ferris, 11th July 2025, 08:47

Did you scan or take a image of the paper and then use OCR or just retype to get txt file?

Bernard, 12th July 2025, 00:45

I was lucky enough to be bequeathed my long-deceased grandfather's Blickensderfer Featherweight (1915, see pic in Wikipedia) which had been round the forests of imperial Burma. It featured an exchangeable type-head, as re-invented decades later in IBM's Selectric machines. I used it from 11 to 13 when grateful parents donated a brand new Imperial (!) Good Companion 4 -- on condition I learnt to touch-type, a skill that has been extremely useful for both text and code.

jgh, 12th July 2025, 21:20

Yes, I omitted that I started aged 8 on a plastic (really!) typewriter, looking at Google Images probably branded "Petite", and not only no 1 or 0, but no digit keys at all! You pressed Q to P in conjuction with a "Symbol" key! Predated Sinclair by three or four years. :)    I graduated onto a lump of iron Remmington "International". It was too heavy to take to university, so somebody in the family gave me a tiny hand-held "journalist's" typewriter. That got me through essay writing until I could get to a Beeb with a printer.    One of the annoying things about university was that after several years of word processing and printing stuff, I was forced to go back to typewritering because I had no access to "proper" computing resources. It took me over a year to save up to replace what I'd had access to previously in school.

Rick, 12th July 2025, 21:52

Colin: I had the paper as an image, obviously because it's here, so I just tossed it into the Google Translate app and copied the original language text, then fixed up all the stuff it wasn't able to recognise like the fractions and dashes.    Bernard: That Blickensderfer is quite a beast, and I note intentionally not QWERTY.    My very first typewriter was brought over from Japan (by somebody that worked on a cruise ship). It was a Brother EP-20, a dinky little battery powered thing that output a ridiculously low quality nine dot matrix type using either a special thermal ribbon (that you could unwind to read what had been printed) or directly onto thermal paper (like fax roll).  The person that got it thought it was my kind of weird. 😉 He was right. Unfortunately it stopped working a long long time ago so I no longer have it. But, really, the output was kind of lame, but I guess not bad for purely electric given it was 1983. Here's some information along with a print sample: https://typewriterdatabase.com/1983-brother-ep20.22043.typewriter

Joseps, 14th July 2025, 22:54

Delightful. I was totally not expecting this, and what a trip has been back in time.    I have in the attic tree machines (at least), two I personally used as a youngster at the family office back in the day, a mechanical Olivetti Linea (omnipresent here) and a early electric (before screens, memory and other technological advances. Just some electrons launching the classic hammers. Truly similar to the mechanical one until you get close.    Those were still very in use until an ink printer for the 386 joined the party. I also have a very ancient model, early XX century probably in its carry case that I have never seen used. I should get that one out some day and see at least what it is.    I must say, I am honestly impressed for the typing quality of such a substantial page you shared. I typed a few paragraphs in the mechanical one maybe a year ago, when I moved them upstairs to make room for me at mom's , and it was quite difficult to get any kind of rhythm. The electrical one, on the other hand, was pretty easy to catch, and a fairly easy way to get the job done. Bad thing being that even for that early design, the pages are way more uniform and boring that what you produce with the muscle randomized force.

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