Episode: 900
Title: HPR0900: Episode 000 - Introduction
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr0900/hpr0900.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-08 04:36:53

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Hi, my name is Gerjola and this is my first attempt to record a podcast.
In this episode I will describe how I started with computers and what led me to use open
source and free software in my life.
I started with computers when I was rather young, I was something like 9 or 10 years old
and my uncle gave me a Commodore 16K which he had won in a TV show about science and computing
and this kind of things in the early 80s.
Well he gave me this computer but just a computer without any peripheral, any games because
at that time computers were sold with a set of cassettes with games.
So he gave me the computer without any other information that the user manual and a set
of magazines that he had compiled during some months, magazines about programming.
And at the time the main way to program the computer was to use basic.
So I started to play with this computer which was plugged into a black and white TV
with a spare one which I found at home.
And so I started to just copy lines of code from these magazines that my uncle had gave
me.
I didn't really understand what I was doing, I was just copying things and then running
the programs.
And since I had no peripheral, I had no way to save, to store my program.
So every time I wanted to use a program from the magazine I had to write it from the beginning
to the end, I executed and then when I stopped the computer the program went away.
So this was my beginning with computing and then several years after that, maybe a couple
of years only after that, the same uncle gave me a ZX Spectrum 48K because he was at
the time just buying PC, the first PC in the whole family.
So he gave me the ZX Spectrum 48K with which I used in the same model in the same way
that I had been using the Commodore 60K.
The difference with this one is that you didn't have to buy a special cassette recorder in
order to save your program.
You could plug any kind of cassette recorder and I started using a very simple Walkman
that I had at home.
So this time I could store my programs and I started writing more complex programs and
even programs imagined by myself.
I remember one that I did which was reproducing my handwritten signature on the screen and
the way I did to do that was drawing pixel by pixel on the screen my handwritten signature.
In order to be sure that the result was very close to my signature, I started by writing
by hand on the screen of the TV that I use as a monitor for the computer.
So I spent my time doing this kind of things and also the ZX Spectrum could be programmed
in a sampler.
I don't really remember how it worked because when you booted the computer, what you
got was a basic prompt but I remember that there was a way to programming in a sampler
so I started programming in a sampler also with this computer.
And I should say a couple of years after that, the same uncle again convinced my father
to buy me a PC.
We were talking here about the mid 80s or the end of the 80s, I don't really remember
when it was.
So I went to the computer store with my uncle and then at the time you didn't really
buy a built computer, what you went to the store and you selected the different parts
of the computer and the guy at the store would build a computer for you.
So I bought my first PC which had 512Ks of RAM, no hard disk, two floppy disks, a monochrome
screen, a green screen, I remember.
Then when I went home with this and this was completely different because you couldn't
boot the computer just like that.
You had to insert a floppy disk on the first floppy unit, boot the computer, this floppy
disk would contain your operating system at the time it was a dose, I don't know which
version it was.
And then from then on you could load programs from floppy disks.
I used to head my operating system on the first floppy and then use the second floppy
to load programs, store programs.
So I continued programming basically, but this time the basic was not part of the OS itself
as it had been for the X spectrum or for the computer, I had to use a basic interpreter
that I had to load.
So then I started to understand that a computer had an operating system and then you could
load programs and I think this is the thing that I didn't understand when I was working
with the other first two computers.
So I started programming in GW basic and through the years I started to upgrade the PC
and just continue programming with basic building interesting programs.
I remember that I had built a problem to guess so that the user would think of a name
of an animal and then look at the computer using very basic if then questions would try
to guess the animal that the user had thought of.
So my uncle told me about this graphical user interface called Windows and I remember
at the time you launched Windows manually from dust and I started working like this,
but without really understanding what I was doing, I didn't really have a project to
work on, I was at the time, 15 years old, 16 years old, I don't really remember.
