A Python Toolchest to dissect historic data media.

The fundamental problem is how to explore the data from ancient and rare computers, in a convenient and user-friendly way.

The AutoArchaeologist is a framework where plugins can be written to take apart and present old data media, in a browser-friendly fashion.

Our first historic use of the AutoArchaeologist is now online:

https://datamuseum.dk/aa/cbm900

This is the harddisk from datamuseum.dk's rare and running Commodore CBM-900 UNIX computer (https://datamuseum.dk/wiki/Commodore/CBM900)

In this case, the code in unix/v7_filesystem.py recognizes this as a little endian Version 7 unix filesystem, and creates artifacts for the individual files in the filesystem.

The generic/ascii.py code spots which files are text files, and thus we can see how few fortunes, the CBM-900 came with, back in 1984:

http://datamuseum.dk/aa/cbm900//5c/5caa31010.html

The paper-tapes from this computer, like many other of 1950-1960 vintage, are not in ASCII but in a per-model, and in some cases, per-installation character set. The one on GIER isnt too bad (https://datamuseum.dk/wiki/GIER/Flexowriter) but did cause a bit of headache before we got a good HTML representation of overprinting underlines and the "10" glyph.

GIER is of course the computer Peter Naur of Backus-Naur-Notatation fame worked on, and his demonstration program is a good example of the output:

http://datamuseum.dk/aa/gier/9c/9cb418c94.html

RC7000 was a Data General Nova with a "RC7000" sticker, RC3600 was Regnecentralens own reimplementation, and they were as a sort of swiss army-knife computer doing everything from industrial control and monitoring, to teaching programming in high-schools.

We have a rich software archive for these computers, and making sense of them requires quite a number of "examiners".

Here is a saved COMAL program (https://datamuseum.dk/wiki/COMAL) to solve second degree equations, written by a high-school student in 1981:

http://datamuseum.dk/aa/rc3600/7b/7b059e3b3.html

This list is current as of september 2021

• `ansi_tape_labels - ANSI tape header/trailer records

• ascii - ASCII text files, with or without parity

• bigdigits - 5x7 fonts - often punched into paper tape

• bitdata - Base-class for dealing with bit-aligned data

• hexdump - Sometimes that's all you can do

• iso8632_gcm - ISO 8632-3 Computer Graphics Metafiles

• pyreveng3 - Calls on https://github.com/bsdphk/PyReveng3 for disassembly

• samesame - summarizes artifacts with a single byte value so they dont pointlessly generate a lot of hexdump

• sccs_id - @(#) "what" markers from sccs(1)

• tap_file - SIMH magtape files

• textfiles - Recognize specific types of ASCII files, presently only Postscript.

• absbin - Absolute Binary Format

• relbin - Relative Binary Format

• papertapechecksum - Product identification marker on paper tapes

• cbm900_ar - Commodore CBM 900 ar(1) files

• cbm900_l_out - Commodore CBM 900 l_out(4) files

• cbm900_partition - Commodore CBM 900 disk partitioning

• compress - compress(1) (bla.Z) files

• fast_filesystem - Kirk McKusick's BSD4 FFS

• hpux_disklabel - HPUX disk partitioning

• sunos_disklabel - SunOS 4 etc.

• sysv_filesystem - AT&T System V filesystem

• tar_file - tar(1) archives

• unix_fs - Filesystem base-class

• v7_filesystem - As Ken wrote it

• xenix286_fs - How SCO botched it

• xenix286_partition - As found on the PC platform

• gier_text - GIER text files

• domus_fs - DOMUS filesystem

• rc3600_fdtape - 8" Floppies emulating ½" tapes

• rc7000_comal - COMAL save files

• rc8000_save_tape - SAVE tapes from RC8000

• rcsl - RCSL markers

• subdisk2 - Disk Partitioning

• gks - Graphical Kernel System

• dfs_tape.py - DFS tape files

• disk_part.py - Disk partitioning

• index_data.py - Archive filesets

• r1k_6zero.py - Very often ASCII files

• r1k_97seg.py - Possibly DIANA trees

• r1k_a6seg.py - Environment WORLDs

• r1k_assy.py - Code segments

• r1k_backup.py - Backup tape, tape aspects

• r1k_backup_objects.py - Backup tape, object aspects

• r1k_bittools.py - R1K specific bit tools

• r1k_diag.py - DIAG processor firmware disassembly

• r1k_disass.py - Call out to https://github.com/Datamuseum-DK/R1000.Disassembly

• r1k_e3_objects.py - Ada program editor objects

• r1k_experiment.py - Diagnostic experiment DFS files

• r1k_linkpack.py - LinkPack object

• r1k_m200.py - DFS executables

• r1k_seg_heap.py - Baseclass for heap segments

• r1k_ucode.py - Microcode DFS files

• tape_blocks.py - R1K logical tape blocks

• bitstore - Get artifacts from the bitarchive

• decorated_context - Standard HTML decoration

/phk