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[#] Fri Mar 27 2020 13:57:53 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

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Wow, there's a lot of it. What I love about these older systems is that it's possible for a single person to understand the entire computer, from the hardware level all the way up through every level of the operating system.

I knew my C-64 with that level of understanding. I spent countless hours poring through books learning every hardware register on every chip and poking around (pun intended) to learn how it all worked. It's possible to understand Z-80 and CP/M at that level too. After around 1990 or so it started to become impossible for one person to understand the entire hardware/software stack of a modern computer.

Still thinking about this "post-apocalyptic computing" concept, though ... if we find ourselves in a world where chip fabs no longer exist, the VAST majority of "scrounged hardware", even in junk piles from before the collapse, will be at least 32 bit.

(Final note: if something like this happens, I want to die first.)

[#] Thu Jul 30 2020 00:54:48 EDT from ParanoidDelusions

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Funny thing, I'm on my Amiga in an ancient terminal program in a Telnet session, and I can't easily follow the links above to see where they lead - that tends to be the case. You can get online, but you can only see a portion of the view. Like being a 2D person in a 3D world.

[#] Thu Jul 30 2020 19:52:31 EDT from darknetuser

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2020-07-30 00:54 from ParanoidDelusions
Funny thing, I'm on my Amiga in an ancient terminal program in a Telnet

session, and I can't easily follow the links above to see where they

lead - that tends to be the case. You can get online, but you can only

see a portion of the view. Like being a 2D person in a 3D world.




Agreed.

I try not to post http(s) links when working on BBS with text terminal interaces. Or if I do, I post a summary of the contents behind the link.

http(s) is so pervasive that even FreeDOS had to include a web browser.


[#] Fri Jul 31 2020 13:01:39 EDT from ParanoidDelusions

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My feeling is that part of the allure of old-school telecommunications is less fluff, though - so, I suppose I'm getting exactly what I want. 

 

 



[#] Thu Aug 06 2020 09:30:18 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

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Every now and then I've tried setting out an old terminal to have that old-skool computing experience. It never ends up being useful enough to justify the desk space it takes up. It's fine for a bit of programming, and fine for Citadel as long as you're not following links.

If you have the Citadel client running locally you can configure it to open links in a real browser, then you can just hit "<U>RL View" at the message prompt. I've never found text-mode browsers to be useful at all. Even back in the old days when web pages were static and straightforward, they were never built for multiple kinds of devices as the creators of HTML intended; they were built for Netscape. And today, most web pages are mini applications running in the browser window; forget about them even rendering at all on anything other than a modern browser.

What I find amusing about modern web applications is that the late-1990s vision for Java essentially became reality less than 20 years later. Sun expected applications to download into a local execution environment at the moment the user called for them, and store all of their state on a server. The applications would have to be written in Java, of course, which is what caused this vision to initially fail. Today, this is exactly how most new software works, except the execution environment is the browser's JavaScript engine. But they basically nailed the vision: write once, run anywhere; remove dependencies on specific hardware and software at the user's end; eliminate the need for persistent storage on the client side. And it's truly pervasive -- even Microsoft Office runs in a web browser now. Talk about a Pyrrhic victory for Sun.

[#] Thu Aug 06 2020 10:07:10 EDT from zooer

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A previous employer was talking about software as a service around 2006, he said it would be the future.  I didn't believe him.  Everything is a web app.  My mother enjoys genealogy, she had a great program that she spent years getting the data into. She had to update her computer and the software is no longer available, it is a web app.   She spent years working on our families history, there are many things she doesn't want others to have access to.  It might be listed as private but it isn't.  

Quicken is another program that is software as a service.



[#] Tue Aug 11 2020 13:43:51 EDT from Ragnar Danneskjold

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Businesses like SaaS. Sellers because it leads to predictable revenues, buyers because operational expenses are better tax wise.

I don't think consumers really relish it, but are being forced into it.

When people start looking to cut expenses, it's those recurrent expenses they look to drop first.

[#] Tue Aug 11 2020 17:44:42 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

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I am currently dealing with a software vendor who offers both on-prem and SaaS versions of their software.  If it were my decision I would have gone with on-prem.  Their SaaS version is completely stupid: they make you choose the version of their software you want, and then when they offer new versions you have to go through a complex set of upgrade procedures.  This completely discards the CI/CD benefit of SaaS while still forcing the customer to pay forever.

Of course, I still think that software costing more than $0 is evil.



[#] Fri Aug 21 2020 15:54:37 EDT from ParanoidDelusions

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Tue Aug 11 2020 13:43:51 EDT from Ragnar Danneskjold @ Uncensored
Businesses like SaaS. Sellers because it leads to predictable revenues, buyers because operational expenses are better tax wise.

