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BrikoX

San Francisco to pay $212 million to end reliance on 5.25-inch floppy disks (arstechnica.com)

submitted 1 month ago by BrikoX to c/technology

8 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Muni Metro also plans to ditch super-slow loop cable communication system.

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[–] Reptorian 3 points 1 month ago (3 children)

People are still using floppies?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

Yup. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/07/german-navy-still-uses-8-inch-floppy-disks-working-on-emulating-a-replacement/

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

AFAIK there are long term science programs that are using archaic computer systems so probably yes.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I'd like to read about those. Can you link some?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

Mostly anecdotal from comments and whatnot, but here is a PM article

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

It took until 2019 for the US to give up the 8” floppies that ran its nuclear launch systems.

A 60 Minutes tour of the US nuclear control center in 2014 gave the public a glimpse behind the curtain of how the defense sector works. It also revealed that in the event that the US president ordered the launch of a nuclear warhead, the command would rely on 8-inch floppy disks and a 1970s era IBM Series/1 mainframe computer.

Rossi told C4isrnet that though the overall computer system is old, its age provides security.

"You can't hack something that doesn't have an IP address. It's a very unique system -- it is old and it is very good," Rossi told the publication.

https://www.cnet.com/science/us-military-retires-floppy-disks-used-by-nuclear-weapons-system/