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1982's Canon AS-100 Computer Workstation
Big. Weird. Customizable. And wonderful. With a jog dial controller.
August 26, 2023
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In 1982, Canon released the AS-100 computer. A fascinating — and awesome looking — computer workstation that was aimed squarely at the business market.

Let’s take a close look at the AS-100 — the second computer released by the famous printer company. A weird, wonderful, extraordinarily customizable machine capable of running both CP/M and MS-DOS… but which was not exactly IBM PC Compatible.

Ain’t she a beauty?

So, the Canon AS-100 is not an IBM Compatible system (at least… not completely). But what sort of specs did that little beast have?

  • Intel 8088 CPU (with an optional 8087 math co-processor)

  • 128 KB RAM (expandable to 512 KB using a 384 KB expantion)

  • An 8 color (with a full palette of 27 colors), 640x400 display (with a cheaper, black and white monitor option available)

  • Capable of running both MS-DOS and CP/M (though not compatible with all DOS software that relied on IBM PC Compatible hardware)

Nothing too crazy here — though definitely pretty beefy for 1982!

But look at that picture up there. Look at the “mouse”. Here. Let me zoom in for you. ENHANCE!

Well, what do we have here? That’s not a mouse at all! It’s a jog dialer! A little wheel you can turn (not unlike old Atari 2600 paddle controllers). This was called the “A-1100 Pointing Device”.

The storage options were equally fantastic and unusual. Let’s take a closer look. ENHANCE!

There were a whole host of different storage options for the AS-100:

  • 5 1/4” floppy drives (640 KB, Double Sided, Double Density).

    • You could purchase an expansion unit with either one floppy drive… or two.

  • 8” floppy drives (1.2 MB).

    • What’s wild… is you could purchase an expansion unit with a single 8” drive… or two 8” drives… or three 8” drives… or, I kid you not, four 8” drives in a single (huge) chasis.

  • A Winchester Hard Disk (8.2 MB)

And you could combine them together. Which means you could have a LOT of storage drives on this badboy.

Oh, and get this. The full rig weighed a whopping 66 lbs (give or take, depending on which options you selected).

All of the pictures showcased either a Canon Daisy Wheel or Ink Jet printer.

 

Because this is Canon. And they sell printers. But, technically, you didn’t need to have a printer connected.

The Canon Software

What many people forget is that Canon made PC software — that they either shipped with or sold for the AS-100 — back then.

This included Canobrain (which was a database package with color charting), CanoCalc, CanoGraph, CanoWriter, and CanoBasic. Cano-Everything. All very business-oriented packages. This was, after all, a very professional computer.

CanoBrain screenshots courtesy the AS-100 flyer

How much did a standard configuration with a color screen set you back? Over $4,000 USD. And that’s 1982 dollars.

In the end, the Canon AS-100 was not a huge seller — likely due to the fact that it was not “IBM PC Compatible” and, thus, had compatibility problems with some software. Plus it was expensive. And huge. Also heavy.

But, gosh darn it, it’s still an impressive, gorgeous machine. One that I would not mind having on my desk.

For your viewing pleasure, here is a sampling of magazine advertisements for the AS-100. Enjoy the early 1980s goodness.

From “Personal Computer World”, December 1982

 

From Micro Systèmes, May 1983

 

From Bit Magazine, June 1983
 
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Firefox! Russia! WWDC! Open Source A.I.!

My-oh-my.  Another wild week at The Lunduke Journal!  It all kicked off with a live video commentary of Apple's WWDC keynote (which was banned by YouTube, but still available at the links below), then quickly moves to Mozilla and Open Source AI.

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The CIA, NSA, and Pokémon Go

Back in July of 2016, I wrote a short article for Network World entitled “The CIA, NSA, and Pokémon Go."

While the title was certainly viewed as a bit “over the top” and “conspiracy theorist-y”, it was really just a collection of (in my opinion, rather bizarre) facts that – even without any sinister connection – were worth documenting. I am republishing it here, with some additional (increasingly odd) details added at the end (including radio and TV appearances related to this article).

Some of the details relating to the exact permissions and capabilities of the Pokémon application have changed over the last few years… but everything else remains correct, factual, and up to date.

 


 

The CIA, NSA, and Pokémon Go

With Pokémon Go currently enjoying, what I would call, a wee-bit-o-success, now seems like a good time to talk about a few things people may not know about the world's favorite new smartphone game.

This is not an opinion piece. I am not going to tell you Pokémon Go is bad or that it invades your privacy. I’m merely presenting verifiable facts about the biggest, most talked about game out there.

Let’s start with a little history

Way back in 2001, Keyhole, Inc. was founded by John Hanke (who previously worked in a “foreign affairs” position within the U.S. government). The company was named after the old “eye-in-the-sky” military satellites. One of the key, early backers of Keyhole was a firm called In-Q-Tel.

