12 Jan
2001
12 Jan
'01
6:17 a.m.
On January 11, Richard Erlacher wrote:
Sir, you damage your credibility with statements like
some you've made here.
While it's true that the Microsoft products may not be the "best" thing
for
thos of us who are inclined to fuss and fiddle with our computers, they're
WAY better for those who can't, won't, or shouldn't.
I know this response wasn't directed at me, but I have to take [at
least a little] exception to this.
Microsoft products are teaching (have teached?) the world that
computers (ALL computers) need to be restarted several times each day,
and that this is normal and acceptable behavior. That computers break
frequently, and cause the loss of work. That computers (MODERN
computers) have a bitmapped click-happy interface, and anything that
doesn't is "quaint, useless old technology".
Do you really think these are good things for computer neophytes to
be taught? There are hoards of Microsoft weenies running around who
actually *believe* these things...and with Microsoft teaching them to
shun other technologies, they'll probably *never* understand the true
nature of "computers".
Here's an exaple of the brain-damage that Microsoft is promoting. A
while back, I had a job in which I was designing some custom
microcoded floating-point processors using MSI and LSI chips and
PAL/TTL glue. My grandmother (may she rest in peace) was talking to
her [windows-running] neighbor, bragging about me in typical
grandmother style...when asked what I do for a living, she answered
proudly and accurately, "my grandson is very smart...he builds
computers!" The neighbor, obviously lacking the social skills to
understand that he was being insulting, said "aww, that's
nothing...building them is the easy part. It's LOADING them that's
hard! Maybe he'll get to that level in a few years. Keeping all
those programs from messing up Windows is the really hard part of
'computers'."
I was utterly flabbergasted by this, so much that I was rendered
speechless.
-Dave McGuire
12 Jan
12 Jan
7:06 a.m.
No, it wasn't really directed at any specific person, but, rather, toward
those, in general, who repeat the questionable and second-hand remarks of
others in an effort to lend credibility to them by attributing them to
someone else (presumably smarter or more knowledgable, which they seldom
are).
----- Original Message -----
From: "Dave McGuire" <mcguire(a)neurotica.com>
To: <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Friday, January 12, 2001 10:17 AM
Subject: Re: Nuke Redmond!
Judging from the language I've heard in association with such breakdowns, I
have to say I don't believe anyone believes them to be normal, acceptable,
tolerable, or anything that they aren't. They're system breakdowns! These
same users, however, are getting a "feel" for working with systems that are,
in the whole, much more complex than all the automobiles that have ever seen
daylight, combined.
Moreover, I have had a couple of Windows machines (still have one, the other
went with my elder son) that seldom if ever have to be restarted. Of
course, they're portables, so the hardware environment is much better
controlled than in a desktop, and the inherent limitations mitigate the risk
of unfavorable hardware/software interactions.
On January 11, Richard Erlacher wrote:
> Sir, you damage your credibility with statements like some you've made
here.
> While it's true that the Microsoft products
may not be the "best" thing
for
> thos of us who are inclined to fuss and fiddle
with our computers,
they're
WAY better for
those who can't, won't, or shouldn't.
I know this response wasn't directed at me, but I have to take [at
least a little] exception to this.
Microsoft products are teaching (have teached?) the world that
computers (ALL computers) need to be restarted several times each day,
and that this is normal and acceptable behavior. That computers break
frequently, and cause the loss of work. That computers (MODERN
computers) have a bitmapped click-happy interface, and anything that
doesn't is "quaint, useless old technology".
Do you really think these are good things for computer neophytes to
be taught? There are hoards of Microsoft weenies running around who
actually *believe* these things...and with Microsoft teaching them to
shun other technologies, they'll probably *never* understand the true
nature of "computers".
I don't think you're giving your fellow man credit he deserves.
Here's an exaple of the brain-damage that Microsoft is promoting. A
while back, I had a job in which I was designing some custom
microcoded floating-point processors using MSI and LSI chips and
PAL/TTL glue. My grandmother (may she rest in peace) was talking to
her [windows-running] neighbor, bragging about me in typical
grandmother style...when asked what I do for a living, she answered
proudly and accurately, "my grandson is very smart...he builds
computers!" The neighbor, obviously lacking the social skills to
understand that he was being insulting, said "aww, that's
nothing...building them is the easy part. It's LOADING them that's
hard! Maybe he'll get to that level in a few years. Keeping all
those programs from messing up Windows is the really hard part of
'computers'."
Clearly an unenlightened viewpoint! Since my elder son, 10 years ago, when
he was 10, successfully installed Win3.0 without my advice, knowledge, or
consent, on one of my machines. It worked as well as that generation of OS
ever did.
