CARDIAC paper computer emulator

Posted by Cory Doctorow, June 3, 2009 10:11 PM | permalink

Mark sez, "The recent post of the CARDIAC Unboxing [ed: the CARDIAC being a cardboard teaching computer that Bell Labs released in the late 60s] made me poke my father, who has written a CARDIAC emulator that actually looks like the real CARDIAC, to put together a webpage with the source of it. Both his childhood and mine were definitely influenced by this little wonder out of Bell Labs, so for those who can't get the cardboard variant, here's the software one, along with a scan of the original CARDIAC manual."

CARDIAC: (CARDboard Illustrative Aid to Computation) (Thanks, Mark!)

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Discussion

Take a look at this

#1 posted by Pantograph, June 3, 2009 11:34 PM

Sure, anybody can make a computer using computer magic. Now let's see you make one out of cardboard. (Seriously, aren't there papercraft models out there?)

Take a look at this

#2 posted by cmpalmer, June 4, 2009 9:33 AM

Check out the PDF of the original manual for a amazingly sexist flowchart on fixing a flat tire...

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Yes
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Take a look at this

#3 posted by Marc Kelsey, June 4, 2009 9:52 AM

@1:

You can get some PDFs to make a CARDIAC from here:

http://kylewiki.mine.nu/wiki/Cardiac_Computer

(I haven't built it, so I can't vouch for it).

There is no manual with these, so you should grab that from the link in the post.

Take a look at this

#4 posted by tomhiggins, June 4, 2009 5:41 PM

After years of tracking resources about this device I have to say this last week has been a gold rush of goodness. The links on this new page are amazingly useful, thank you much for posting it up.

Stay tuned for the video tutorials, we found the tripod so the video quality will be better than before...maybe.

Take a look at this

#5 posted by tomhiggins, June 4, 2009 9:51 PM

I didi build a paper version of the CARDIAC from some pdfs I found a year or so back. It worked, but paper was not the way to go. Get yourself some good cardstock. I am working up an idea to build a bigger version of the device for teaching.