In-Q-Tel is the venture capital firm of the CIA. Yes, the Central Intelligence Agency. Much of the funding purportedly came from the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA). The NGA handles combat support for the U.S. Department of Defense and provides intelligence to the NSA and CIA, among others.

Keyhole’s noteworthy public product was “Earth.” Renamed to “Google Earth” after Google acquired Keyhole in 2004.

In 2010, Niantic Labs was founded (inside Google) by Keyhole’s founder, John Hanke.

Over the next few years, Niantic created two location-based apps/games. The first was Field Trip, a smartphone application where users walk around and find things. The second was Ingress, a sci-fi-themed game where players walk around and between locations in the real world.

In 2015, Niantic was spun off from Google and became its own company. Then Pokémon Go was developed and launched by Niantic. It’s a game where you walk around in the real world (between locations suggested by the service) while holding your smartphone.

Data the game can access

Let’s move on to what information Pokémon Go has access to, bearing the history of the company in mind as we do.

When you install Pokémon Go on an Android phone, you grant it the following access (not including the ability to make in-app purchases):

Identity

  • Find accounts on the device

Contacts

  • Find accounts on the device

Location

  • Precise location (GPS and network-based)

  • Approximate location (network-based)

Photos/Media/Files

  • Modify or delete the contents of your USB storage

  • Read the contents of your USB storage

Storage

  • Modify or delete the contents of your USB storage

  • Read the contents of your USB storage

Camera

  • Take pictures and videos

Other

  • Receive data from the internet

  • Control vibration

  • Pair with Bluetooth devices

  • Access Bluetooth settings

  • Full network access

  • Use accounts on the device

  • View network connections

  • Prevent the device from sleeping

Based on the access to your device (and your information), coupled with the design of Pokémon Go, the game should have no problem discerning and storing the following information (just for a start):

  • Where you are

  • Where you were

  • What route you took between those locations

  • When you were at each location

  • How long it took you to get between them

  • What you are looking at right now

  • What you were looking at in the past

  • What you look like

  • What files you have on your device and the entire contents of those files

I’m not going to tell people what they should think of all this.

I’m merely presenting the information. I recommend looking over the list of what data the game has access to, then going back to the beginning of this article and re-reading the history of the company.

Update: April 14th, 2020

In March of 2017, a little less than a year after this article was originally published, WikiLeaks released what they called “Vault 7." A series of documents that was purported to be a large leak of CIA related documents focused heavily on hacking and electronic surveillance.

Among those documents was a list of code names, descriptions, and various details around Android specific exploits.

Of the code names listed… almost a third of them were Pokémon names. Between that and the CIA investment (via In-Q-Tel) in Niantic (the company behind Pokémon Go)… I mean, that's just a heck of a lot more Pokémon than one would expect from the CIA.

One other little tidbit:

The original CEO of In-Q-Tel was a man named Gilman Louie. Louie received multiple awards for his work with In-Q-Tel - including CIA Agency Seal Medallions, Director's Award by the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, and Director of National Intelligence Medallion – which included investing in Keyhole.

Louie now sits on the board of directors of Niantic.

In 2019 alone, Pokémon Go earned $1.4 Billion (USD). As of February 2019, the game had been downloaded over One Billion times.

Update: June 15th, 2024

After this article was originally published, back in 2016, I made a few radio guest appearances to talk about it -- my favorites being for Coast to Coast AM and Fade to Black.  Both of which remain available online.

This was followed by an episode of a TV show, for The History Channel, called "Breaking Mysterious".  That show only received a limited run in the USA, but it remains available via streaming in many other countries in case you want to look it up.

Here's a few snapshots from that episode (Season 1, Episode 1 - "The Watchers") just for good measure.

The show was originally titled "The Unexplained".  But the name was changed to "Breaking Mysterious"... and, later, "The Unexplained" title was used for an entirely different show, hosted by William Shatner.

 

Yup.  The video editors for the History Channel spelled my name wrong.  (It's with a Y!  A Y, I say!)

 

Sitting in a park.  Dropping truth bombs about surveillance on the show host, Jimmy Church.

 

Giving the show's host "The Look".
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Funny Programming Pictures Part XLIV
Father's Day Weekend Edition

I hit Ctrl-C 187,000 times while creating this article.

 

... or simply don't know what we did, but it works.  It's "the algorithm".

 

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We're all doomed.

 

This is the correct answer for every topic for an experienced dev: I hate everything, for different reasons.

 

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This is a tough conversation for any dad to have.

 

The other 1% is giving up and just using a Center tag inside of a Table.

 

The more times you hit Ctrl-C, the better it copies.

 

GLAAARRGGHHH!

 

"Backend Developer"

 

WE ARE LINUX. YOU WILL BE ASSIMILATED. YOUR LINE BREAK TYPE WILL BE LF. RESISTANCE IS FUTILE.

 

Don't look behind you.  Copilot is catching up.
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