Translating filk from Computerese ca. 1984 to Legible Now
Does anyone still have the functional hardware and software to read some 5 1/4-inch floppies and extract / translate some files to current editability?
I have found my copies of the Michigan State University Tolkien Fellowship Songbook volume 1 to 4 that were edited by David Siegel, the late Dr. John Filpus, and me in 1984 etc. Unfortunately, they're not on the 3 1/2 inch floppies that I thought they were (which I can actually read) but on 5 1/4 ones.
I have two set of floppies: one was our original set in WordStar on a machine running the CP/M operating system. The other is marked in Dr. John's handwriting as being WordPerfect version 5, and was possibly done on a DOS machine.
I have the printouts of the files that I want, but I don't trust my scanner character recognition software to read it well enough to save me more time than it will make me waste.
I've been trying to find these files for several years now; here's hoping the hardcopies aren't the only useable versions left of them.
I have found my copies of the Michigan State University Tolkien Fellowship Songbook volume 1 to 4 that were edited by David Siegel, the late Dr. John Filpus, and me in 1984 etc. Unfortunately, they're not on the 3 1/2 inch floppies that I thought they were (which I can actually read) but on 5 1/4 ones.
I have two set of floppies: one was our original set in WordStar on a machine running the CP/M operating system. The other is marked in Dr. John's handwriting as being WordPerfect version 5, and was possibly done on a DOS machine.
I have the printouts of the files that I want, but I don't trust my scanner character recognition software to read it well enough to save me more time than it will make me waste.
I've been trying to find these files for several years now; here's hoping the hardcopies aren't the only useable versions left of them.