29 Aug
2006
29 Aug
'06
8:53 p.m.
On Tuesday 29 August 2006 19:45, Tony Duell wrote:
Every computer that I own is made out of the same silicon-based semiconductors
that common machines are. Does that mean that all computers are thus
off-topic? OF COURSE NOT!
You do have some common sense I hope?
If you must
have an easy-to-state rule, I'd much prefer the form given
upthread that was something like "anything well outside the current
computing mainstream". Even that, though, seems to me to err enough
(in both directions) to be problematic.
I think that's completely unworkable.
In the next room I have a machine. It has a GUI, a mouse, bitmapped
display, networking, and so on. Sounds like something close to the modern
mainstram, yes? Well, I think it's a classic computer by any reasonable
standard. Or do people object to PERQs now ;-). Most modern computers have winchester hard disks. Does
that mean that
discussions of the SA4000 series are now off-topic?
You can't be serious.
Most machines discusser here (and most machines that I
own [1]) have a
von Neuman architecture. So do most modern machines. Does that make
almost all of what we talk about off-topic?
If you think so, then sure.
C'MON people, this isn't a HARD concept. Jay is trying to weed out the people
who want to post obviously off-topic stuff (like 32/64 bit Windows, modern
Linux/BSD/UNIX, and MacOS X) which is handled better other places.
I honestly don't see what's so hard about this idea. Jay abolished the strict
10-year rule in favor of people being "smart" and using their own common
sense to figure out what's classic. It should be obvious to anyone who's
been on this list for more than a month or so that a Dell Optiplex running
Windows 95 ISNT a classic machine, but that something like a DEC AlphaStation
500 running VMS and DECwindows IS on topic, despite the fact that the Dell
Optiplex may well be older than the Alpha, and that they both have a GUI, and
use very much the same peripherals.
Pat
--
Purdue University Research Computing -- http://www.itap.purdue.edu/rcac