I was utterly flabbergasted by this, so much that I was rendered
speechless.
Both Windows and the popular varieties of LINUX are pretty easy to install
these days. However, Windows suffers greatly from the fact that it has
tried to maintain the usefulness of those applications that were written for
and bought concurrently with much earlier versions of the OS. My brief
encounter with UNIX systems (SUN) taught me that in order to have a
functional system, the system has to be rebuilt every time there's a new
module installed, AND all the software needs to be revised. That means
about 6 weeks of downtime every time anything is revised, be it a serial
port driver or an application patch. To have the system "up" most of the
time, it required a man on duty 24/7. That meant a burn rate of $100K per
year just to keep the OS working. I was REALLY grateful that I could unload
that piece of junk onto my client. Do you think the average "user" wants
that sort of overhead for his computer that he uses to download the latest
nudies?
-Dave McGuire
8:02 a.m.
New subject: Patching running systems
Both Windows and the popular varieties of LINUX are
pretty easy to install
these days. However, Windows suffers greatly from the fact that it has
tried to maintain the usefulness of those applications that were written for
and bought concurrently with much earlier versions of the OS. My brief
encounter with UNIX systems (SUN) taught me that in order to have a
functional system, the system has to be rebuilt every time there's a new
module installed, AND all the software needs to be revised. That means
about 6 weeks of downtime every time anything is revised, be it a serial
port driver or an application patch. To have the system "up" most of the
time, it required a man on duty 24/7. That meant a burn rate of $100K per
year just to keep the OS working. I was REALLY grateful that I could unload
that piece of junk onto my client. Do you think the average "user" wants
that sort of overhead for his computer that he uses to download the latest
nudies?
>
> -Dave McGuire
Boy... that's pretty surprising since the SUN Ultra10's here are running
5 year old Solaris 2.6 (with the y2k and recommended patches from Sun).
Was this back in the Sun 3 days with SunOS under v4.1?
I've never seen this in 13 years of Sys Admin and 20 in the business.
My stuff is up over 6 months at a time (usually rebooted for lab moves,
ups battery problems, and power failures.
I've got 6 months on an old FreeBSD box which I decommissioned.
Would've been at least two years if I left it running in the corner.
I've got Sparc's running SunOS 4.1.4 with the Y2k patches.
The uptime is pretty good.
Time to patch to was a couple of hours per Sun. The Solaris boxes
patch right up with a shell script and the only downtime involved is the
5 minutes of reboot. I patch 'em all about twice per year when things
are slow (between Christmas and New Years).
I do them all in a couple of hours... from one window to each desktop.
Type reboot when done and it's finished.
The SunOS y2k was done manually -- per patch scripts run and then
the changed files were moved to a tar file which dropped on top of each
machine at single user. Machine specific tweaks were applied
and they were rebooted -- time 15 minutes/Sun once per machine and about
3 hours testing and verifying the Sun patches.
Not quite as nice as RT11's PATCH and SIPP on PDP11's or VMSUPDATE... but OK.
--Bill
--
bpechter(a)monmouth.com | FreeBSD since 1.0.2, Linux since 0.99.10
Brainbench MVP | Unix Sys Admin since Sys V/BSD 4.2
Unix Sys.Admin. | Windows System Administration: "Magical Misery Tour"
8:16 a.m.
On Fri, 12 Jan 2001, Richard Erlacher wrote:
Moreover, I have had a couple of Windows machines
(still have one, the other
went with my elder son) that seldom if ever have to be restarted. Of
course, they're portables, so the hardware environment is much better
controlled than in a desktop, and the inherent limitations mitigate the risk
of unfavorable hardware/software interactions.
I buy nothing but Dell now, a good system that is as tightly integrated
with Windows as any machine out there. I have one at home, and one at the
office. Yet I have to reboot each on average once a week.
and bought concurrently with much earlier versions of
the OS. My brief
encounter with UNIX systems (SUN) taught me that in order to have a
functional system, the system has to be rebuilt every time there's a new
module installed, AND all the software needs to be revised. That means
about 6 weeks of downtime every time anything is revised, be it a serial
port driver or an application patch. To have the system "up" most of the
Bullshit.
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org
12:55 p.m.
I don't know what that says about DELL. My Winbook ran for over a year
without ever being shut down. Its main purpose was to serve as the comm
station while my modem was on load to my mother. Unfortunately, I'm still
waiting for the replacement battery, since I ruined the battery in the
process.
Dick
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sellam Ismail" <foo(a)siconic.com>
To: <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Friday, January 12, 2001 12:16 PM
Subject: Re: Nuke Redmond!
the
On Fri, 12 Jan 2001, Richard Erlacher wrote:
> Moreover, I have had a couple of Windows machines (still have one, the
other
> went with my elder son) that seldom if ever have
to be restarted. Of
> course, they're portables, so the hardware environment is much better
> controlled than in a desktop, and the inherent limitations mitigate the
risk
of unfavorable
hardware/software interactions.
