13 ms·

It Is Done

329 points by kryptiskt 11y ago

Osiris 11y ago
Is the plan to scan all those manuals to make them accessible online?
- stonogo 11y ago
  The plan is to come up with a plan. This was the first step, shared by all possible archival plans: don't let the manuals be thrown in a landfill.
keithpeter 11y ago
Sounds like OP had a blast. A few takeaways from OA... But this went down in less than a week, and here we are. And what an achievement! And how many new 'converts' made? Might pay dividends down the road as we begin to lose the paper archives. I took the word of someone standing right there over someone on a forum bloviating about the One True And Right Way. Situated knowledge wins every time. Listen to the ones doing it and moderate/evaluate the feedback. Like it often is with professionals, they didn’t whine, grate, or sniff when faced with a room of boxes – they just got to it. I, as part of a team, aspire to this smooth well articulated action.
- db48x 11y ago
  It seems that this might be the start of a trend: http://archivecorps.com/ http://archivecorps.com/
jszymborski 11y ago
Jason Scott does it again... I love that guy, and am inspired by the passion with which he seems to undertake everything. I've been following this, and if I didn't live eons away, would have been there in a flash.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
bane 11y ago
It's hard to unroll the importance of this effort, and the work Jason Scott and archive.org does...but think of this. Today, we look back at the development of mass manufacturing from a historical perspective, there are entire museums dedicated to nothing but preserving and educating people about this technological transformation...and we still learn modern lessons from it every day. For example, you can go to Harpers Ferry, WV and see a small museum with a working workshop that's capable of converting nothing more than raw materials and river power to guns. To wit, an impressive amount of my career has been about nothing more than applying mass manufacturing techniques to previously bespoke work, and I'm proud to say that it has transformed the way some organizations approach certain classes of problems. And it's often nothing more than me coming into a workplace and saying "let's see if we can get this problem up-to-speed with the industrial revolution" These manuals are not so much about how an individual can operate outdated equipment as that they capture how humans dealt with complex technical challenges over decades. In a hundred years, historians looking at the digital scans of this archive might find a "first of" known process or technology that turns into a later technological revolution that we might not even be aware that we're part of right now that could transform all of humanity. Astonishing work and well done.
- dboshardy 11y ago
  I completely agree. Perhaps it's my "more data is good data" approach, but the more we save of our history (no matter how seemingly inconsequential), the better.
  - sounds 11y ago
    Just one: the effect this might have on patent law prior art...
- cmrx64 11y ago
  Excellent way to put this in perspective.
- PhasmaFelis 11y ago
  > To wit, an impressive amount of my career has been about nothing more than applying mass manufacturing techniques to previously bespoke work, and I'm proud to say that it has transformed the way some organizations approach certain classes of problems. And it's often nothing more than me coming into a workplace and saying "let's see if we can get this problem up-to-speed with the industrial revolution" That sounds fascinating. Can you give some examples?
cwkoss 11y ago
Jason Scott (and all who helped), thanks for all of your work!
adamkochanowicz 11y ago
Setting up context fail.
- MereInterest 11y ago
  Primarily due to the requirement that post titles be identical to article titles. If a post is intended for a small audience who are already aware of what is going on, then little additional context would be needed. If Hacker News allowed modifying titles, a reasonable one would be "Over 50,000 Old Technology Manuals Rescued".
  - bmir-alum-007 11y ago
    Perhaps if there were some semantic way for HN to link an article to a previous one, like threading. For example, a text field with previous HN item ID and a type drop-down with "duplicate"# and "follow-up" fields. # For editors to reduce duplicate posts.
  - gus_massa 11y ago
    The strict requirement of using the exact title as the article was lifted a few months ago, but it doesn't mean that someone can editorialize freely the submission title. I think that the preferred alternative is one sentence of the subtitle / opening paragraph / abstract of the article. In this case I can't find anything useful. I guess a correct alternative is to use the title of the previous submission to provide context so my proposal is "Saving 25,000 Manual: It Is Done" Anyway, the mods can disagree and change it back to the original, so YMMV. (Note 1: They saved more than 25,000 :).) (Note 2: I think your proposed title is good, but I tried to create one using cut&paste text from the article.)
