nose@milo.UUCP (12/13/83)
I'm interested in obtaining information about programs for storage
and plotting of cave survey data. I am particularly interested in
anything that would run on an Apple. Programs that run under UNIX
are also of interest to me. If anyone has any info, it would be greatly
appreciated!
-Steve Dunn
UUCP: {allegra,ucbvax,amd70,hao}!nbires!noseriddle@ut-sally.UUCP (Prentiss Riddle) (12/20/83)
You may already know about this, but a former boss of mine, Dave McKenzie,
is the author of what is reputedly the state-of-the-art cave surveying
program. The main thing that makes it unique is Dave's algorithm for
closing loops and minimizing survey errors in three-space. The algorithm
was the fruit of Dave's master's thesis in math. In addition, of course,
the program has the plotting features you'd expect -- arbitrary scaling,
rotation in three-space, and also the nice ability to fake an approximate
sketch of tunnel walls given only skeletal survey data plus occasional
estimates of tunnel width. (Does that last sentence make any sense? My
knowledge of caving survey lingo is almost nil.)
I've been out of touch with Dave for about two years now. When I still
worked for him, the program was written in aged and creaky fortran and ran
on the University of Texas's cybers. Since then, Dave has started a private
consulting firm writing business software for micros and has reputedly
rewritten the program in pascal to run under CPM.
According to the Austin phone book, Dave can be reached at:
David W. McKenzie
8503 Shenandoah
Austin, TX 787??
(512)-836-8133
At last report, Dave was still an enthusiastic caver and regularly provided
computing support to the various Mexican caving projects operating out of
Texas. He's a very helpful fellow and will probably be glad to answer your
questions. If you write him, tell him "hi" from me.
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Prentiss Riddle
{ihnp4,seismo,ctvax}!ut-sally!riddlekolstad@parsec.UUCP (12/22/83)
#R:milo:-14100:parsec:41200006:000:313 parsec!kolstad Dec 21 16:31:00 1983 I called the number posted by P. Riddle and talked with a nice lady who informed me that there are TWO David McKenzie's and I had surely contacted the wrong one. I have obtained a phone number alleged to be the correct one from the Austin phone book but have not succeeded in contacting Mr. McKenzie. Rob
riddle@ut-sally.UUCP (Prentiss Riddle) (01/06/84)
Okay, sorry about the incorrect phone number. Before any of you waste any
more of your money on long-distance calls or disturb the "nice lady" in
Austin again, let me look into it and see if I can find the "real" Dave
McKenzie. (Hmm. Maybe I know now why he hasn't answered any of my Christmas
cards for two years...)
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Prentiss Riddle
("Aprendiz de todo, maestro de nada.")
{ihnp4,seismo,ctvax}!ut-sally!riddle