{{{It ocxDcurr{ed to m{e that in ~rthis era of hi{gh-speed
error-{correc{{{ting m~rodems, the vast ho{rdes of peoxDple
who are getxDting ixDnto onl~rine com{muni{caxDxDtions for the
first ti{me may nev{er have {{experiexDnced a pheno{{{~rmenon
familiar to veterans ~rlike me kno{{{{wn as LI~rNE NOxDISE. WitxDh
ol{{der modems of the 3~r00, 1200, and 24{00 bps variety, stat{{{ic
on the phone line would gxDet pas{{{~rsed through the ~rmodem
unfi~rltxDered and sh{ow up on yxDour scxDreen as{{{ variou{s
semi-random characte~rrs intexDrspersed with t{he text ~rthat was{
supp{{osed to be th{{{ere. WxDith a really b{{ad conxDnection,
t{{{his could make the text almost u{{nr~r~rexD~adable.

ThisxD is th~re ite{{{m to wax nos{{{talgic a{{{bout l{{ine
noi{se. GrizzxDled vet{{erans {are invited to sha{{{re their
f{{{~raxDvorite line noise ho{{rror stxDories or present
t~r~pechnical exp{{{lanatioxDns of why cert~rain pattxDerns of
n{{oise chxDaracters te{{{{nded to be soxD common. N{{{e~~rrwbies
who have ne{{{ver seen line xDnoise may eitxDher lurk sixDlently
in thexD shadows or offer ~rappro{{{prixDate xDexprxDessions
of awe.

I h{ave e{{{nterxDed some sxDimulatedxD li~rne noise in this
xD{texDxt to gi{{ve you a fee~rl for w{hat it wxDas like{{{.
You a{{xDre u{{{nder no obl~rigatxDion t{o do like~rwise, bu{{{t
yxDou may if yo{{{u wxDish~r.

33 responses total.

oh, wow, real reading comprehension tested again!! thankxx for the thrill!

Remmers is speaking in tongues!

All those { and ~ do warm my heart. They are the most commonly appearing
sporadic characters, because of their bit configuration. 

xxxxx~xxxxxxx

Now that is *not* line noise, but rather a modem running at the wrong speed.

Has someone written a program for mixing text and simulated line noise
with the correct statistical distributions? Was #0 generated that way? It
seems to me that it would be out of character for remmers to (tediously)
type that out. 

Line noise often arrived in two character consonants.  I was always especially
fond of the relatively rare "ok" noise.

Hmmm...maybe that's a fund-raising idea.  We could write a "line noise"
filter that inserts similated line noise into text.  Turn it on as the default
in party and conferences, and make it so only members can turn it off.

I think it was Brian C. Orion who told me that ~r was the sign of the 
evil raster snake.

   I have a true line noise story that took me weeks to overcome.

   It was on a VAX, using 1200bps modei.  I had made the call to
it; the lines were really horrible that night, and after the third
time of switching phone lines, I gave up.  Probably the modem
line at the VAX end had the problem, and since there was only one
modem, I was stuck.  I was also trying to finish things on a
project by morning.

   I had two data files to work with.  It was data on shoes, as I
remember.  The data was output from some ancient thing like Condor,
ASCII comma delimited.  My job was to take the data from these two
files and rearrange it with awk and friends.

   Problem was, the line noise kept on bothering me and blowing me
off.  Since it was getting difficult to stay on for more than five
minutes, and since the line noise was getting into the input stram
of my sesion, I started using aliases to speed things up.  One of
the aliases was to make 'x' be a 'cp' (the UNIX file copy command)
and y to 'mv'.  Stuff like that.

   As I continued throught the night, the problem fgot worse.  I
could expect to be thrown off within a few minutes, and several
times as I was editing a file dear little pieces of noise would
crawl into the file.

   Finally the end was near.  Since I don't type well, I was using
single letter file names, just so I might get the damned things
typed in before the noise would introduce itself again.

   Probably less than an hour before I was to have finished, a
blast of noise killed me.  OK, I thought.  It was only about the
50th time I'd called that night (really).  So I climb back on,
and start to continue on.

   Only the 'y' file that I'd been working on wasn't there.  Now,
at this point in the morning, I'd been up for about 20 hours,
fighting with the people who owned the data, trying to get them
to explain what they wanted in writing, as opposed to changing it
every 11 minutes.  Panic time.

   The file was definitely not there.  I had wondered if I'd
removed it during one of the last phases of changing stuff, (I'd
gotten a call at 5AM, asking yet Yet Another Change (YAC).  But
no, it didn't seem that way.  I was wondering how I was going
to pull a rabbit out of a hat by 9am, since I'd said that 5am
that all would be ready.  In the midst of my semi-controlled
panic, I did an ls of the work dir, just to see if perhaps I'd
done something stupid with it.

   I did eventually find it.  The line noise renamed the #(*&#$
file.

   I had lots of aliases set up.  Apparently, the last burst of
noise, which was truely impressive, had sent me a valid UNIX
command.  A sign from God.  Or perhaps from a little farther down.

   I use single characters for things, both commands and file
names, since I'm not great at typing.  The file that contained
all the data was 'x'.  The UNIX move command (mv) was called
'x', also.

   Somehow, the fates sent me what must have been this line--

       x x x{{_p

   I remember that file name, because I kept on staring at it,
after I'd realized that 20 hours work hadn't been stolen, trying
to figure out what the devil had gone on.  Finally it dawned on
me, that the line was was accepted as a valid UNIX command and
was executed, just before getting blown off the system.

