Questions tagged [bugs]
Defects in historical software and hardware, their causes, questions about well-known bugs. Use [debugging] for bug diagnosis and discovery.
25
questions
13
votes
2
answers
719
views
Why does the FRE() function in CBM BASIC v2 return negative values?
On Commodore machines featuring CBM BASIC v2, the FRE() function to query the amount of memory available to BASIC returns a negative number when the result exceeds 32767 bytes:
This quirk does not ...
- 7,023
15
votes
1
answer
930
views
Why would an implementation of getwd call mktemp?
As mentioned here the book Expert C Programming contains the claim that there was a bug in SunOS 4.0.3's version of lpr, (a printing program) caused by a custom mktemp function overriding the library ...
- 525
13
votes
1
answer
422
views
Was there a hard disk type that had a SMART overflow crash/bug?
A data center employee told me a story about 25 years ago, explaining why that data center took some time to assemble a RAID array. Recently, I wasn't able to verify the facts by googling, and I may ...
- 273
37
votes
1
answer
7k
views
In the classic "Windows 98 crashes live on CNN" video, why does the BSOD appear so oddly?
I've been seeing this since the late 1990s: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKy9fV_zX_o
Was this a hoax or joke of some kind? The only reason I ask is that, when the blue screen appears, it does so in ...
- 371
29
votes
1
answer
4k
views
How did anti-Y2K-bug boards work?
During the Y2K bug hype, I remember seeing a store announcing some kind of board that one would connect to the motherboard of a PC and the problem would be fixed. Were these devices legit and, if so, ...
- 299
77
votes
2
answers
16k
views
Why does the infamous "ENGAGERIDLEYMOTHERFUCKER" Metroid password break NES emulators?
For those who are unfamiliar, the original NES Metroid was one of many NES games to use passwords as a means to save progress.
Later, this password system was leveraged to create unusual effects in ...
- 4,001
37
votes
2
answers
8k
views
Why does Windows 1.01 crash at the splash screen?
When Windows 1.01 is started under DOSBox, FreeDOS or one of the later versions of MS-DOS, garbage characters are printed on the screen right after displaying the Microsoft logo. Here’s an example in ...
- 21.6k
24
votes
1
answer
1k
views
How did the C64 lockup bug and its workarounds work?
The Commodore 64 suffered from a strange bug that caused it to lock up when typing in the full-screen BASIC editor. To trigger the bug, position the cursor on the last line of the screen, type enough ...
- 7,023
21
votes
1
answer
1k
views
Why can MS-DOS not read partitions starting at logical sector 0?
When creating a FAT file system, mtools and newer versions of mkfs.fat write a stub MBR partition table to the boot sector. This makes the file system accessible when written directly to media that ...
- 21.6k
7
votes
1
answer
2k
views
Was there a bug in Wirth's original Pascal compiler?
It appears that both legacy Pascal compilers I have access to (for the BESM-6) contain a bug: they would happily produce code for
program test(output);(* may have to omit (output) depending on the ...
- 18.3k
13
votes
6
answers
792
views
Are there any primary sources for the “passing constant by reference” behavior in old Fortran compilers?
Occasionally I have heard references to a peculiarity of certain (old) Fortran compilers, with regards to subprogram argument passing. Here is an example, from an answer to a Stack Overflow question:
...
- 3,465
9
votes
1
answer
2k
views
Is this a bug or an allowed Pascal behavior?
Consider the following Pascal program:
1 1 PROGRAM MAIN(OUTPUT); VAR F:TEXT; I:INTEGER;
2 2 BEGIN
3 2 REWRITE(F);
4 3 FOR I := 10 TO 30 DO BEGIN
5 3 WRITELN( I, ’...
- 18.3k
193
votes
1
answer
55k
views
Why does trying to break into the NT 3.1 kernel reboot my 486DX4 machine?
I installed Windows NT 3.1 on a Compaq ProSignia 3080 system, because of several reasons: I know that this machine was running Windows NT 3.1 when it was in productive use. And I think this machine ...
- 7,636
37
votes
3
answers
3k
views
How can I play QBasic Nibbles on a modern machine?
MS-DOS versions 5 and 6 come bundled with the QBasic interpreter and a handful of example programs written in that BASIC dialect. One of the programs is Nibbles, a variant of the well-known Snake game....
- 21.6k
13
votes
2
answers
1k
views
Why do sprites lag behind a scrolling map in first-generation Pokémon games?
This is something I often notice whenever I see a first-generation Pokémon game being played on a Game Boy emulator. It might be present on real hardware as well, but I don’t have that to test.
When ...
- 21.6k
12
votes
2
answers
3k
views
Intel 386 multiply bug
Some early models of Intel 80386 processors had a bug with 32-bit integer multiplication. Those which were found to have the bug were marked "16-bit S/W ONLY" (not sure what S/W is supposed ...
- 2,277
23
votes
12
answers
7k
views
Was memory corruption a common problem in large programs written in assembly language?
Memory corruption bugs have always been a common problem in large C programs and projects. It was a problem in 4.3BSD back then, and it's still a problem today. No matter how carefully the program is ...
- 3,084
13
votes
1
answer
763
views
What was the specific function of the relay which captured Grace Hopper's famous "bug"?
Computer pioneer Grace Hopper often recounted the story of her team finding the first physical computer bug:
While she was working on a Mark II Computer at Harvard University in 1947, her associates ...
- 15.8k
3
votes
1
answer
317
views
What bug in first version of game Karateka for Apple 2e cause this game reset in Apple 2c?
If I try to start the first version of the game Karateka for Apple IIe on an Apple IIc, the Apple IIc will restart after reading the game from disk after a few seconds. Later versions of Karateka for ...
- 505
76
votes
4
answers
16k
views
What made Windows Me so crash-prone?
Many people remember this operating system as not exactly a walk in the park, namely that it could crash as early as during the installation phase or at unexpected times when the user wasn't doing ...
- 6,358
440
votes
8
answers
230k
views
Why did moving the mouse cursor cause Windows 95 to run more quickly?
I was playing Hypnospace Outlaw, a game about a retro-themed OS. This OS has a peculiar behavior that when loading a webpage, wiggling the mouse cursor will load the page faster.
That reminded me of ...
- 2,020
14
votes
1
answer
691
views
SYSENTER/SYSEXIT broken on Pentium Pro and Pentium II?
I was just reading What is linux-gate.so.1?, and it says this:
Intel recognized this problem early on and introduced a more efficient system call interface in the form of sysenter and sysexit ...
- 3,388
43
votes
1
answer
8k
views
Why does the kill-screen glitch occur in Pac-man?
Pac-man is a game where you navigate a small yellow circle around a maze, collecting dots and fruit whilst avoiding brightly-coloured monsters, or ghosts. As long as there was at least one 'man left, ...
- 18.5k
26
votes
6
answers
8k
views
Why did Pokémon Red have so many overflow bugs?
(This question also applies to other Game Boy games, but Pokémon seems to be one of the best-documented.)
Pokémon Red & Blue (Red & Green in Japan) is a pair of Game Boy games about capturing &...
- 18.5k
15
votes
1
answer
1k
views
What is the CoCo "Head Banger bug" and what is the "fix"?
I remember that horrible racket coming from the floppy disk when I first used it after started my CoCo, and that it was called the "Head Banger bug".
I remember that it was due to a quick-n-...
- 1,337