Now that you have some really good stuff written, what
will you do with it? Not the part that you send out to be
rejected, but the part that stays in your files (or in that
Cinzano case under your desk?) Shouldn’t you also store it in
some form so you can shove it back into your computer if the
editor wants changes?
Electronic or magnetic data storage
is the subject of so much controversy that I’m not going to even
stick my oar in. When I first started using computers, all data
going in or coming out was on cards. Cards with up to eighty
rows of punched holes, believe it or not. To load a word
processor program into a computer, you first had to load a
“bootstrap” program (about a half-inch pile of cards). The
“compiler” followed, and that could be as much as fifteen inches
of cards. After that came a half to two feet of cards for the
actual program.
That sounds like a lot, until you do a little arithmetic. An inch
of cards numbered about 140. That times eighty gave you eleven
thousand bits, which we call “11k” today. A drip in the bucket
by today’s standards.
The next big jump for the “desktop” computer (size of a
desk, that is) was to the magnetic tape. With high-quality tape
and precise readers/writers storing two and a half million bits
was practical. The tape, first on “open” reels, then in
cassettes, was a lot easier to handle than the stacks of cards.
It had an additional advantage; the whole thing was in one
piece. No longer did you wake up screaming at night, after
dreaming you had found one of the cards for your compiler on the
floor or, worse, missing. Stuff on tape stayed in order, also.
If you dropped a stack of cards and they strewed across the
floor, you might spend the rest of the day squinting at them and
trying to put them back in order. Tape was much friendlier.
Then came the disk. While the big, movie computers were
using magnetic disks the size of DeLorean hubcaps, the Apple
people (and others) developed the disk system (DOS). Now the
information from a cassette could be put on a eight-inch
diameter “floppy” disk. Not only was it cheaper, it allowed
access by address. On a cassette, you could to specify where you
wanted to start reading, but the machine still had to roll
through the tape, mile by mile, until it got to the right place.
With the disk system, getting to the right place took only one
revolution of the disk. There wasn’t much on those big
“floppies,” though. Usually less than 200k.
Development rolled on and gave us, finally, the standard
five-and-a-quarter-inch floppy that served most small computer
applications for over a decade. It had drawbacks, of course. It
had to be kept in a little folder, like an 78 record. It would
die quickly if it was folded or spritzed with Coca-Cola. A
chronic smoker would kill it with tar and ash. And it only held
about 180k of data. Then, as unbelievable as it seems, the
manufacturers realized, later, that using both sides of the disk
would give the user twice as many bits! Up to then, I suppose it
would have seemed incredible that anyone would actually NEED so
much space!
The next stage that most of us saw was the little “3.5”
floppy which was housed in its own little armor. It held 360k,
then 720k, and finally, 1440k (1.4meg). Now we’re talking megs
(millions) of bits. A meg will hold a nice picture or about 400
pages of text. While many of us won’t write two many 400-page
epics, we do like pictures. A floppy for each is unhandy. To be
sure, the computer’s hard drive has a lot more space, but it
doesn’t lend itself to storing in the Cinzano case or
transferring to someone else’s computer or mailing to a faraway
land.
We need, then, a detachable medium with lots more
storage. Came the era of the “flash drive” (know by many other
names,
(top)
also – some unflattering). This little gem, not having any
moving parts, was rugged enough to be on a key chain! And the
capacity? As much as 22,000 megs!
Now, ain’t science wonderful! Instead of a heap of paper
up to the ceiling in the spare room closet, we need only have a
couple of these little electronic ice cream spoons. What can go
wrong?
Well, now, young feller, I still have a few five-inch
floppies with really nifty stuff from my early days of
scribbling. In fact, I even have the GREAT AMERICAN SOMEWHAT on
a couple of cassettes. But I can’t read ‘em any more. They are
worthless, just keepsakes. That will also be true shortly with
the 3.5 disks. The two latest computers I bought had to be
cluttered with “external” (afterthought) disk drives. Almost,
not quite obsolete. My punched cards? Useful for picking up
crumbs off a linoleum floor.
As I said, what can go wrong, if I transfer everything
to the latest media? One of these little flashies can hold every
thought I ever had (or ever will, as the old grey mush in the
head starts to clot.)
What can go wrong is this: as each storage medium is
developed, it uses less and less space, either as magnetic
domains or electronic cells, for each bit. With the old cards, I
could shoot a bullet through the stack and still read most of
the information. I actually did that once with a five-inch
floppy just to see what it would do. It made a small piece of
the data unreadable. If I did the same with a 3.5, I’d lose
more.
Well, so, stop shooting bullets at disks, dummy! I have,
but Mom Nature still enjoys shooting jabillions of cosmic rays
and other such particles through our world. If a cosmic ray hit
one data bit on a big floppy, it probably would degrade the bit
a little, but it would still be readable. If the same cosmic
dart hit a flash card, it might wipe out a few k’s of data. And
if the spot was part of a file for a picture, the picture would
still be essentially intact, but the computer wouldn’t read it
any more. And the next cosmic ray might hit the same card later.
Or many cosmic rays could.
What’s my answer to long-term data storage? Well, believe it or
not, it’s paper! Since the days of Leonardo, inks and papers
have been available that last for many centuries. Just go to the
Huntington Library and look at a Gutenberg Bible. Not only is it
readable, it’s nearly perfect! Since 1453! In fact, the paper
“hard copy” is the only easy-to-use medium that is, for mere
mortals like us, permanent. The format hasn’t changed much since
the early monks decided to add spaces between the words. Your
eyeball can read the same text that was useful to the Middle
Ages scholar.
I use a small font, like eight point, and divide the
page into two columns to make it easier to read. I cut the
margins to the very least my printer will tolerate, and use both
sides of the paper. And my entire output – ever - is a stack
only about three feet high.
Well, the paper isn’t something you can stuff into a slot and
address it. You must scan it if you want your computer to read
it as text. But that’s an easy process today. If it’s a picture,
any digital camera can read it and put it into whatever format
is current.
Paper long-term storage affords a final boon to the poor
sods who must pick through your stuff after you are installed in
your mahogany crate. They can quickly separate the trash from
the almost-trash. No wondering what word-processor program was
used to create the file. Just hold it up under a fair light and
look. Circle the stuff that will warrant a second look with a
crayon. Bale the rest and re-cycle it. It won’t stay forever in
some landfill like the imperishable diskettes. And, best yet,
it’s a sustainable material. It grows on trees.