Hello Rob!

** On Saturday 17.01.26 - 08:41, Rob Mccart wrote to NIGHTFOX:

I don't recall hearing anyone call them "microfloppies".

I still have a couple of original boxes of them here and they call
them Microfloppies right on the box.

[...]

Yes, it's the disk that is floppy, not the sleeve it comes in.. B)

This outfit is repurposing them this way:

https://atticjournals.com/collections/other-bookish-goods/products/floppy- disc-notepad

A novelty. But I wouldn't pay that much for that.

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Re: 3.5 floppies
By: Ogg to Rob Mccart on Sun Feb 15 2026 03:38 pm

I still have a couple of original boxes of them here and they call them
Microfloppies right on the box.

[...]

Yes, it's the disk that is floppy, not the sleeve it comes in.. B)

That may be, but it was common to just call the whole thing a floppy disk.

Nightfox

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Nightfox wrote to Ogg <=-

That may be, but it was common to just call the whole thing a floppy
disk.

I think I mentioned this before, when there were 8 inch floppies, they
were called "floppy" disks. 5 1/4 were mini-floppies, until 8 inch
floppies became rare, then they became floppies. When 3 1/2" floppies
came around, they were microfloppies, until they became the standard.



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Re: Re: 3.5 floppies
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Nightfox on Mon Feb 16 2026 10:31 am

That may be, but it was common to just call the whole thing a floppy
disk.

I think I mentioned this before, when there were 8 inch floppies, they were called "floppy" disks. 5 1/4 were mini-floppies, until 8 inch floppies became rare, then they became floppies. When 3 1/2" floppies came around, they were microfloppies, until they became the standard.

Maybe it's regional, but I don't recall anyone ever calling the 3 1/2" ones "microfloppies". Just 3 & 1/2" floppies or 3 & 1/2" floppy disks.

Nightfox

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Re: Re: 3.5 floppies
By: Nightfox to poindexter FORTRAN on Mon Feb 16 2026 02:08 pm

Maybe it's regional, but I don't recall anyone ever calling the 3 1/2" ones "microfloppies". Just 3 & 1/2" floppies or 3 & 1/2" floppy disks.

I think what he meant is that was what was printed on the packaging, vs what people in the real world actually say out of their mouths when referring to said object.

Do people "call" them miniSIM, microSIM, and nanoSIM when referring to the little cards they used to put in their phones? No, they call them SIM cards. Doesn't mean they didn't have some other "official" name :D.

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I still have a couple of original boxes of them here and they call
them Microfloppies right on the box.

This outfit is repurposing them this way:

https://atticjournals.com/collections/other-bookish-goods/products/floppy-

>disc-notepad

A novelty. But I wouldn't pay that much for that.

Ha, yes.. A bit pricey and I'm not sure I'd be interested in any case..

I guess it's a case of us old people just seeing old junk and young
people seeing valuable antiques.. B)

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Re: Re: 3.5 floppies
By: Nightfox to poindexter FORTRAN on Mon Feb 16 2026 14:08:00

Maybe it's regional, but I don't recall anyone ever calling the 3 1/2" ones "microfloppies". Just 3 & 1/2" floppies or 3 & 1/2" floppy disks.

I just did a search on Google Images for "Micro Floppies" and sure enough, companies did use the term on their packaging. We call them floppies out of conveinance. Houmans love to verbally abbreviate things.

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On 16 Feb 2026, phigan said the following...

Re: Re: 3.5 floppies
By: Nightfox to poindexter FORTRAN on Mon Feb 16 2026 02:08 pm

Maybe it's regional, but I don't recall anyone ever calling the 3 1/2" "microfloppies". Just 3 & 1/2" floppies or 3 & 1/2" floppy disks.

I think what he meant is that was what was printed on the packaging, vs what people in the real world actually say out of their mouths when referring to said object.

Do people "call" them miniSIM, microSIM, and nanoSIM when referring to
the little cards they used to put in their phones? No, they call them
SIM cards. Doesn't mean they didn't have some other "official" name :D.

it seems most of the companies settled on "diskette" so that's what i always called them. in fact i remember having a conversation with someone where we were using 'disk' for 5 1/4" and diskette for 3 1/2" so at least at one point that must have been a thing too..

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Do people "call" them miniSIM, microSIM, and nanoSIM when referring to the little cards they used to put in their phones? No, they call them SIM cards. Doesn't mean they didn't have some other "official" name :D.

I mostly agree with this, although IIRC for a while they was a modifier
applied to the smaller SIM cards back when phones took different sizes.


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Re: Re: 3.5 floppies
By: Nightfox to poindexter FORTRAN on Mon Feb 16 2026 02:08 pm

That may be, but it was common to just call the whole thing a
floppy disk.

Maybe it's regional, but I don't recall anyone ever calling the 3 1/2" ones "microfloppies". Just 3 & 1/2" floppies or 3 & 1/2" floppy disks.

We just called them 3 1/2 Diskettes or Disks.

Denn

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Re: Re: 3.5 floppies
By: fusion to phigan on Tue Feb 17 2026 12:12 pm

where we were using 'disk' for 5 1/4" and diskette for 3 1/2" so at least at one point that must have been a thing too..

Same.

Denn

... Misspelled? Impossible. My modem is error correcting.

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I think I mentioned this before, when there were 8 inch floppies, they
were called "floppy" disks. 5 1/4 were mini-floppies, until 8 inch
floppies became rare, then they became floppies. When 3 1/2" floppies came around, they were microfloppies, until they became the standard.

