ANTIC Interview 356 - Michael McInerney, physics experiments with Atari computers - a podcast by Randy Kindig, Kay Savetz, Brad Arnold

 

In the 1980s, Michael McInerney was a professor in the physics department at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, when he wrote several journal articles about how to control experiments and gather data using Atari computers. 

 

The articles included Interfacing the Atari Microcomputer in the Science Laboratory, which appeared in the spring 1983 issue of Journal of Computers in Mathematics and Science Teaching; Game Port Physics - Introductory Experiments in Linear Dynamics, which appeared in the spring 1984 issue; and Computer-Aided Experiments with the Damped Harmonic Oscillator, which appeared in the October 1985 issue of American Journal of Physics.

 

This interview took place on May 21, 2018.

 

"The reviewers refused to believe I could do it which such cheap equipment. ... They said it wasn't possible to do it."