Foonly Inc. was an American

computer A computer is a machine that can be programmed to Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as C ...

company formed by Dave Poole in 1976, that produced a series of ''

DEC PDP-10 Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC)'s PDP-10, later marketed as the DECsystem-10, is a mainframe computer family manufactured beginning in 1966 and discontinued in 1983. 1970s models and beyond were marketed under the DECsystem-10 name, especi ...

'' compatible

mainframe A mainframe computer, informally called a mainframe or big iron, is a computer used primarily by large organizations for critical applications like bulk data processing for tasks such as censuses, industry and consumer statistics, enterprise ...

computers, named ''Foonly F1'' to ''Foonly F5''.Foonly Product Overview Brochure
/ref> The first and most famous Foonly machine, the ''F1'', was the computer used by

Triple-I Information International, Inc., commonly referred to as Triple-I or III, was an early computer technology company. Background The company was founded by Edward Fredkin in 1962 in Maynard, Massachusetts. It then moved (serially) to Santa Monic ...

to create some of the

computer-generated imagery Computer-generated imagery (CGI) is the use of computer graphics to create or contribute to images in art, printed media, video games, simulators, and visual effects in films, television programs, shorts, commercials, and videos. The images may ...

in the 1982 film ''

Tron ''Tron'' (stylized as ''TRON'') is a 1982 American science fiction action-adventure film written and directed by Steven Lisberger from a story by Lisberger and Bonnie MacBird. The film stars Jeff Bridges as Kevin Flynn, a computer programmer a ...

''.

History

At the beginning of the 1970s, the

Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory Stanford University has many centers and institutes dedicated to the study of various specific topics. These centers and institutes may be within a department, within a school but across departments, an independent laboratory, institute or center ...

(SAIL) began to study the building of a new computer to replace their ''DEC PDP-10 KA-10'', by a far more powerful machine, with a funding from Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (

DARPA The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is a research and development agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the development of emerging technologies for use by the military. Originally known as the Adv ...

). This project was named "''Super-Foonly''", and was developed by a team led by Phil Petit, Jack Holloway, and Dave Poole. The name itself came from FOO NLI, an error message emitted by a PDP-10 assembler at SAIL meaning "FOO is Not a Legal Identifier". In 1974, DARPA cut the funding, and a large part of the team went to DEC to develop the ''PDP-10 model KL10'', based on the ''Super-Foonly project''. But Dave Poole, with Phil Petit and Jack Holloway, preferred to found the Foonly Company in 1976, to try to build a series of computers based on the ''Super-Foonly project''. During the early 1980s, after the releasing of their first and only F1, Foonly built and sold some F2, F4 and F5 low cost

compatible machines. In 1983, after the cancellation of the

Jupiter project Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but slightly less than one-thousandth th ...

, Foonly tried to propose a new ''Foonly F1'', but it was eclipsed by the ''SC Group'' company and their ''Mars project'', and the company never quite recovered, shutting down in 1989.

Computers

List of models

The Foonly F1

The Foonly F1 was the first and most powerful Foonly computer, but also the only one being built of its kind. It was based on the ''Super-Foonly project'' designs, aimed to be the fastest

compatible, but using

emitter-coupled logic In electronics, emitter-coupled logic (ECL) is a high-speed integrated circuit bipolar transistor logic family. ECL uses an overdriven bipolar junction transistor (BJT) differential amplifier with single-ended input and limited emitter current to ...

(ECL) gates rather than

transistor–transistor logic Transistor–transistor logic (TTL) is a logic family built from bipolar junction transistors. Its name signifies that transistors perform both the logic function (the first "transistor") and the amplifying function (the second "transistor"), as opp ...

(TTL), and without the extended instruction set. It was developed with the help of

, its first customer, and began operations in 1978. The computer consisted of four cabinets: * One for the

central processing unit A central processing unit (CPU), also called a central processor, main processor or just processor, is the electronic circuitry that executes instructions comprising a computer program. The CPU performs basic arithmetic, logic, controlling, an ...

(CPU) * One AMPEX for the

random-access memory Random-access memory (RAM; ) is a form of computer memory that can be read and changed in any order, typically used to store working Data (computing), data and machine code. A Random access, random-access memory device allows data items to b ...

