HPCC Mini-Conference (Virtual) on this Saturday, 9 January

[rprosperi]

HPCC will be hosting a virtual mini-conference this Saturday, from 15:00-18:00 BST(UTC+1), (or 10:00am - 1:00pm EDT, etc.) similar to the wildly popular virtual conference held in October.

There will be presentations by Cyrille de Brebisson of HP and Eric Smith, author of the well-known Nonpareil Nut Emulation software. There will also be plenty of time for Q&A with the presenters and others on these and other calculator-related topics.

Please see the HPCC website conference page (http://hpcc.org/conferences/index.html) for the agenda and more details. Previously registered folks will be attending via Webex, however HPCC has once again worked with Eric Rechlin to have his hpcalc.org YouTube page live-stream the event, so any and all are welcome to watch and submit questions through the YT live chat feature. The live-stream will be at this address: https://youtu.be/fmyvilGbIgU

We hope you can attend and participate, and look forward to seeing you on Saturday.

For HPCC,

--bob

[Paul Dale]

In my local time: midnight to 3am. I might possibly be awake at midnight (but it is oft dubious). I definitely won't be awake at 3am.

I am willing to stay up late for such meetings, as I've done for UK gatherings in another hobby. I'm less willing to get up really early for the same. However, this isn't feasible for those of us in Oz

Still, I've little to contribute to the mentioned presentations so my absence will likely not be missed.

At some point, I'd like to present my "Dunning-Kruger and Cryptography" talk. It's not calculator related but it is a fun and irreverent discussion about something topical.

Pauli

[Mark Power]

Timing the conferences to suit Europe, the Americas and Asia-Pacific is a problem!

For Paul and others in Australia and New Zealand, the session will be recorded for playback on YouTube.

Mark

[Massimo Gnerucci]

Thanks for the head-up, Bob!

[Paul Dale]

I know that it is impossible to schedule for Europe, the US and Oz simultaneously.
We always seem to be left last on the list

Regardless, it's far better than not having a meeting.


Pauli

[EdS2]

I've got a bit of a diary clash - the YouTube side of this is much appreciated!

Bob, you give the times in BST, but it's winter now, so I think we need times in GMT, which matches UTC.

[Mark Power]

Just a quick correction on timing (my fault, not Bob's):

15:00-18:00 GMT(UTC), (or 10:00am - 1:00pm EDT, etc.)

Los Angeles 07:00am (07:00)
Berlin 04:00pm (16:00)

Regards, Mark.

[Massimo Gnerucci]

(01-08-2021 08:03 AM)Paul Dale Wrote:  I know that it is impossible to schedule for Europe, the US and Oz simultaneously.
We always seem to be left last on the list :(

Time to MOVE THAT CONTINENT!

:)

[aurelio]

(01-08-2021 12:43 PM)Massimo Gnerucci Wrote:  

(01-08-2021 08:03 AM)Paul Dale Wrote:  I know that it is impossible to schedule for Europe, the US and Oz simultaneously.
We always seem to be left last on the list

Time to MOVE THAT CONTINENT!

I wish myself to be able to move, one day, to that Continent, Massimo

[Massimo Gnerucci]

(01-08-2021 01:16 PM)aurelio Wrote:  

(01-08-2021 12:43 PM)Massimo Gnerucci Wrote:  Time to MOVE THAT CONTINENT!

:)

I wish myself to be able to move, one day, to that Continent, Massimo :)

Thought about it, some 30 years ago.
Now they would not need me anymore, I'm sure.

[John Keith]

(01-08-2021 12:43 PM)Massimo Gnerucci Wrote:  Time to MOVE THAT CONTINENT!

Nature is working on it, may take a while though.

Looking forward to tomorrow's conference.

[Sylvain Cote]

(01-08-2021 10:26 PM)John Keith Wrote:  

(01-08-2021 12:43 PM)Massimo Gnerucci Wrote:  Time to MOVE THAT CONTINENT!

Nature is working on it, may take a while though.

Firmware upgraded will be needed for all calculators: January 9, 10456987

[mfleming]

(01-08-2021 12:43 PM)Massimo Gnerucci Wrote:  

(01-08-2021 08:03 AM)Paul Dale Wrote:  I know that it is impossible to schedule for Europe, the US and Oz simultaneously.
We always seem to be left last on the list

Time to MOVE THAT CONTINENT!

I pine for the good old days when the Earth was flat and 8 AM was 8 AM EVERYWHERE!

[teenix]

(01-09-2021 04:11 AM)mfleming Wrote:  I pine for the good old days when the Earth was flat and 8 AM was 8 AM EVERYWHERE!

With all the conspiracy theories gaining traction these days, maybe the earth isn't round after all :-)

cheers

Tony

[Chr Yoko]

(01-08-2021 09:18 AM)Mark Power Wrote:  Just a quick correction on timing (my fault, not Bob's):

15:00-18:00 GMT(UTC), (or 10:00am - 1:00pm EDT, etc.)

Los Angeles 07:00am (07:00)
Berlin 04:00pm (16:00)

Regards, Mark.

Thanks for the heads-up, will try to connect at 16:00 Paris Time.
But as curfew only starts at 20:00 here, i might go out a bit and watch on replay instead.
(on some places, curfew starts at 18:00...)

[Eric Rechlin]

For those who missed the mini-conference, the recorded livestream is available to watch at the URL above, and the two talks can be watched separately (and in somewhat higher quality) here:

Cyrille de Brébisson - What's New at HP Calculators and What Isn't: discussions of operations of large corporations, HP calculators, and telescopes.

Eric Smith - Math Coprocessors Before the x86: an overview of floating point hardware from the 1930s to the 1990s

[EdS2]

Thanks Eric! (And thanks to the organising team and the speakers of course.)

I see these two videos have a searchable transcript, which is very handy, even if inevitably imperfect.

At about the 10min mark of Cyrille's talk we hear his take on which calculators are in production, and what CPUs they have inside them. (ARM, and 8051, apparently.) After that we hear how the two major app stores will drop apps which are not frequently updated and rebuilt.

(Previously people have declared that it's a 6502-like CPU, which I tend to believe, so I'm not sure about this 8051 claim, even if it is from Cyrille! It seems it is a SunPlus chip, and they do offer both cores, in different products.)

[Giancarlo]

Hello,
i just would like to thank for the organisation of this confernece and having it available both in direct and as video on youtube.

i really appreciated Cyrille for his speach. it has been something very special for me after one full year of speculation about why there were no releases of new firmware for the Prime.
I am not thinking that the Prime had so many severe bugs to fix, however in the last years i measured HP heartbeat with the pace of new releases and new calculators.

just to better explain, Cyrille didn't promise to release soon a new update; at least we understood why there were no updates in the last year.

It is not clear to me and i think to nobody, when Cyrille and Tim will fully dedicate to calculators again.

that said i am happy for having these virtual conferences; i know that a lot of people will shout because the real conference is something else but for europeans during the pandemic, i think this is the best thing we can ask.

sorry for this comments; i was just trying to let you know that comunication for HP would be necessary to show that the calculator division is still alive.

I really apreciated,

giancarlo

[grsbanks]

Still alive but very, very constrained. Cyrille and Tim were allowed to continue their work on calculators as long as they prioritised other duties that are more important to HP these days. That means that calculators are so far on the back burner that you need a telescope to see them. Good job Cyrille builds the things...

[Massimo Gnerucci]

Mice first, calculators eventually...