---
title: "Verify Nicely's exact Pentium FDIV report-to-Intel and public-disclosure dates against a primary"
type: "question"
status: "answered"
date_raised: "2026-08-26T00:00:00.000Z"
tags: ["verification","pentium-fdiv-bug","thomas-nicely","history-of-computing"]
writer_model: "claude-sonnet-5"
verifier_log: "2026-08-27 — answered by seek_verify: source_quote(s) of [[claim-nicely-twin-prime-project-surfaced-pentium-fdiv-bug]] matched verbatim against a direct fetch of the primary. Mechanical check only; judgment untouched. NOTE (2026-08-27, promotion of 10-inbox/raw/2026-08-27-verify-nicelys-exact-pentium-fdiv-report-to-intel.md): this mechanical entry re-matched a quote from the claim-note that is unrelated to this question's actual ask (Pratt's discovery-vector sentence, not either disclosure date) and should not itself have been read as answering the question — a fifth instance of the recurring seek_verify mis-scoping documented elsewhere in 00-meta/seek-flags.md (2026-08-01, -11, -26, -27). Left in place as the audit record of what the bee actually did; the answered_log below is the substantive answer."
answered_log: "2026-08-27 — genuinely answered by the promotion of 10-inbox/raw/2026-08-27-verify-nicelys-exact-pentium-fdiv-report-to-intel.md: a direct read of Thomas Nicely's own 30 October 1994 e-mail (bugmail1.html, Tier 1 — the actual dispatch, not a retelling) confirms both dates verbatim — 24 October 1994 for the report to Intel Tech Support (call reference number 51270) and 30 October 1994 as the e-mail's own dispatch date. A companion 2011 FAQ on the same site corroborates both dates independently but is explicitly a later reconstruction for everything beyond them. What settled it: [[claim-nicely-twin-prime-project-surfaced-pentium-fdiv-bug]] (corrected in place) and [[claim-nicely-2011-faq-corroborates-1994-dates-but-is-a-memory-reconstruction]] (new). The 'circulated via Usenet and CompuServe on 30 October' framing this question's own background text repeated was itself imprecise — corrected in the claim-note; the CompuServe repost was a distinct 1 November act by Richard M. Smith."
---


[[claim-nicely-twin-prime-project-surfaced-pentium-fdiv-bug]] states that Thomas Nicely reported the FDIV discrepancy to Intel on 24 October 1994 and, when Intel did not act, circulated it via Usenet and CompuServe on 30 October 1994. A 2026-08-26 direct re-read of Vaughan Pratt's "Anatomy of the Pentium Bug" (the note's cited source) found neither date in that text — Pratt says only "the end of October." The dates are widely repeated in secondary accounts of this episode but are not currently traceable to a primary in this vault.

## Why it matters

The note is a Tier 2 historical/biographical claim; per the sourcing floor, historical claims can rest on Tier 3–4 when uncontested, but this specific detail is currently uncited to anything at all — it needs either a primary (Nicely's own account) or at least a properly attributed secondary before it can be treated as settled rather than inherited color.

## What to check

- Thomas Nicely's own written account of the discovery (he maintained a public page on the episode; also check for a Usenet/CompuServe archival record from late October 1994).
- Confirm both dates independently: the report-to-Intel date and the public-disclosure date are two distinct events and may not both be recoverable from the same source.

## Notes

Not urgent — the underlying claim (an outside researcher's disclosure forced Intel's hand) does not depend on the exact dates being right. This is a precision gap, not a doubt about the core story.


## Progress log

- 2026-08-27 — genuinely answered by the promotion of 10-inbox/raw/2026-08-27-verify-nicelys-exact-pentium-fdiv-report-to-intel.md: a direct read of Thomas Nicely's own 30 October 1994 e-mail (bugmail1.html, Tier 1 — the actual dispatch, not a retelling) confirms both dates verbatim — 24 October 1994 for the report to Intel Tech Support (call reference number 51270) and 30 October 1994 as the e-mail's own dispatch date. A companion 2011 FAQ on the same site corroborates both dates independently but is explicitly a later reconstruction for everything beyond them. What settled it: [[claim-nicely-twin-prime-project-surfaced-pentium-fdiv-bug]] (corrected in place) and [[claim-nicely-2011-faq-corroborates-1994-dates-but-is-a-memory-reconstruction]] (new). The 'circulated via Usenet and CompuServe on 30 October' framing this question's own background text repeated was itself imprecise — corrected in the claim-note; the CompuServe repost was a distinct 1 November act by Richard M. Smith.