Another Example of why Linux Loses. Do the Samba b4 it does you.

[P. Johnson]

My first machine was an AMD-8088 based 12-MHz Vendex HeadStart II with 640kB
RAM with a 40MB hard drive and CGA graphics, purchased at a Montgomery Ward
in 1988 for about $650 new (though this was at a store closing sale, the
same model at other Wards locations was going for a little over twice
that). I had that machine until '94 or '95 when I finally got around to
catching up with 1988 technology and got a 386.

Hardware was plenty cheap in the late 80's. Macs and PC's weren't
but fortunately, the world was not limited to those two rather limited
options. At least with Macs you kinda got something for your money. The
VM on Mac II's was just the bee's knees at the time. The integrated LAN
stuff also seemed quite nifty.

AppleTalk was anything but nifty... used the Mac serial port (those round
things with no thumb screws) to connect a little dongle with two RJ11 plugs
that went to the next computer in each direction on the network, or was
terminated with an RJ11 male plug shorted with a resistor. If any of the
phone cords connecting the machines on the networks, terminators, or
dongles came unplugged anywhere in the chain, the network would crash,
often locking up some, if not all the machines on the network, and the
network would be nonfunctional until everything was reconnected and
rebooted. I'm so glad the schools were starting to finally throw
away/donate to some other less fortunate (and given AppleTalk's flakiness,
less lucky) charity all the machines that couldn't handle Ethernet back
when I was working for one of the local school districts.

 

[P. Johnson]

The internet didn't come around until after all of that was
already in place. Although you could quite easily access all of that
if you wanted to way back in 1988.

The Internet came round in the late 1960s, it just wasn't easily or cheaply
available to the general public until around 1990. Odds are if you look
around long enough, you'll find some MUD running on a university machine
since prior to 1990 even. There's a few domain names that have been
registered continuously since well before I got my first computer.

Strangely enough, the Apple didn't need any of that. It
managed to do quite well in a mere 1M while DOS machines had
trouble managing well with as much as 8M and really needed 16M
or more.

You have a rather non-neutral view of history. Apple was just as much
guilty of ripping off Xerox when it came to the GUI as Microsoft was, Steve
Jobs was just a baby about it. He famously screamed "YOUR STEALING FROM
ME" at Bill Gates after inviting him down to the Apple campus shortly after
Windows 1.0 came out, never mind he sent a team to PARC to check out the
Alto for ideas on what to do with MacOS. Heck, when it first came out, the
Macintosh strongly resembled a white, plastic-cased Alto, though unlike the
Alto, it was next to network-incapable due to a severe lack of Ethernet
port...

Go read/watch the Pirates of Silicon Valley sometime if you want the quick
two-hour summary of the history of Apple and Microsoft and how they relate
to each other.

 

[Cynic]

Then they shouldn't try to "trick out" their ride.

I'm thinking of the user who just wants to buy an off-the-shelf PC and
add a few things that are sold for the user to install.

Actually, a real 747 pilot is infact inspecting the plane to
make sure it is in basic working order. The same goes for a cessna
pilot. So your rant falls apart a bit there.

The *pilot* does, sure. But not the passengers (although I usually
take my GA passengers through the walk-round). You should also do a
walk-round before driving a car, though few people do.

And many 747 captains skimp on the walk-round, especially in inclement
weather. One requested pushback the other day with the undercarriage
locking pins still in place. Not only do they have big red flags on
them, but they are kept in a bag in the cockpit when not in use, and
the captain is supposed to check that they are all there before doing
anything.

 

[JEDIDIAH]

I'm thinking of the user who just wants to buy an off-the-shelf PC and
add a few things that are sold for the user to install.

That qualifies as "tricking out" the ride.

You can buy all manner of after market parts for your car at
the local parts store. It doesn't necessarily follow that it's a good
idea for you personally or your grandmother to install any of them.

The *pilot* does, sure. But not the passengers (although I usually

...which is quite irrelevant and rather demonstrates my
point about leaving maintenance and alteration of complex systems
to those that are actually qualified to do it and otherwise treating
devices as a black box.

[deletia]

You would probably be arrested for trying to load a game onto
the avionics of a 747.

 

[Cynic]

You would probably be arrested for trying to load a game onto
the avionics of a 747.

A glass cockpit *is* a video game! Problem being that you only get
one life ...

 

[P. Johnson]

You would probably be arrested for trying to load a game onto
the avionics of a 747.

Probably not, actually. Just depends on whether or not you own the 747, and
if you don't, whether or not you have permission to do so. That being
said, odds are the avionics are an embedded platform running off a ROM and
not something that one can readily tamper with.