12-11-2015, 07:30 PM
Tom Scully Wrote:All in a day's work.... cost me a night's sleep, putting this together, but......
Sorry Brian, Jean, and DVP, Banks Did Not Key-Punch 1963 P.O. Money Orders
"We are all outlaws in the eyes of America ....."
Actually, I seem to recall they did. It was the very first year, as I recall reading. Let's talk about this, this is an important issue.
And as long as Gil's here, let's do this right. (Hi Gil, nice to meet you, I've been following your work for quite a while).
So now, I happen to know a little bit about 1963 computer technology. There are two sets of punch holes on the money order, one set is square (the "ordinary" card-type punch holes that we all know and love), and the other set is round. If my hunch is on target, the square ones use the Hollerith code (that was the commonly used keypunch code in the day, it was a selectable output format of pretty much any and all existing keypunch machines at the time). The round holes, however, are non-Hollerith as near as I can tell, and I don't know what that format might be. Anyone know?
I'd like to know exactly what numbers are being shown there, in those keypunch holes. We should be able to decode that, right? Maybe we'll find that they represent payer numbers, and maybe we'll find they're complete garbage. I'm not aware that anyone's done this verification yet, this is still an open question isn't it?
I'd like nothing better than to be able to show those punched "numbers" (if that's what they are) are complete garbage. That would be yet another smoking gun, together with the sequence number and everything else.