DarrenBarefoot.com

Avoiding more pressing matters since 2020

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My Oldest Computer File is Nearly 22 Years Old

That’s a bit crazy, isn’t it?

As I just mentioned, I got a new computer. In moving all the files from Viola to Horatio (yes, I name all my digital devices after Shakespeare characters), I visited my oldest archives, which live in F:Backup, August 2, 2004DarrenArchives, 1984-2000Converted Files84-89RTF.

The file itself is a very short, uh, essay, entitled “Adults”. I posted it back in 2003. Journey back in time and visit DarrenBarefoot.com 2.0 if you’re interested in reading it.
Technically speaking, of course, the file on my new computer is a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of copy (and so forth) of the original file, which first lived on a floppy disk. I may actually still have that floppy disk (it looked a lot like this one), but I definitely have a copy of the file.

What can I say? I’m a digital packrat.

9 comments

  1. I have scans from a student newspaper I was involved in from the fall of 1982 on my computers, but the scans are relatively recent. And there’s an anthropology paper from 1989. Most of my archives start at 1990, however.

  2. I wrote my first computer game in 1975. It lived on a long narrow strip of paper with millions of holes punched in it. It’s too bad I don’t still have that file, but I doubt that paper tape would fit in a USB port anyway.

  3. I believe my oldest program is on a tape (!) at my parents’ house. Vic 20 program — probably from 1981 or so.

  4. My Master’s Thesis is on early Wordperfect punched out on a PCJr with a whopping 128K of RAM. Circa, 1984-85, Unfortunately I think its on a 5 1/4 floppy

  5. My oldest file is a Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy game (one of those “You are standing in an empty room. There is a door to your left.” ones) on a 5.25″ floppy from about 1985.

  7. Excellent title and description of being a digital packrat. Moving data along to new drives is the right choice for accessibility in the future. Now the question each of us has to ask is — what is the probability of actually using that Visicalc spreadsheet from 1983 or the WordStar document from 1982?

  8. I have sidekick from 1985 on my hds, this is the oldest one, if you disregard scanned documents of older date.

  9. The oldest file I have is from 1979, it’s a misc data file I have just sitting in a folder on my HD.

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