(RAM), with 2 MB of

core memory Core or cores may refer to: Science and technology * Core (anatomy), everything except the appendages * Core (manufacturing), used in casting and molding * Core (optical fiber), the signal-carrying portion of an optical fiber * Core, the central ...

* A specific cabinet holding the Magic Movie Memory, a 3 MB video buffer, used especially to render movie frames * One cabinet with tape and disk controllers, and power switches. It was able to reach 4.5 MIPS. The F1 is mostly famous to have been the computer behind some of the

Computer-generated imagery Computer-generated imagery (CGI) is the use of computer graphics to create or contribute to images in art, printed media, video games, simulators, and visual effects in films, television programs, shorts, commercials, and videos. The images may ...

of the Disney 1982

movie, and also

Looker ''Looker'' is a 1981 American science fiction film written and directed by Michael Crichton and starring Albert Finney, Susan Dey, and James Coburn. The film is a suspense/science-fiction piece that comments upon and satirizes media, advertising ...

(1981). After that, the computer was bought by the Canadian Omnibus Computer Graphics company, and was used on some movies, such as television logos for CBC, CTV, and

Global Television Network The Global Television Network (more commonly called Global, or occasionally Global TV) is a Canadian English-language terrestrial television network. It is currently Canada's second most-watched private terrestrial television network after ...

channels, opening titles for the show Hockey Night in Canada, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock (1984),

Flight of the Navigator ''Flight of the Navigator'' is a 1986 American science fiction adventure film directed by Randal Kleiser and written by Mark H. Baker, Michael Burton, and Matt MacManus. It stars Joey Cramer as David Freeman, a 12-year-old boy who is abducted by ...

(1986),

Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future ''Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future'' is a science fiction-action television series, merging live action with animation based on computer-generated images, that ran for 22 episodes in Canadian and American syndication. A toy line was ...

television series (1987), and MarilynMonrobot.

Other models

Unlike the F1, the other models (F2, F4, F4B, F5) were built with the slower TTL rather than ECL circuits, and housed in a single cabinet, rather than four. Rather than use DEC's

Massbus The Massbus is a high-performance computer input/output bus designed in the 1970s by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC). The architecture development was sponsored by Gordon Bell and John Levy was the principal architect. The bus was used by Di ...

(or other DEC bus), Foonly developed F-bus, which can work with DEC and non-DEC peripherals.

F2

Foonly described the F2 as "a powerful mainframe at a minicomputer price," "with an average execution speed about 25% of that of the

DECSYSTEM-20 The DECSYSTEM-20 was a 36-bit Digital Equipment Corporation PDP-10 mainframe computer running the TOPS-20 operating system (products introduced in 1977). PDP-10 computers running the TOPS-10 operating system were labeled ''DECsystem-10'' as a ...

60."

Peripherals

Standard equipment: * Disk drives: 1–6 units, with choices of 160 MB

Winchester Winchester is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in Hampshire, England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government Districts of England, district, at the western end of the South Downs Nation ...

or 300 MB removable * Tape drives: 1–4 units, with choices of 800, 1600 & 6250 BPI

Software

The Foonly machines, which could run the TENEX operating system, came with a derivative thereof, FOONEX.

Tymshare

Tymshare Tymshare, Inc (Matthew Heyer-Baker) was a time-sharing service and third-party hardware maintenance company competing with companies such as CompuServe, Service Bureau Corporation and National CSS. Tymshare developed or acquired various technolog ...

attempted marketing the Foonly line, using the name "Tymshare XX Series Computer Family" of which the ''Tymshare System XXVI" was the main focus.

External links

Lars Brinkhoff's table showing the F1 in perspective with other PDP-10 models

* ttp://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/pdf/foonly/Foonly_Product_Overview.pdf The product line overview, Foonly brochure
The Foonly F2 Brochure, 1981

References

{{Tron American companies established in 1976 American companies disestablished in 1989 Companies based in California Computer companies established in 1976 Computer companies disestablished in 1989 DEC hardware Defunct computer companies of the United States History of computing hardware