In France, horse races happen every day of the year and you can bet on horses through the PMU, the "Pari Mutuel Urbain". Nowadays, you can bet through the Internet, but back in the eighties, there was no Internet. But you could use a device called the "Minitel".
The Minitel was a small terminal with a modem on your telephone line. 1200 bauds download and 75 bauds upload.
So, in the eighties, I decided to bet on horses. I did not know anything about horses, but I had a plan. I bought every day a newspaper named Paris-Turf. In it, there was for each race of the day prognoses by various horse tipsters that were supposed to know what they were doing.
I wrote a program to compute statistics about the different races, the prognoses and the results of the different races. After a month of getting these data, my program started to indicate when there was a good chance that I would make money on some bets.
So, I started to follow the instructions from my program. I did that for one full year. Sometimes I would win, sometimes I would lose. As I remember, I have bet around 60,000 francs, but I was down only 3,000 francs. It was in fact cheap entertainment.
Sunday, July 10, 2011
Monday, July 04, 2011
Showing my conjugator to my father
In the 80s, as I was still in the French Navy, in my spare time, I had written a program to conjugate all the French verbs, a conjugator.
The data came from a French dictionary and from a very popular book of conjugations of French verbs. I had entered all this data manually.
You could enter any verbal form and the program would display the full conjugation of all the verbs that include this verbal form.
My father had never liked computers. I think he was afraid of them, because he did not understand how they worked.
I told him that I had written this conjugator program and I wanted to show it to him. He was very reticent but finally I was able sit him in front of my computer.
After I explained how this conjugator worked, I asked him to give me any verbal form he wanted to demonstrate the capabilities of the program.
He chose "aille". He expected the program to display the verb "aller" (to go), where "aille" is in the present subjunctive.
So, I entered "aille" and the first verb displayed was "ailler", where "aille" is in the present indicative. "Ail" in French means garlic and the verb "ailler" means "to add garlic to", for example to a leg of lamb. My father did not know of this verb and considered that it was not a real French verb.
Even after I pressed "next" and the program displayed the conjugation of the verb "aller", he was still convinced that my program was useless. That reinforced his dislike of computers.
The data came from a French dictionary and from a very popular book of conjugations of French verbs. I had entered all this data manually.
You could enter any verbal form and the program would display the full conjugation of all the verbs that include this verbal form.
My father had never liked computers. I think he was afraid of them, because he did not understand how they worked.
I told him that I had written this conjugator program and I wanted to show it to him. He was very reticent but finally I was able sit him in front of my computer.
After I explained how this conjugator worked, I asked him to give me any verbal form he wanted to demonstrate the capabilities of the program.
He chose "aille". He expected the program to display the verb "aller" (to go), where "aille" is in the present subjunctive.
So, I entered "aille" and the first verb displayed was "ailler", where "aille" is in the present indicative. "Ail" in French means garlic and the verb "ailler" means "to add garlic to", for example to a leg of lamb. My father did not know of this verb and considered that it was not a real French verb.
Even after I pressed "next" and the program displayed the conjugation of the verb "aller", he was still convinced that my program was useless. That reinforced his dislike of computers.
Sunday, July 03, 2011
Chroniques and Collectives
On both side of the family, my grandparents had a large number of children. When their children started to have children and there were some news that were worth dissaminating to the rest of the family, both my grandfathers started a circular letter around 1952.
On my mother's side the circular letter is called "la Collective" and on my father's side, it is called "la Chronique".
Everybody would write to my grandfathers and they would give their own news and those of their children that they had received in a circular letter that was sent to everybody who did not live in their house.
When my paternal grandfather started to decline in the sixties, my father took over. When my maternal grandfather died, my father also took over. So, his brothers, sisters, stepbrothers and stepsisters wrote to him and he published the circular letters weekly.
Originally, my father used a duplicating machine from the brand name Gestetner. Then, in the 80s he bought small self-contained word processors (from the brand names Philips and Cannon) and photocopiers.
When he started to decline in the 90s, my mother took over, still using the word-processors and the photocopiers.
We had a hard time persuading my mother to get a computer. She agreed on the condition that she would get a laptop. At this time, that made no economic sense, because a laptop was costing more than twice the price of a desktop. On hindsight, she was right. She got a used laptop and started to learn to use Microsoft Word. She was still printing, photocopying and sending the circular letters by snail mail.
Around 2000, I persuade her to get the Internet. So, she was able to send the letters through e-mail.
She is still writing the two original circular letters, twice a month. Recently, she has started another circular letter, the "Bulletin Paul", to disseminate the news of the descendants of my parents.
At 90 years of age, she still continue to publish two family newsfeeds that have been in publication for almost sixty years. She has more than 100 subscribers, from three generations, most of them receiving the circular letters by e-mail.
The publication of the original Chronique and Collective will cease when she dies or are no longer able to publish. It is possible that one of my brother or sister will be able to take over the Bulletin Paul, but nothing is for sure.
On my mother's side the circular letter is called "la Collective" and on my father's side, it is called "la Chronique".
Everybody would write to my grandfathers and they would give their own news and those of their children that they had received in a circular letter that was sent to everybody who did not live in their house.
When my paternal grandfather started to decline in the sixties, my father took over. When my maternal grandfather died, my father also took over. So, his brothers, sisters, stepbrothers and stepsisters wrote to him and he published the circular letters weekly.
Originally, my father used a duplicating machine from the brand name Gestetner. Then, in the 80s he bought small self-contained word processors (from the brand names Philips and Cannon) and photocopiers.
When he started to decline in the 90s, my mother took over, still using the word-processors and the photocopiers.
We had a hard time persuading my mother to get a computer. She agreed on the condition that she would get a laptop. At this time, that made no economic sense, because a laptop was costing more than twice the price of a desktop. On hindsight, she was right. She got a used laptop and started to learn to use Microsoft Word. She was still printing, photocopying and sending the circular letters by snail mail.
Around 2000, I persuade her to get the Internet. So, she was able to send the letters through e-mail.
She is still writing the two original circular letters, twice a month. Recently, she has started another circular letter, the "Bulletin Paul", to disseminate the news of the descendants of my parents.
At 90 years of age, she still continue to publish two family newsfeeds that have been in publication for almost sixty years. She has more than 100 subscribers, from three generations, most of them receiving the circular letters by e-mail.
The publication of the original Chronique and Collective will cease when she dies or are no longer able to publish. It is possible that one of my brother or sister will be able to take over the Bulletin Paul, but nothing is for sure.
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