I buy nothing but Dell now, a good system that is as tightly integrated
with Windows as any machine out there. I have one at home, and one at the
office. Yet I have to reboot each on average once a week.
> and bought concurrently with much earlier versions of the OS. My brief
> encounter with UNIX systems (SUN) taught me that in order to have a
> functional system, the system has to be rebuilt every time there's a new
> module installed, AND all the software needs to be revised. That means
> about 6 weeks of downtime every time anything is revised, be it a serial
> port driver or an application patch. To have the system "up" most of
Bullshit.
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer
Festival
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
International Man of Intrigue and Danger
http://www.vintage.org
12:25 p.m.
Check your FCC code. Last time I looked, Dell and Winbook laptops were
made by the same company in Taiwan.
-- Doug
On Fri, 12 Jan 2001, Richard Erlacher wrote:
I don't know what that says about DELL. My
Winbook ran for over a year
without ever being shut down. Its main purpose was to serve as the comm
station while my modem was on load to my mother. Unfortunately, I'm still
waiting for the replacement battery, since I ruined the battery in the
process.
Dick
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sellam Ismail" <foo(a)siconic.com>
To: <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Friday, January 12, 2001 12:16 PM
Subject: Re: Nuke Redmond!
the
On Fri, 12 Jan 2001, Richard Erlacher wrote:
> Moreover, I have had a couple of Windows machines (still have one, the
other
> went with my elder son) that seldom if ever
have to be restarted. Of
> course, they're portables, so the hardware environment is much better
> controlled than in a desktop, and the inherent limitations mitigate the
risk
of
unfavorable hardware/software interactions.
I buy nothing but Dell now, a good system that is as tightly integrated
with Windows as any machine out there. I have one at home, and one at the
office. Yet I have to reboot each on average once a week.
> and bought concurrently with much earlier versions of the OS. My brief
> encounter with UNIX systems (SUN) taught me that in order to have a
> functional system, the system has to be rebuilt every time there's a new
> module installed, AND all the software needs to be revised. That means
> about 6 weeks of downtime every time anything is revised, be it a serial
> port driver or an application patch. To have the system "up" most of
Bullshit.
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer
Festival
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
International Man of Intrigue and Danger
http://www.vintage.org
4:29 p.m.
New subject: OT! Re: Nuke this off-topic flamefest!
On Fri, 12 Jan 2001, Richard Erlacher wrote:
I don't know what that says about DELL. My
Winbook ran for over a year
without ever being shut down. Its main purpose was to serve as the comm
station while my modem was on load to my mother. Unfortunately, I'm still
waiting for the replacement battery, since I ruined the battery in the
process.
It says all you ever did with your laptop was run a communications
program, and that is a very simple task for Windows to perform on a sole
basis. Open up 10 other applications concurrently and use them actively,
then see how Windows holds up.
If this is what Microsoft thinks the consumer market will tolerate, and
the consumer market does tolerate it, then who holds the shame?
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org
8:03 p.m.
New subject: OT! Re: Nuke this off-topic flamefest!
On Fri, 12 Jan 2001, Richard Erlacher wrote:
<<snippage>>
It says all you ever did with your laptop was run a communications
program, and that is a very simple task for Windows to perform on a
sole basis. Open up 10 other applications concurrently and use them
actively, then see how Windows holds up.
If this is what Microsoft thinks the consumer market will tolerate,
and the consumer market does tolerate it, then who holds the shame?
Sellam Ismail
Amen. A lot of the blame for Microsoft's dominance (aside from the
illegal predatory tactics) lies in the fact that the buying public has
just accepted substandard, buggy products for years, and
continues to do so. I've seen quotes from Ballmer that said "We'd
rather ship a buggy product on time, and fix it down the road, than
miss a ship date." The kind of errors and bugs that ship in MS
"final" products would bring scores of lawsuits and bankruptcies in
any other industry, but the computer-buying public just says, "I
know it's buggy and not really finished. I know it'll cause problems
and probably isn't compatible with my other software. That's OK.
It's from Microsoft, so I have to have it because it's the latest
thing...you just go ahead and fix the flaws when you have time.
Here's another boxful of cash. Oh, and while you're at it, let me
know when the next beta is out, and I'll send you another boxful of
cash for that, too."
It's a great business model. If the automotive industry could get
away with selling partially-finished, problematic cars for full retail
price, and demand that you pay full price for a new one every two
years, don't you think they'd do the same thing?