    - DanBC 11y ago
      > The strict requirement of using the exact title as the article was lifted a few months ago The title thing seems to have caused confusion. dang has said that there hasn't been a change in policy (nor in the way the policy has been applied) and that the policy has always been "the original title is preferred except when it is misleading or linkbait." https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8227198#up_8228566 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8227198#up_8228566 But this meme of "you must only ever use the original title, even if it's terrible" is pretty strong. I think people don't understand that HN seems to prefer titles that convey little meaning over titles that create kneejerk reactions. There are plenty of posts on HN from people who are responding to the title, and who haven't read the submitted article. (EDIT: I think I upvoted you. I meant to. I might have accidentally downvoted, and I'm sorry if I did).
mey 11y ago
Context earlier on the site - http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/4683 http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/4683
Animats 11y ago
Nice. Of course, once they started throwing money at the problem, it went better. Boxes were purchased and quickly delivered. Trucks were rented. A storage space was rented. Professional movers were brought in. Then it's no problem. OK, now what's the plan for the next phase?
- ersii 11y ago
  I'd say there's currently no plan, but to figure out a plan. I recommend keeping an eye out on the blog for further news - although it'll probably be published to HN as well.
eljimmy 11y ago
So, forgive me for being naive, but I am left wondering... why do this at all? Is there a demand for this stuff?
- mindcrime 11y ago
  So, forgive me for being naive, but I am left wondering... why do this at all? Is there a demand for this stuff? In terms of "is there market demand to sell copies of these manuals for a profit" or whatever? Probably not, which is why they were slated for disposal in the first place. But do they serve an important role in maintaining the historical record and connecting the dots across time? Absolutely? Are they invaluable to at least a handful of individuals out there "right now"? Almost certainly. Will they be of value to somebody else "down the road"? I'd wager yes. It's not just 50,000 old manuals, it's a huge body of knowledge, much of which probably isn't yet in digital form, and a large portion of which would probably be lost for good if this trove of manuals had gone to the landfill. Now, IF all the things can happen that would need to happen (raising money, blah), and this collection can be scanned and digitized and placed online, you're talking about a real treasure trove of useful knowledge. Imagine the kid at J. Random Hackerspace who finds an old oscilloscope at a flea-market for $15.00. What a wonderful project it would be to fix that thing up, get it working, and watch a circuit work using it. But what if he wasn't able to find a parts list, schematics, or operators manual? But if this batch of material is truly saved, how much better is his chance of finding what he needs? How could someone's life be changed by participating in a project like that? A lifetime of interest in electronics, engineering, making, and building could be sparked (heh, pun intended) by something like that. So yeah, these manuals do fill a useful, if indirect, role. Jason and the other volunteers are "doing FSM's work" as far as I'm concerned. See also, bane's comment above. He puts it much more eloquently than I do.
- Sanddancer 11y ago
  It's a rescued research library. Tens of thousands of manuals from different eras to compare, to contrast. It's not just a pile of books, either. It's a history of technical typography, the fonts used, the style diagrams and how they changed. Some of these books are the tales of machines that no longer exist, and of machines that will one day function again due to access to schematics and diagnostic routines. There are a lot of subtle things that these manuals may end up being useful for, keeping them from the trash means those can be thought up and executed.
namuol 11y ago
Jason Scott is a real-life Indiana Jones of the digital age.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
  That's a rather insulting way to describe him! :p (Indiana Jones is a pretty terrible archæologist)
  - namuol 11y ago
    Maybe, but he's a badass hero!
bmir-alum-007 11y ago
Community archivism FTW (with a dash of leadership, out-of-pocket $, project management and planning).
pavs 11y ago
Those moving guys are very photogenic!
- textfiles 11y ago
  Or I'm a good photographer. :)
leax 11y ago
it's javascript in python style

