Talk:AN/FSQ-32

SAGE "abolished" in the 1960s statement is incorrect
The SAGE system, from what I recall, was removed in the early 1980s to be replaced by the AN/FYQ-93 Joint Surveillance System (which I worked on at the Northwest Air Defense Sector, currently called the Western Air Defense Sector). The removal of the statement would leave a hole I'm unsure of how to fill, however. Murasaki66 (talk) 22:37, 27 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks for catching this. You are correct. Please check what I've written for accuracy according to your recollection. I was on the USAF Q-32 team at SDC from early 60s to 69. The Q-32 was intended to replace the Q-7 in SAGE, but I don't recall why they changed that direction. Thanks. Afaprof01 (talk) 00:51, 28 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Sounds right, though my own experience is simply from talking to other techs who worked on the SAGE before it was replaced. My only experience is with the Q-93, other than seeing a few pictures and bits of the old SAGE equipment sitting on some older technicians' desks. Murasaki66 (talk) 03:24, 4 September 2009 (UTC)


 * I joined SDC in 1969. The prototype Q-7 was still in operation at SDC then, though I was told that it took 1/3 of the power of the City of Santa Monica to run it and that Edison had to be told in advance when it was turned on or off.  I remember walking **through** it--carefully guided--once when it was running.  Some years later--can't say exactly when--I saw stacks of vacuum-tube-based parts just sitting on our parking lot as scrap.  It is my understanding that only one Q-32 was built.  As it was said to be a transistorized Q-7, its design would have been obsolete when it arrived at SDC.LM6407 (talk) 09:20, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

Timesharing used ASR-33s
I used this system at SDC in 1968, and I want to add that time sharing was by means of at least 30 ASR-33 teletypes scattered around the building and probably in remote locations. The primary programming language was TINT (Teletype INTerpreter), a BASIC-like interpreted language. It also had a small number of vector graphics displays with lightpens, and someone had written a tic tac toe game for them. I know all this to be factual but have not met the Wikipedia level of verification. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Betamarx (talk • contribs) 00:42, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

I also used this system at SDC briefly several months after joining the R&D Division in 1969. I knew GE-235 BASIC and wanted to see if I could find something like that at SDC (hardly knowing the history of time-sharing at that moment in my career!) A colleague led me to the second floor of the Q-7A Building at SDC into a very cold room with an enormous amount of air conditioning, several large, round-screened graphics terminals, and a few teletype terminals. (I noticed the absence of paper tape, which had been on the GE-235 teletypes.) I used TINT via a teletype; TINT was somewhat like early GE-235 BASIC but even more limited. I did not use the graphics terminals and don't recall seeing them live. (The room was probably as cold as it was because the vacuum-tube-based graphics terminals were off; all that air conditioning had been for them.) That room remained as it was until 1974, when it was rebuilt to house a commercial sound-isolating booth and a PDP-11/40 minicomputer system for SDC's work on the ARPA Speech Understanding Research (SUR) project. (The booth, with the computer visible outside through windows, was used as a set for a science-fiction movie starring Peter Graves in 1974 or 1975.) In summary, then, Q-32 time-sharing went off the air after 1969 and before 1974 to my personal knowledge.LM6407 (talk) 09:08, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

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