That's the only thing Microsoft has "innovated". All their products
are bought, stolen, reverse-engineered, "borrowed", or otherwise
derived from someone else's work. The ability to sell crap, and sell
it consistently, while gaining market share and making more profit
than half of the world's countries put together, is true marketing
genius. They've gotten everyone to say, "Yes, sir. May I have
another?"
Paul Braun WD9GCO
Cygnus Productions
nerdware_nospam(a)laidbak.com
"A computer without a Microsoft operating system is like a dog without a bunch of
bricks tied to its head."
9:20 p.m.
New subject: OT! Re: Nuke this off-topic flamefest!
It's just the American way of doing business. Detroit's been doing it for
50 years. Get over it!
Dick
----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Braun" <nerdware(a)laidbak.com>
To: <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Saturday, January 13, 2001 12:03 AM
Subject: Re: OT! Re: Nuke this off-topic flamefest!
bunch
of bricks tied to its head."
On Fri, 12 Jan
2001, Richard Erlacher wrote:
<<snippage>>
It says all you ever did with your laptop was run a communications
program, and that is a very simple task for Windows to perform on a
sole basis. Open up 10 other applications concurrently and use them
actively, then see how Windows holds up.
If this is what Microsoft thinks the consumer market will tolerate,
and the consumer market does tolerate it, then who holds the shame?
Sellam Ismail
Amen. A lot of the blame for Microsoft's dominance (aside from the
illegal predatory tactics) lies in the fact that the buying public has
just accepted substandard, buggy products for years, and
continues to do so. I've seen quotes from Ballmer that said "We'd
rather ship a buggy product on time, and fix it down the road, than
miss a ship date." The kind of errors and bugs that ship in MS
"final" products would bring scores of lawsuits and bankruptcies in
any other industry, but the computer-buying public just says, "I
know it's buggy and not really finished. I know it'll cause problems
and probably isn't compatible with my other software. That's OK.
It's from Microsoft, so I have to have it because it's the latest
thing...you just go ahead and fix the flaws when you have time.
Here's another boxful of cash. Oh, and while you're at it, let me
know when the next beta is out, and I'll send you another boxful of
cash for that, too."
It's a great business model. If the automotive industry could get
away with selling partially-finished, problematic cars for full retail
price, and demand that you pay full price for a new one every two
years, don't you think they'd do the same thing?
That's the only thing Microsoft has "innovated". All their products
are bought, stolen, reverse-engineered, "borrowed", or otherwise
derived from someone else's work. The ability to sell crap, and sell
it consistently, while gaining market share and making more profit
than half of the world's countries put together, is true marketing
genius. They've gotten everyone to say, "Yes, sir. May I have
another?"
Paul Braun WD9GCO
Cygnus Productions
nerdware_nospam(a)laidbak.com
"A computer without a Microsoft operating system is like a dog without a
9:09 p.m.
New subject: OT! Re: Nuke this off-topic flamefest!
Well, I did run the Windows internet suite and the Winfax, and the Office 97
stuff, along with CorelDraw (before their acquisition of Ventura and
WordPerfect) and some DOS stuff. Oh, yeah ... there was Autocad, and a
couple of other goodies, but it's true, there were seldom more than three or
four of them open, maybe five if one considers Calculator. It's true,
though, that most of this stuff was vanilla-flavored Windows apps, which one
would expect to behave pretty normally.
Nevertheless, it did run without interruption (unless I took it somewhere)
for well over a year.
I certainly agree that it's not Microsoft that's to blame for what people
buy.
Dick
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sellam Ismail" <foo(a)siconic.com>
To: <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Friday, January 12, 2001 8:29 PM
Subject: OT! Re: Nuke this off-topic flamefest!
Festival
On Fri, 12 Jan 2001, Richard Erlacher wrote:
> I don't know what that says about DELL. My Winbook ran for over a year
> without ever being shut down. Its main purpose was to serve as the comm
> station while my modem was on load to my mother. Unfortunately, I'm
still
waiting for
the replacement battery, since I ruined the battery in the
process.
It says all you ever did with your laptop was run a communications
program, and that is a very simple task for Windows to perform on a sole
basis. Open up 10 other applications concurrently and use them actively,
then see how Windows holds up.
If this is what Microsoft thinks the consumer market will tolerate, and
the consumer market does tolerate it, then who holds the shame?
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
International Man of Intrigue and Danger
http://www.vintage.org
8573
days inactive
8574
days old
9 comments
6 participants
participants (6)
-
doug＠blinkenlights.com -
edick＠idcomm.com -
foo＠siconic.com -
mcguire＠neurotica.com -
nerdware＠laidbak.com -
pechter＠pechter.dyndns.org