FPGA

[Jared]

Oh, dear. It's easy to see I'm excited because I accidentally
sent the previous e-mail while still editing it. Well, I'll
finish it by adding the missing URL at the end of the email:

> Now, if that did not convince you, here is one of the most
> interesting things you have ever seen, in the way of computers.
> It is one of the oldest mechanical computers ever built,
> and, it was ternary.

http://www.mortati.com/glusker/fowler/

This is truly one of the most intriguing things I have come
upon in my life. Take a moment to consider this computer,
designed in the 1830s.

Yes, 1 8 3 0 s.

It is possible to emulate a whole bunch of these in an FPGA.
Anyone want to dig in to this FPGA project, which is entirely
over my head, but with a handful of us, might get interesting?

Here is a starting point:

http://www.trinary.cc/
http://web.archive.org/web/20070315212305/http://www.niisi.ru/old/pap_for.htm

(This is to address Oren's concern that we don't _do_ much
'round here, for I am 100% certain that it will be seen in
the future as one very interesting thing that KCLUG did, back
in the day. Even just talking about it is enough.)

The fork of Linux which would run on this system? We could
call it Trinux? It would actually not be a fork, but I hadda
think of some way to bring this around to on-topic...

Although Linux would be able to run on it, now that I come
to think about it. Hmmm... That's a ways off...

-Jared