It Is Done

329 points by kryptiskt 11y ago

Osiris 11y ago

Is the plan to scan all those manuals to make them accessible online?

stonogo 11y ago
The plan is to come up with a plan. This was the first step, shared by all possible archival plans: don't let the manuals be thrown in a landfill.

keithpeter 11y ago

Sounds like OP had a blast. A few takeaways from OA... But this went down in less than a week, and here we are. And what an achievement! And how many new 'converts' made? Might pay dividends down the road as we begin to lose the paper archives. I took the word of someone standing right there over someone on a forum bloviating about the One True And Right Way. Situated knowledge wins every time. Listen to the ones doing it and moderate/evaluate the feedback. Like it often is with professionals, they didn’t whine, grate, or sniff when faced with a room of boxes – they just got to it. I, as part of a team, aspire to this smooth well articulated action.

db48x 11y ago
It seems that this might be the start of a trend: http://archivecorps.com/ http://archivecorps.com/

jszymborski 11y ago

Jason Scott does it again... I love that guy, and am inspired by the passion with which he seems to undertake everything. I've been following this, and if I didn't live eons away, would have been there in a flash.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

bane 11y ago

It's hard to unroll the importance of this effort, and the work Jason Scott and archive.org does...but think of this. Today, we look back at the development of mass manufacturing from a historical perspective, there are entire museums dedicated to nothing but preserving and educating people about this technological transformation...and we still learn modern lessons from it every day. For example, you can go to Harpers Ferry, WV and see a small museum with a working workshop that's capable of converting nothing more than raw materials and river power to guns. To wit, an impressive amount of my career has been about nothing more than applying mass manufacturing techniques to previously bespoke work, and I'm proud to say that it has transformed the way some organizations approach certain classes of problems. And it's often nothing more than me coming into a workplace and saying "let's see if we can get this problem up-to-speed with the industrial revolution" These manuals are not so much about how an individual can operate outdated equipment as that they capture how humans dealt with complex technical challenges over decades. In a hundred years, historians looking at the digital scans of this archive might find a "first of" known process or technology that turns into a later technological revolution that we might not even be aware that we're part of right now that could transform all of humanity. Astonishing work and well done.

dboshardy 11y ago
I completely agree. Perhaps it's my "more data is good data" approach, but the more we save of our history (no matter how seemingly inconsequential), the better.
- sounds 11y ago
  Just one: the effect this might have on patent law prior art...
cmrx64 11y ago
Excellent way to put this in perspective.
PhasmaFelis 11y ago
> To wit, an impressive amount of my career has been about nothing more than applying mass manufacturing techniques to previously bespoke work, and I'm proud to say that it has transformed the way some organizations approach certain classes of problems. And it's often nothing more than me coming into a workplace and saying "let's see if we can get this problem up-to-speed with the industrial revolution" That sounds fascinating. Can you give some examples?

cwkoss 11y ago

Jason Scott (and all who helped), thanks for all of your work!

adamkochanowicz 11y ago

Setting up context fail.

MereInterest 11y ago
Primarily due to the requirement that post titles be identical to article titles. If a post is intended for a small audience who are already aware of what is going on, then little additional context would be needed. If Hacker News allowed modifying titles, a reasonable one would be "Over 50,000 Old Technology Manuals Rescued".
- bmir-alum-007 11y ago
  Perhaps if there were some semantic way for HN to link an article to a previous one, like threading. For example, a text field with previous HN item ID and a type drop-down with "duplicate"# and "follow-up" fields. # For editors to reduce duplicate posts.
- gus_massa 11y ago
  The strict requirement of using the exact title as the article was lifted a few months ago, but it doesn't mean that someone can editorialize freely the submission title. I think that the preferred alternative is one sentence of the subtitle / opening paragraph / abstract of the article. In this case I can't find anything useful. I guess a correct alternative is to use the title of the previous submission to provide context so my proposal is "Saving 25,000 Manual: It Is Done" Anyway, the mods can disagree and change it back to the original, so YMMV. (Note 1: They saved more than 25,000 :).) (Note 2: I think your proposed title is good, but I tried to create one using cut&paste text from the article.)
  - DanBC 11y ago
    > The strict requirement of using the exact title as the article was lifted a few months ago The title thing seems to have caused confusion. dang has said that there hasn't been a change in policy (nor in the way the policy has been applied) and that the policy has always been "the original title is preferred except when it is misleading or linkbait." https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8227198#up_8228566 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8227198#up_8228566 But this meme of "you must only ever use the original title, even if it's terrible" is pretty strong. I think people don't understand that HN seems to prefer titles that convey little meaning over titles that create kneejerk reactions. There are plenty of posts on HN from people who are responding to the title, and who haven't read the submitted article. (EDIT: I think I upvoted you. I meant to. I might have accidentally downvoted, and I'm sorry if I did).

