On Tue, 02 Jan 2001 10:48:48 +0200, Or Botton wrote:
> Robert Deering wrote:
>> DOS is dead. Live with it. Having a rough time with the fact, myself.
> For the mass home user market, yes.
> For the private user who just want to get a job done fast, or in
> buisness, or in the embadded system market, or in mission critical
> devices, its very much alive.
As a stand-alone, desktop OS, it's dead.
> Regarding streaming audio: Just because there is no DOS program that
> support this, no one said its impossible. Fact: Arachne and Quickview
> were an "impossibility" until awhile ago.
A usable DOS system for pertinent info gathering is nowhere near
impossible, just highly unlikely to the point of its chances being nil.
> For the real power user, there is no such thing as a "dead system".
> For he/she can use it without needing the support of the rest of
> the mainstream market.
Power users need info. There aren't DOS apps for gathering it as it
exists now, much less as it will be offered in 6 or 12 months. Witness
all the technical documents in .pdf . Can't read it with GhostScript
(Which, by the way, is largely considered unbuildable in DOS for current
versions). Converted to .txt, the tables and diagrams are meaningless.
Even the most enterprising DOS-only user can't WRITE a pdf reader
because the spec needed to do it can't be read in DOS.
> So, if you are talking from the aspect of what the mainstream home
> user market believe, its dead.
> And i'd rather let them keeping on thinking so. Its actually better
> this way.
Not if you're the one trying to use DOS. If DOS as a valid user platform
isn't dead, why is your mail client Mozilla/W95 and your IRC client
mIRC16 (if you haven't switched to 32 yet)?
Nothing wrong with liking DOS, and nothing wrong at all with availing
yourself of software that can read and write current data. Just pointing
out that it's a lot easier to tell DOS is dead if DOS is all you have.
DOS is all I have. Viewing the current alternatives for OSes that have
apps capable of using the unfortunate current data formats, I might
simply choose to stay uninformed.
DOS is dead. Get over it if you can.
I may not be able to.
Bob
Starts April 1, 2001
-- Arachne V1.69, NON-COMMERCIAL copy, http://arachne.cz/