Then for several years I really more or less stopped using the computer and then when
I was at the university I started learning Pascal, a little bit of C, then a little bit
of C++ but without really understanding I remember at the time that I would use turbo
Pascal or turbo C to build some programs and well, but without really understanding that
there was an OS, there was a compiler, there was all these different parts.
Well I had let's say lectures about this kind of thing so I theoretically understood what
it was but there was a gap between theory and reality.
And then when I was in my fourth year at the university, a friend of mine told me about
Linux. Linux was this kind of thing that was more or less the same kind of thing that
we had on the workstation, the computer lab, we had some sun workstation at the computer
lab at the university, but for me it was two different things, one thing was working
at the PC to do some work processing or things like this and I think was working with the
workstation which was connected to the network because at that time of course the PCs were
not connected to the network, there was no internet at home.
So well at the time I was living on the campus of the university and we had Ethernet where
connected to the university network from every room on the student dorm.
And so there was a group of students who were maintaining this sub network of the university
with a Linux server and they tried to teach people about Linux, about installing Linux
and this kind of thing.
So I had my, by the time I think it was for 86, the process of my PC and I tried to install
Linux. So at the time it was Debian, I don't really remember what version it was.
I remember you had something like a 10 or 15 floppy disks or from the installation you
started with the basic boot of floppy and then from then on you started to configure the
network and then try to connect to a server in other two, download the different packages
and build your system, etc.
I remember that I spent many, many nights trying to install this Debian Linux on my PC.
Of course I never got to run X11 on this very low and PC at the time.
But well I succeeded to get a terminal and yes, filled the, I had a Unix on my PC in my
dorm next to my bed so I could play all night long with this kind of things.
And actually I used the PC to just to tell net to a real Linux workstation and do some
work on there.
At the time I was using C++ mainly and a little bit of latex for work processing.
And well then I started to work on a PhD and at the time I bought a brand new PC to work
on my PhD at the beginning of the PhD.
And well this time it was already a pension and with a little bit of RAM so I decided
that I would work full time on Linux.
So I built myself the PC from parts that I bought and well I started to try to install
this Debian thing again and well I had some problems.
I think I couldn't even boot the PC using Debian so I tried something else and somebody
told me about this Red Hat thing for which you could get a CD and an install from CD.
So I did that, it worked and then well I started using Red Hat for my PhD and well I spent
all day long working on my PhD using this Red Hat PC which was very, which actually had
all what I needed to do my work.
So I won't give details about the contents of my PhD but I spent most of my time
programming in C++ although I tried some other programming languages just for fun during
that time.
At the time there was no really difference between work and play I should say.
Well I stayed on Red Hat for several years and really I started to understand what free
software was, what were the advantages, the freedom that it gives you and these kind
of things are really become very fond of this and since then I have never stopped using
free software and I have had the chance to be able to continue using Linux and free software
on my everyday work since then up until now and it's been something like 15 years now
since I started using the Linux.
Okay well I think I would stop here in terms of my presentation to the audience of the
Hacker Public Radio and while I hope I will have the time to make some contributions
to the network with some other podcasts and in this podcast I would like to talk a little
bit about programming languages I like very, very much programming and different programming
languages.
I wouldn't say I'm a very, very good programmer but I hope from language to language and
try different things and so I have used many different languages and I would like to
talk a little bit about my impressions and what I know about these different languages.
I would also talk maybe about Linux distributions, different distributions that I have tried
and what I like about them etc.
I also have a home server, I have been using this home server like my some kind of private
cloud for something like six months now so I have a little bit of experience now and I
can maybe give some advice to people thinking about having their own server at home and
well I can also talk about other small things that I make come across, things about of course
programming, hacking, free software etc.
Okay I think that's going to do it for this introductory episode.
If you want to get in touch with me you can send me an email to gargolaatgargola.net.
Gargola is spelled as g-a-r-j-o-l-a, g-a-r-j-o-l-a, gargolaatgargola.net.
Thank you for listening and I hope to I will talk to you again soon, bye.
Thank you for listening and I hope to see you again soon and I hope to see you again soon
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