   I really love line-noise.

That's a great one, STeve.

Remmers #0 looks just like my screen whenever it rains (something to do with
crappy telephone groundbox which the telephone company won't replace.

duct tape some sheet plastic over/around it!

Does it mean that I am grizzled that I could read #0 about 90% as fast as I
can read 'normal' text?

I remember connecting to merit at 300 about 2 years ago because the stuff at
the node local to my 'permanent address' was so bad.  I was went right ahead
with my rn anyway for about 2 minutes until I got dropped.

only 90% ??? no, you're not grizzled yet <g>. 
  
96-97% and you;re grizzled. i only slowed down to 96% for the 1st line,
i'm grizzled. 
  
steve's report brings tears to my eyes, it really does. it's been a rare
time when i laugh and cry at the same time, but #7 did it.
  
for that single response alone, this itme needs to be archived.

So, was the file renamed x{{_p? I just want to be sure I understand
this before I laught..  8*}.

This response has been erased.

   Yes Rane, you got it.  The line noise hung me up, and renamed
my data on me.

I would have expected it to ask whether you want to replace or add to x{{_p.

   Nope.  Mv is silent, unless you give it the -i option.


   Hey! Doesn't anyone else have anything for this item?

  Back in high school, with a room full of 300-baud acoustic modems, a
standard prank was to whistle at someone's modem while they were printing.
A talented whistler could induce line noise on most of the terminals in
the room.  (For those unfamiliar with acoustic modems, they use a speaker
and microphone which are kind of suction-cupped onto a phone's handset,
rather than using a direct phone line).

I just bought an acoustic modem - separate rubber cups for the mike and
speaker of a phone: thought it might be handy when traveling (and, it was
cheap). It doesn't fit modern phones with square mike/speakers very well,
though 8^{. 

My first modem was a 300-baud acoustic, back in 1978. Cost about
$350 (and that was 1978 dollars!). A loud sneeze could disconnect
me. Xmodem transfers were "interesting" too.

Oh oh...I don't know what baud rate  my "new" acoustic modem will handle.
I may have just a piece of historical trivia...(however the unit is not
a *modem*, but just the audio interface - it plugs into a modem. MIght
still be OK)

I'd be *very* surprised if it's faster than 300 bps, Rane, & it might be 110
or less.  It's possible that faster ones were produced, but as the anecdotes
given earlier suggest the signal really is not good enough to handle faster
speeds.

Back in those days (which is the time I'm from), speeds above 1200 baud were
considered impossible because of the inability of phone lines to carry signals
reliably.

I remember reading a thread when V.34 modems were becoming popular, explaining
why 28.8 kbps was the fastest possible, when Hayes released their 33.6 kbps
modem.  There is, of course, an upper limit around there, for uncompressed
throughput.  Even a 28.8 kbps connection depends on a better phone line
than most people have.

There are definitely high speed acoustic couplers out there.  Black Box
carries one that purports to do up to 14.4k.

Where might I get a set of those rubber cups?  I need them for a project...

(Actually, an accoustic coupler sounds like it could come in *real* handy from
a pay phone, if the line noise isn't too bad [pay phones seem to consistently
be the worst for line noise, don't they?].)

arthrup, if you want them for your teletype project, then go to the junkyard
and look  for an old acoustic modem to scavenge.  The new stuff (marketed to
International Road Warriors (tm)) is expensive, I think about $150 for the
coupler.

   Ah, memories.

   Vadic actually made an acoistically coupled 1200bps modem, which
really worked.  Unforunately, there were the two standards at that
time, Vadic and Bell's "212" modem system.

   Since Vadic considered their system superior and propritary,
they wouldn't let other companies use them.  This means that other
1200bps modei were 212-compatible, and the rest they say, is
history.  Vadic was plowed into the earth and the 212 modei ruled.
Which really was too bad, becuase the Vadic system was better.
Much better under noisy conditions.

  The V.34 standard (28.8Kbps) was known to not be completely
pushing the phone systems possibilities back before it was
ratified, but the political problems over V.34 were so intense,
worse than the technical really, that they finally agreed to
stop bitching at each other and ratify the damned thing.  I
do not know if V.34bis (which is what the 33.6Kbps standard
will be called, eventually) has been formally drawn up yet,
so I suppose that there is still a possibility that we haven't
seen the end of modem upgrades yet.  At worst we'll probably
see the official V.34bis be a little different meaning that
companies like Hayes and USR will release new ROMs to conform.

 ...But that will mark the end of the speed changes in modei
that work over US phone lines, unless someone comes up with
something truely neat and new.  But that won't be the end of
it in Europe.  Swiss phone lines are *considerably* better
than ours, so I wouldn't be surprised to see something around
56K there, eventually.

I got the Acoustic Coupler from Alltronics (408-943-9773) for $4.95.
(Item 92C032). It consists of two rubber cups - and wires to a modular
plug. I just tried it...it's "live", but the signal is too weak. I
will check the battery (hard to get at).

I really only need the rubber cups, nothing else, so I guess salvage is the
way to go.  :)

I have started Item 109, Acoustic Couplers, in the hardware cf. No matter
how {{{Li{nexD No~rise N{{ostxDalgi~a IxDt{em they are, that seemed a
sensible place to continue the discussion. The battery is OK, but it
didn't work: details in hardware.

 I love line noise in party, it comes out as M-{'M-{"M on and on

 though I preferred the old line noise before the days of
 seecontrol... it was full of greek letters and such.

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