Sure sounds familiar!
Another old geezer
end
----- Original Message -----
From: "Stevens" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, November 10, 2006 8:43 AM
Subject: Re: [opensuse] "Real" programming
On Friday 10 November 2006 09:45, Carlos E. R. wrote:
You know, older programmers could have a joke like real programming
was done with physical switches; there were old computers you
actually had to load the initial boot program into memory,
programming word by word flipping switches. Or so I have been told.
Cute :-)
Rank amateurs!
I watched as friends flipped switches on their Altairs and SWTP 8080s
and kept thinking. "How crude". When the Apple II came out it was,
"That's better", so we started importing Apple clones from Taiwan. When
big blue got into the act we switched to pc clones. Windows was a huge
improvement over whatever was before. When I started working in a
computer center we had PDP-8, 11, VAX 11/70 and HP stuff. None used any
graphics software until the early 90s and the PDPs needed a bootloader
paper (or mylar) tape. I remember the latest and greatest 300MB disk
drives that were as small as a washing machine. etc, etc, etc
And all during this progression was my "Where's the beef" attitude. I
saw vast amounts of software sold that I would have been embarrassed to
put my name on because of all the bugs and gotchas. I learned that Bill
Gates and Ross Perot weren't computer geniuses, they were marketing
geniuses. I found out that I could program but that I could also stick
sharp things in my eyes and I didn't like that, either. I learned that
if I needed a comp sci degree for a job I could go to one of the gas
stations in this 2 college town and hire one for a couple of bucks over
minimum wage.
Now, after around 30 years of personal computing I am finally starting
to see some decent desktops. Linux is, in my shop, a major player but
since it still is a M$ world I maintain XP capability. I know that a
lot of the software that I see now is a result of CASE tools, which
partially explains the bloat that all seem to have. Nobody optimizes
anymore. Why should they with memory being so cheap? I remember
spending $500 to add a whopping 64 Megs of RAM once and, at the time,
that was a bargain. (chips only, no labor)
Yeah, I know about keying in a half days work to be able to play command
line blackjack and I wouldn't go back to then for anything. Them wasn't
the good ol' days, nosiree Bob.
Fred
An old fart
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