[cctalk] Re: who has a computer of your very own

On Sun, 23 Nov 2025, ben via cctalk wrote: This is an interesting thread in the whole "who owns what" category. Also, "Who understands what". I feel we've lost the ability for a single person to now fully understand an entire system. Maybe the Apple II or BBC Micro was possibly the last system that was possible - and by understand it all, I mean hardware and software.... I have designed and built my own systems - mostly 6502 and 65816 based, but that's it. One piece of the jigsaw puzzle missing there is the assembler. (and PCB layout package?). I didn't write them, but maybe that no different from a carpenter buying tools to use to make bespoke furniture. (Alt least a carpenters tools are maintainable for the most part) I even wrote a filing system for these systems - although it was based on ProDOS8. And a multi-tasking OS - written in BCPL... And there is a minor issue of what tht OS might look like... Unix Having been using Unix now since 1980 (I know, a latecomer!) it's hard to think of something that might be different - for better or worse. I have used other "micro" systems from CP/M to Flex and the briefest exposure to VAX VM/S and a few years of Primos as well as a nice little, of somewhat unique OS called Mouses (a sort of cut-down EMAS for those who may know) but ... Unix keeps coming back to haunt me. At least at the command line, and some of it's ideas, anyway. Do we own our modern computers? Maybe the hardware, maybe not. When "big corp" can remotely brick then, then very likely not. Then there's the subscription model... Almost everything now is moving to that. Fridges with advertising panels? Where will that end... Slaves to the system now and we walked right into it. (Sir) Alan Sugar once said; Engineers don't make good businessmen and having run my own companies in the past, I fear he's right. We're engineers (like Woz) but the Businessmen (like Jobs) will always win-out in the end. Share and enjoy. Gordon