Maybe it's regional, but I don't recall anyone ever calling the 3 1/2" ones "

>rofloppies". Just 3 & 1/2" floppies or 3 & 1/2" floppy disks.

You're right about what most people called them, but I have old boxes
of the 3 1/2" ones and it does say Microfloppies on the label.

Later ones may have just said High Density 3 1/2" floppies..

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Rob Mccart wrote to NIGHTFOX <=-

You're right about what most people called them, but I have old boxes
of the 3 1/2" ones and it does say Microfloppies on the label.

My first real computer job was with a Honeywell-Bull VAR. They had 8 inch floppy discs on some of their DPS mini and maimframe computers.. Looked just like a 5.25 inch floppy only bigger.

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My first real computer job was with a Honeywell-Bull VAR. They had 8 inch

>floppy discs on some of their DPS mini and maimframe computers.. Looked just
>like a 5.25 inch floppy only bigger.

I've never seen an 8 inch one. Some were probably still around when
I got into computers (1983) but likley those bigger ones were more
corporate than for home use, and it was me who bought and set up
the computers at the company where I was working at the time rather
than me having to adapt to what they were using.

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Rob Mccart wrote to BOBBY <=-

I've never seen an 8 inch one. Some were probably still around when
I got into computers (1983) but likley those bigger ones were more corporate than for home use, and it was me who bought and set up
the computers at the company where I was working at the time rather
than me having to adapt to what they were using.

My first corporate IT job was in 1991 at a home/kitchen retailer, they
ran their operations on a S/36 and 2 AS/400s. We used IBM PS/2 model
80s running OS/2. I recall an 8 inch floppy drive and floppy disks in
the server room.

The weird thing was that I took a job in local government in 2017, and
in the server room was one last AS/400 with an IBM PS2 model 80 running
OS/2 that they used to to local tape restores. Serious Deja Vu.




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Re: Re: 3.5 floppies
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Rob Mccart on Mon Feb 23 2026 07:06 am

The weird thing was that I took a job in local government in 2017, and in the server room was one last AS/400 with an IBM PS2 model 80 running OS/2 that they used to to local tape restores. Serious Deja Vu.

I've heard the US government tends to use technology for a fairly long time. If it's not broken, don't fix it.. Some years ago, I'd heard they were still using a computer system from the 70s, though they may have replaced it by now. And I've heard there are still some COBOL jobs, mainly in the government for old computer systems.

Nightfox

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Re: Re: 3.5 floppies
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Rob Mccart on Mon Feb 23 2026 07:06 am

My first corporate IT job was in 1991 at a home/kitchen retailer,
they ran their operations on a S/36 and 2 AS/400s. We used IBM PS/2
model 80s running OS/2. I recall an 8 inch floppy drive and floppy

after 20 years i have seen you say about 10+ different things when you post
'my first corporate it job'


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Nightfox wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

I've heard the US government tends to use technology for a fairly long time. If it's not broken, don't fix it.. Some years ago, I'd heard
they were still using a computer system from the 70s, though they may
have replaced it by now. And I've heard there are still some COBOL
jobs, mainly in the government for old computer systems.

What killed me about that job was my boss telling me that in preparation
for my coming, he'd cleaned up the server room and e-wasted "pallets" of
IBM ATs. Those would have been worth a LOT - and I would have taken one
home!



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The weird thing was that I took a job in local government in 2017, and

> in the server room was one last AS/400 with an IBM PS2 model 80 running
> OS/2 that they used to to local tape restores. Serious Deja Vu.

After I got away from normal employment and started doing things on
my own, I did a lot of computer work for people needing help, repairs
and upgrades, and various things for multiple businesses and tourist
resorts up here, but one on my big customers was the local Township
(think 'County') government offices.

I was amazed when I first started working there at the equipment
they were using to run the place. It was a long while back but
at least 33k modems were out by then and they were still using a
single 300 baud modem for 3 very old networked computers.

I can understand not spending money to upgrade if you don't need
it but you'd think the time spent sending and receiving data
would have had those they dealt with complaining about how long
it took to get anything through them...

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Rob Mccart wrote to POINDEXTER FORTRAN <=-

I can understand not spending money to upgrade if you don't need
it but you'd think the time spent sending and receiving data
would have had those they dealt with complaining about how long
it took to get anything through them...

Conversely, there are solutions that just work. Back in the '90s, when
you networked voicemail systems, you tied in a data modem. If someone
needed to forward a voicemail off-PBX to another site, the modem would
dial out to the other system and transfer sounds files using Xmodem.
Since they were fairly small, it just worked. Later on, they'd use
something like FTP over the network to get voicemail files from one
site to another.



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I can understand not spending money to upgrade if you don't need
it but you'd think the time spent sending and receiving data
would have had those they dealt with complaining about how long
it took to get anything through them...

Conversely, there are solutions that just work. Back in the '90s, when

> you networked voicemail systems, you tied in a data modem. If someone
> needed to forward a voicemail off-PBX to another site, the modem would
> dial out to the other system and transfer sounds files using Xmodem.
> Since they were fairly small, it just worked. Later on, they'd use
> something like FTP over the network to get voicemail files from one
> site to another.

If it works don't fix it.. B)

Another thing, before I came along, the Township had all their computer
work done remotely, software repairs and updates, by the 300 baud modem,
which took forever, but I suppose they paid by the hour so the other end wouldn't much care..

A year later I walked into the office one day (I worked from home, not
there and they were just one of many customers) and I was introduced
to the guy from WANG computers as their Computer Guru, which was sort
of neat.. B)

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