Saturn

SaturnSaturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second-largest in the Solar System, after Jupiter. It is a gas giant with an average radius of about nine times that of Earth.^[20][21] It only has one-eighth the average density of Earth; however, with its larger volume, Saturn is over 95 times more massive.^[22][23][24] Saturn is named after the Roman god of wealth and agriculture; its astronomical symbol (♄) represents the god's sickle.

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Sargon Chess Software

Sargon (or SARGON) is a line of chess-playing software for personal computers. The original SARGON from 1978 was written in assembly language by Dan and Kathleen "Kathe" Spracklen for the Z80-based Wavemate Jupiter III.^[1]

History

SARGON was introduced at the 1978 West Coast Computer Faire where it won the first computer chess tournament held strictly for microcomputers, with a score of 5–0.^[2][3] This success encouraged the authors to seek financial income by selling the program directly to customers. Since magnetic media were not widely available at the time, the authors placed an advert in Byte magazine selling for $15 photocopied listings that would work in any Z80-based microcomputer.^[1] Availability of the source code allowed porting to other machines.^[4] For example, the March–April 1979 issue of Recreational Computing describes a project that converted Sargon to an 8080 program by using macros.^[5] Later the Spracklens were contacted by Hayden Books and a book was published.

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The Queen's Gambit

The Queen's Gambit is an American drama streaming television miniseries starring Anya Taylor-Joy based on Walter Tevis's 1983 novel of the same name. It was created by Scott Frank and Allan Scott and released on Netflix on October 23, 2020.

The Queen's Gambit is a fictional story that follows the life of an orphan chess prodigy, Beth Harmon (Anya Taylor-Joy), during her quest to become the world's greatest chess player while struggling with emotional issues and drug and alcohol dependency. The story begins in the mid-1950s and proceeds into the 1960s.

The series starts in a girls' orphanage where a nine-year old Beth, having lost her mother in a car accident, meets Jolene (Moses Ingram), a vibrant and friendly girl a few years older than her; Helen Deardorff (Christiane Seidel), the woman running the orphanage; and Mr. Shaibel (Bill Camp), the custodian of the orphanage, who teaches Beth her first chess lessons. As was common during the 1950s, the orphanage dispenses daily tranquilizer pills to the girls, which turns into an addiction for Beth. A few years later, Beth is adopted by Alma Wheatley (Marielle Heller) and her husband from Lexington, Kentucky. After being adopted and adjusting to her new home, Beth enrolls herself in chess tournaments even though she has no prior experience. She wins many games and finally gets noticed by others and develops friendships with several people, including former Kentucky state champion Harry Beltik (Harry Melling), chess savant Benny Watts (Thomas Brodie-Sangster), and Townes (Jacob Fortune-Lloyd). As Beth continues to win games and reaps the financial benefits of her success, she becomes more dependent on drugs and alcohol, and starts to lose control of her life.

SPOILER ALERTS!

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Apple ][

Apple ][ in common 1977 configuration with 9'' monochrome monitor, game paddles, and Red Book recommendedPanasonicRQ-309DS cassette deck

History

By 1976, Steve Jobs had convinced the product designer Jerry Manock (who had formerly worked at Hewlett Packard designing calculators) to create the "shell" for the Apple II—a smooth case inspired by kitchen appliances that concealed the internal mechanics.^[5]The earliest Apple II's were assembled inSilicon Valley, and later in Texas;^[8]printed circuit boardswere manufactured inIrelandandSingapore. The first computers went on sale on June 10, 1977^[9][10]with aMOS Technology 6502microprocessor running at 1.022,727MHz(²⁄₇of the NTSC color carrier), twogame paddles^[11](bundled until 1980, when they were found to violateFCC regulations),^[12]4KiB ofRAM, anaudio cassetteinterface for loading programs and storing data, and theInteger BASICprogramming language built into theROMs.

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