Hardware/doc preservatoion, was Re: rarest computers.

[Tony Duell]

> AAAaaarrrggghhh... As I am always pounding into anyone that will listen, 
> hardware with no documentation is practically useless. Documentation 

I fully appreciate the value of documentation -- the several 
_thousand_ schematics/service manuals/etc that I have here support that, 
and if I am offered documentation that is of little interest to me (say 
application progrma user manuals), I pass it on to people who will 
preserve it, or if applicable donate it to the HPCC library (I happen to 
be the librarian at the momemnt...).

However, it is _possible_ to produce documentation from the hardware. You 
can reverse-engineer most classic computers. It's a long job (can take 
_months_), but I have done it. Normally I do this for machines where 
proper service information was never available.

It's easier to preserve the manuals -- if they exist -- though.

-tony