atomicthumbs

remote sensing practicioner

gregarious canid. avatar by ISANANIKA.


Website League address
@wolf@forest.stream
send me an email
atomicthumbs@wolf.observer
twitter but hopefully i only post photos there in the future
twitter.com/atomicthumbs
newsletter!! this one will let me tell you where i go
buttondown.com/atomicthumbs
newsletter rss same thing
buttondown.com/atomicthumbs/rss
Website League (centralized federation social media project)
websiteleague.org/
Push Processing (Website League photography instance)
pushprocess.ing/
88x31 button embed code
<a href="https://wolf.observer/88x31"><img src="https://wolf.observer/images/wolf-88x31.png" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"></a>
forest.stream (general admission website league instance)
forest.stream/
bluesky (probably just for photos)
bsky.app/profile/wolf.observer
this will be a cohost museum someday
cohost.rip/

stepleton
@stepleton

I wrote some software to simulate a flag flying in a breeze. The simulation runs on a network of seven transputers, which are CPUs designed for parallel processing by INMOS of Bristol, England. They were around from the mid '80s to the mid '90s, and INMOS built an entire computing infrastructure for them, from the silicon up. One major component was the programming language occam, which had parallel processing and channel-based inter-process communication built in.

Very few personal computers or workstations used transputers as their sole or primary CPU, although some existed (e.g.). Most people had a setup similar to mine, which establishes a network of transputers as an auxiliary compute engine for a more conventional computer, similar to how GPUs are sometimes used in a modern desktop. A popular way to accomplish this was with an ISA bus expansion card like the INMOS B008 in my late-'80s IBM PC/AT, seen in the picture above with seven TRAMs installed. ("TRAM" is short for "transputer module" --- a self-contained circuit board with a transputer CPU and some RAM.)

I wrote a detailed README about the program, with digressions about transputing and occam. It's here: https://github.com/stepleton/flag/blob/main/README.md

There's also a short YouTube teaser video that shows the flag simulation running: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZY-cUEJT1XQ


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