alan@solar.UUCP (A.LIGHT) (04/08/85)
**** My favorite movie which featured computers has got to be Colosus: The Forbin Project. If you get a chance to see it (It's on TV pretty often) it is well worth your time. One point of honorable mention: Credit has got to go to the writers of the movie Alien. It was one of the first movies which featured a computer where you had to use a terminal to talk to the dammed thing! While we are on the subject, books, movies, and TV shows usually had a name for the computers they featured. We all know that the computer in 2001 was named HAL. But how about the names of the computers in the following: 1. The TV show "I Dream of Jeanne" 2. Alien 3. Rollerball 4. Wargames 5. The Asimov short story "The Last Question"
@RUTGERS.ARPA:RAOUL@JPL-VLSI.ARPA (04/19/85)
From: Alvin Wong <RAOUL@JPL-VLSI.ARPA> I have not seen anyone mention "BOLO" by Keith Laumer. Bolos are fighting machines that resemble tanks but are intelligent and autonomous. The book consists of short stories that loosely follow the development of Bolos. Memorable short stories for me were "The Last Command" and "War Relic". Good emotional stuff. "Wasting time is an important part of life." ------
sabre%Berkeley@csuf.ARPA (04/19/85)
From: uci-icsa!csuf!sabre@Berkeley The CYBORG and the SORCERERS By Lawrence Watt-Evans This is a book about IRU cyborg (Independent Reconnaissance Unit) whos mission is to solo pilot a ship, and play the role of spy and saboteur. He has to determine the capablility of each planet he came across to launch an attack on Old Earth and if possible to distroy its ability to attack. He was also to capture any new weapons he came across, so they could be duplicated by his side back on Mars. A computer was included on the mission to insure loyalty, and to set off the thermite bomb at the base of his skull. This mission could never end untill his death since Earth lost the war and now was no one alive to give them the release or recall code. IRU 205 code named Slant had been on this mission for 14 years. Slant then came a cross a planet in which the computer had detected "gravitational anomalies" and he had to find out why. It turns out that after the planet had been attacked by Old Earth and bombed back from a nuclear age to a level of bow and arrow a few people gain use of psi abilities and become wizards. This book and combines science and fantasy into a very good story. Jeff Ellis ..!ucbvax!ucivax!csuf!sabre
lgondor@utflis.UUCP (Les Gondor) (04/19/85)
How about the computers in Alexis Gilliland's Rosinante novels? It's
interesting that these machines became 'persons' through legally
incorporating themselves. As for their names, Corporate Skaskash
ranks among the more unusual names given to machines.
The other computers mentioned modelled their behaviour and appearance
on communications screens on humans: Coroporates Susan Brown, William
Hulvey and Forziati.
Les Gondor, U of Toronto
{cornell,ihnp4,allegra,uw-beaver,decvax!utzoo}!utcsri![utflis!]lgondor
CSNET: lgondor@toronto ARPA: lgondor%Toronto@CSNet-Relay
From here on down, it's uphill all the way.sean@ukma.UUCP (Sean Casey) (04/26/85)
In article <1671@topaz.ARPA>, @RUTGERS.ARPA:RAOUL@JPL-VLSI.ARPA writes: > From: Alvin Wong <RAOUL@JPL-VLSI.ARPA> > > > I have not seen anyone mention "BOLO" by Keith Laumer. Bolos are fighting > machines that resemble tanks but are intelligent and autonomous. The book > consists of short stories that loosely follow the development of Bolos. > Memorable short stories for me were "The Last Command" and "War Relic". > Good emotional stuff. > There was a very nice maze game for the Apple II called BOLO. In it, you negotiated a maze while various machines attacked you. The object was to destroy the enemy power supply. What made it really interesting was that the enemy machines had different characeristics. Some seemed to be able to track you better, others seemed to 'know' how to box you in. Interesting game... -- --- Sean Casey --- --- UUCP: {hasmed,cbosgd}!ukma!sean or ucbvax!anlams!ukma!sean --- ARPA: ukma!sean<@ANL-MCS> or sean%ukma.uucp@anl-mcs.arpa "We're all bozos on this bus."
wakemanla@sanfan.DEC (05/13/85)
The computer in Wargames was WOPR, Joshua was the password to the backdoor account. Larry Wakeman Digital San Francisco