Re: Constructed Computer Architectures (Concomps?)

In that case , you may want to google the setun computer for ideas -
this was a ternary logic computer built at Moscow State  in the
50's/60's.  If you want to skip the whole binary/ternary/etc logic,
you might want to look into 'analog computers' (usually used for bomb
sights) and 'real computers' (I don't know of any examples of this,
just a theory right now).

You also mentioned using a new programming language to work on
computers comparable to what we have now - again there are some
hobbyist projects like colorforth and a bootable lisp based floppy for
x86 based machines that would serve as inspiration.

Me, personally, I'd toyed with the idea of programming something
together from the ground up in assembler, using a custom
alphabet/script instead of ascii. But then again, most of my
conlanging in in the early stages, so I'm pretty far away from that.

On Mon, Feb 9, 2009 at 9:39 AM, Mark J. Reed <markjreed@...> wrote:
>  Whether you use prefab IC chips or a breadboard and wires, these
> hobbyists making computers are all making von Neumann machines based
> on binary logic. What we're talking about is either designing
> computers that work on different principles, or just designing new
> programming languages that work on the same kinds of computers we have
> now.  Actually building the former would require much more effort than
> a breadboard CPU; much easier to simulate it on one of these binary
> von Neumann machines we're all typing on. :)
>
> On Mon, Feb 9, 2009 at 9:57 AM, John Osborne <osborne6@...> wrote:
>> You may want to look into some work that hobbyists have already done
>> with that.  A few years ago someone built their own computer, using
>> discreet logic chips:
>>
>> http://www.linuxdevices.com/news/NS5804062141.html
>> http://www.homebrewcpu.com/
>>
>> That would give you the rough idea of what's involved.
>>
>> On Sun, Feb 8, 2009 at 2:44 PM, Paul Bennett <paul.w.bennett@...> wrote:
>>> Where does the design of imaginary computer architectures (and programming
>>> languages) stand in the ranks of con-somethinging?
>>>
>>> It's probably a highly esoteric question, but that's what I'm doing right
>>> now, instead of conlanging: noodling around with a few programming language
>>> designs that each started off as attempts to create notation systems for
>>> specific problems, and dummying up a few completely impractical computers to
>>> do thought experiments on. At the hazy borderlines of the two live my
>>> thoughs of assembler opcodes and register sets (etc) for best implementing a
>>> given language on one of those computers.
>>>
>>> Anyone else ever dug into that sort of stuff?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Paul
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Using Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/mail/
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> John Osborne
>> osborne6@ieee.org/osborne6@gmail.com/jro@freeshell.org
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Mark J. Reed <markjreed@...>
>


--
John Osborne
osborne6@ieee.org/osborne6@gmail.com/jro@freeshell.org

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