Computers solve many of the problems we would not have if we did not have computers.

Nick Bulbeck: I’d suggest switching to a Mac

Would that discussion be considered political or religious?

My keyboard is wearing ‘me’ out! That might be a New Year’s resolution.

Ken F (aka Tweed): Would that discussion be considered political or religious?

Yes, on both counts.

GuyBehindtheCurtain,

I see – it’s not a software problem, it’s a keyboard fire. Makes sense!

GuyBehindtheCurtain:
Ken F (aka Tweed),

Computer debates are all religious in nature. Especially those about “better”.

Do people have free choice in platform and operating system? Or is it predestined?

Nick Bulbeck: I see – it’s not a software problem, it’s a keyboard fire.

Which means we probably won’t get into a discussion on original languages. Not even a basic one…

Dee is obviously guilty of computer keyboard abuse. And I have no doubt that she will continue this pattern of abuse. Where does this kind of abuse get reported?

Muff Potter: Anything UNIX based has gotta’ be better than…

Well, quite.

I did a brief spell on Ubuntu; didn’t like it at first, in part because it was part of a job in a very toxic, bullying culture. But I have to admit that Linux itself did grow on me while I was there.

GuyBehindtheCurtain,

Amen to front panel switches as long as you get load address correct

GuyBehindtheCurtain: You are not a real programmer unless you have entered a program via front panel switches.

I qualify on an 18 bit DEC PDP-9 in the the early 70s. As for the religious wars I’ve been using the UNIX shell for at least 45 years, now on a LINUX distribution.

Jeffrey Chalmers: GuyBehindtheCurtain,

Definitely showing your age! I could have taken a class that we had to do that, but I just stuck with Basic and Fortran..

I preferred Pascal myself, but it just kind of died out there in the market place.

Happy New Year to Dee and all the team at WW from Aotearoa New Zealand!
God bless you for the year ahead.

Afterburne: PC vs Mac discussions are decidedly religious in nature and fervor.

This is good news, because if it were political in nature we would not be able to discuss it here.

Ken F (aka Tweed): Nick Bulbeck: I’d suggest switching to a Mac

Would that discussion be considered political or religious?

In my experience, RELIGIOUS.
FUNDAMENTALIST RELIGIOUS.

OldJohnJ: I qualify on an 18 bit DEC PDP-9 in the the early 70s. As for the religious wars I’ve been using the UNIX shell for at least 45 years, now on a LINUX distribution.

I cut my teeth on a DEC PDP-11 running a FORTRAN based application, and from there went to IBM system-370 using the old TSO terminals running the same FORTRAN based application (this was back during the southern cal. aerospace heyday).

After that I became a CATIA (computer aided three dimensional interactive application) user. Back in those days CATIA ran on IBM’s own version of stand alone UNIX based work stations. A basic working knowledge of the UNIX system command-line was essential, you know, the vi editor, piping commands, et cetera.

Dee-Happy New Year from California! I trust you are getting some rest since you are not able to tilt at the windmills of evangelical madness for a little while. Your work is greatly appreciated, and I know you are having a positive affect on the Kingdom.

Jeffrey Chalmers: cards

And system patches were those little chads, manually reapplied to specific holes in the card…

My husband says my computer stops working when it senses my hostility toward it…

Chris Parsons:
Happy New Year to Dee and all the team at WW from Aotearoa New Zealand!
God bless you for the year ahead.

I’m sure you get to claim some kind of First for that, Chris! 🙂

Happy New Year from Scotland!

HAPPY NEW YEAR, WARTBURGERS!

“The Lord bless you
and keep you;
the Lord make his face shine on you
and be gracious to you;
the Lord turn his face toward you
and give you peace.”

(Numbers 6:24-26)

Max,

A nice new year wish!
The OT is not all fire, brimstone, and laws!

“Note that this post may be deleted as soon as keystrokes are returned to normal. Ditto any comments left here.”

What a shame…

Friend: I was going to say he wins the Internet, but he might not want it.

Since OldJohnJ is noted for championing the scientific method, you may be right…

Cool

Dee: Precious (the name of my computer) is back.

I haven’t named any of my computers (obviously, I’ve named all of The Bears, including Tweety Bird and Edgar who are honorary Bears). But if I did, I’d call it Kevin.

As long as you don’t start going around saying stuff like, where issss it, Preciousss? They STOLE it from ussss… in a voice that causes people to leave the building, you’ll be find.

My first computer was an Apple II. Our High School was among the first to start a computer lab in the math department. Those were the days before there were IBM pc’s.

Muff Potter,

Farther along the tangent line, but no so far that we can’t get close to a root of our original function:

Up until version 4, CATIA had its own UNIX based GUI. It was simple, elegant, and straight forward to work with. And then the powers that be got the bright idea of re-platforming it to the Microsoft OS. What came out the other end was a byzantine quagmire of useless glitz, needless duplication, and a rat’s maze of bloated complexity.
End of rant.

Hmm…fun reading.

Back many years ago, my senior year of high school, I was in the first computer class they offered: “Computer Math” taught us BASIC programming. We used TRS80s with thermal printers and a Hewlett Packard card reader.

Later, in college, when I spent a couple years studying business and software engineering (still a very long time ago), I learned COBAL and Pascal. I still have both compilers.

My first computer was an IBM clone – 30MB hard drive, 640KB RAM, 12 megahertz speed, CGA monitor, dual 5 1/4″ floppy drives, and a 9 pin dot matrix printer. It cost $1,600 and was close to the best generally available to the public at the time. I still have my second one: a Packard Bell 486, though I haven’t fired it up in a long time…

As to programming, life diverted my path and now I am so far behind the curve it would nearly be like startaning over..