mey 11y ago

Context earlier on the site - http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/4683 http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/4683

Animats 11y ago

Nice. Of course, once they started throwing money at the problem, it went better. Boxes were purchased and quickly delivered. Trucks were rented. A storage space was rented. Professional movers were brought in. Then it's no problem. OK, now what's the plan for the next phase?

ersii 11y ago
I'd say there's currently no plan, but to figure out a plan. I recommend keeping an eye out on the blog for further news - although it'll probably be published to HN as well.

eljimmy 11y ago

So, forgive me for being naive, but I am left wondering... why do this at all? Is there a demand for this stuff?

mindcrime 11y ago
So, forgive me for being naive, but I am left wondering... why do this at all? Is there a demand for this stuff? In terms of "is there market demand to sell copies of these manuals for a profit" or whatever? Probably not, which is why they were slated for disposal in the first place. But do they serve an important role in maintaining the historical record and connecting the dots across time? Absolutely? Are they invaluable to at least a handful of individuals out there "right now"? Almost certainly. Will they be of value to somebody else "down the road"? I'd wager yes. It's not just 50,000 old manuals, it's a huge body of knowledge, much of which probably isn't yet in digital form, and a large portion of which would probably be lost for good if this trove of manuals had gone to the landfill. Now, IF all the things can happen that would need to happen (raising money, blah), and this collection can be scanned and digitized and placed online, you're talking about a real treasure trove of useful knowledge. Imagine the kid at J. Random Hackerspace who finds an old oscilloscope at a flea-market for $15.00. What a wonderful project it would be to fix that thing up, get it working, and watch a circuit work using it. But what if he wasn't able to find a parts list, schematics, or operators manual? But if this batch of material is truly saved, how much better is his chance of finding what he needs? How could someone's life be changed by participating in a project like that? A lifetime of interest in electronics, engineering, making, and building could be sparked (heh, pun intended) by something like that. So yeah, these manuals do fill a useful, if indirect, role. Jason and the other volunteers are "doing FSM's work" as far as I'm concerned. See also, bane's comment above. He puts it much more eloquently than I do.
Sanddancer 11y ago
It's a rescued research library. Tens of thousands of manuals from different eras to compare, to contrast. It's not just a pile of books, either. It's a history of technical typography, the fonts used, the style diagrams and how they changed. Some of these books are the tales of machines that no longer exist, and of machines that will one day function again due to access to schematics and diagnostic routines. There are a lot of subtle things that these manuals may end up being useful for, keeping them from the trash means those can be thought up and executed.

namuol 11y ago

Jason Scott is a real-life Indiana Jones of the digital age.

TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
That's a rather insulting way to describe him! :p (Indiana Jones is a pretty terrible archæologist)
- namuol 11y ago
  Maybe, but he's a badass hero!

bmir-alum-007 11y ago

Community archivism FTW (with a dash of leadership, out-of-pocket $, project management and planning).

pavs 11y ago

Those moving guys are very photogenic!

textfiles 11y ago
Or I'm a good photographer. :)

leax 11y ago

it's javascript in python style