Write Only was Re: Routers vs. PC's for routing - was list problems?

Fri May 24 05:11:11 UTC 2002

In a silly and useless off topic thread ...

I found the reference. It was Signetics, not NS.

http://sunsite.informatik.rwth-aachen.de/jargon300/write-onlymemory.html

   write-only memory: n. The obvious antonym to `read-only
   memory'.  Out of frustration with the long and seemingly useless
   chain of approvals required of component specifications, during
   which no actual checking seemed to occur, an engineer at Signetics
   once created a specification for a write-only memory and included
   it with a bunch of other specifications to be approved.  This
   inclusion came to the attention of Signetics management only
   when regular customers started calling and asking for pricing
   information.  Signetics published a corrected edition of the data
   book and requested the return of the `erroneous' ones.  Later,
   around 1974, Signetics bought a double-page spread in "Electronics"
   magazine's April issue and used the spec as an April Fools' Day
   joke.  Instead of the more conventional characteristic curves, the
   25120 "fully encoded, 9046 x N, Random Access, write-only-memory"
   data sheet included diagrams of "bit capacity vs. Temp.",
   "Iff vs. Vff", "Number of pins remaining vs. number of socket
   insertions", and "AQL vs. selling price".  The 25120 required a
   6.3 VAC VFF supply, a +10V VCC, and VDD of 0V, +/- 2%.

--On Friday, 24 May 2002 04:50 +0000 "Joseph T. Klein" <jtk at titania.net> wrote:

> Didn't National Semiconductor have a spec sheet for write only memory
> back in the late 70s or early 80s?
>
> I think they developed it for the NSA.
>
> --On Thursday, 23 May 2002 14:53 -0700 Dan Hollis <goemon at anime.net> wrote:
>
>>
>> On Thu, 23 May 2002, Jason K. Schechner wrote:
>>> On Thu, 23 May 2002, Dan Hollis wrote:
>>> > On Thu, 23 May 2002, Steven J. Sobol wrote:
>>> > > Can you set flash drives to be write-only?
>>> > Why would you want to do this?
>>> Logging.  If a h at xx0r cracks your box he can't erase anything that's
>>> already been written there.  Often it takes a physical change (jumper,
>>> dipswitch, etc) to change from write-only to read-only making it pretty
>>> tough for the h at xx0r to cover his steps.
>>
>> Eh? Setting a flash drive to *write-only* would fix this how? Why would
>> anyone want to make a flash drive *write-only*?
>>
>> -Dan
>> --
>> [-] Omae no subete no kichi wa ore no mono da. [-]
>>
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Joseph T. Klein                                         +1 414 628 3380
> Senior Network Engineer                                 jtk at titania.net
> Adelphia Business Solutions                         jtk at adelphiacom.net
>
>     "... the true value of the Internet is its connectedness ..."
>                                                  -- John W. Stewart III

--
Joseph T. Klein                                         +1 414 628 3380
Senior Network Engineer                                 jtk at titania.net
Adelphia Business Solutions                         jtk at adelphiacom.net

    "... the true value of the Internet is its connectedness ..."
                                                 -- John W. Stewart III
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