I find that executives dislike SaaS when their IT staff tells them, "We don't actually have any control over that service, we just call their tech support and they fix it, and we're not necessarily their priority customer."

 




[#] Fri Aug 21 2020 15:56:20 EDT from ParanoidDelusions

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I once explained it almost exactly like this to a room of C level executives. The CFO said, "Give me their number, I'll call them and we'll see about that." 

A couple hours later he came back and said, "Those guys are assholes..." 

:D 

 



[#] Tue Aug 25 2020 14:29:39 EDT from Ragnar Danneskjold

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I've really not found that to be the case. People forgive Microsoft or Salesforce for problems, where they wouldn't forgive their internal staff.

[#] Tue Sep 01 2020 09:00:18 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

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OI do not forgive Microsoft. Ever.

[#] Sun Nov 08 2020 15:37:19 EST from ParanoidDelusions

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Tue Aug 25 2020 14:29:39 EDT from Ragnar Danneskjold @ Uncensored
I've really not found that to be the case. People forgive Microsoft or Salesforce for problems, where they wouldn't forgive their internal staff.

I don't think they FORGIVE. They accept that they're powerless. 



[#] Tue Nov 24 2020 13:33:45 EST from zooer

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Yeah, this has been there for a while but for some reason I looked today.

https://web.archive.org/web/20000815061945/http://uncensored.citadel.org/

 



[#] Tue Nov 24 2020 16:01:57 EST from ParanoidDelusions

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Tue Nov 24 2020 13:33:45 EST from zooer @ Uncensored

Yeah, this has been there for a while but for some reason I looked today.

https://web.archive.org/web/20000815061945/http://uncensored.citadel.org/

 



Funny, I just added a link from the gateway to my Citadel to the Wayback version of my homepage from 1998. 




[#] Tue Dec 15 2020 11:16:24 EST from IGnatius T Foobar

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I have to cringe a little bit over the way I wrote back then.

[#] Tue Dec 15 2020 18:55:29 EST from ParanoidDelusions

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Yeah... I think we all look at what we used to write or draw or play when we get older and go, "Oh my God!" 

I'm not sure why. I tend to like it, though - it is like seeing a snapshot of me in time. 

 

Tue Dec 15 2020 11:16:24 EST from IGnatius T Foobar @ Uncensored
I have to cringe a little bit over the way I wrote back then.

 



[#] Wed Dec 23 2020 15:09:49 EST from ParanoidDelusions

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My first tech job was at a used computer store. Within months I had become the primary buyer when people bought machines in. At some point, the boss took me aside and said, "we want to pay the seller an *ethical* price - which might be MORE than they're willing to take for the item." 

I've always been good at this. I mean, recently, when we talked about Intel NUCs to run The Sanitarium on here - I looked and went - like... $400 for the cheapest i5 NUC... If I want to be under $300 I'm into Core Duos and Centrinos - I might as well stay on the Pi...  


So... a little shopping, and I have two i5 NUC/Minis for $205. Makes me want to buy about 3 more and retire a couple of the laptops I keep around. 

I also was once at a family gathering in Bakersfield, we were eating at this Mexican place, I went out into the parking lot for a smoke, saw a Goodwill, walked in, and walked out with an Intelivision in immaculate shape for $5.95. 

Still have that. One of the crown jewels of my retro collection. :) 


But as I've become more affluent, I less often fall into the "Hey, we're dumping these 20 24" LCDs because we just bought 27" LCDs. You want em?"  kinda deals. 

 

Wed Dec 23 2020 10:28:01 EST from Nurb432 @ Uncensored

Some of their stories, make me jealous

 

" found this stack of 1 year old macbook pros on the corner out at the local school"  or " ya, these 10 xeon servers, sitting in a box beside the dumpster" " or this Altair at a garage sale for 5 bucks"  why cant i ever be like that?

In my decades of being in the business, i have found ONE machine like this.. People next door to me in a double moved out and left an Apple II on the kitchen floor, that i noticed due to a 'shared' driveway..  ( not including things i have got by doing upgrades myself and 'hauling' away the old stuff as that wasn't technically 'found' ). not new by any stretch, but i was still collecting retro machines at that point, so it was a nice find for me.

 

 



 



[#] Wed Dec 23 2020 16:33:49 EST from Nurb432

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Speaking of games, this summer I gave away my jaguar + cd to a guy at work.  Took it to his house, set it on his porch, rang the bell and walked back to the yard to wave.  Gotta love people that are overly paranoid about the virus.

And i guess i forgot, a dude at work gave me an Atari 1200XL this year.   "hey you collect old computers, right, i got this here, it was my Atari for years that my dad bought me as a kid.. bla bla  "  Even tho i stopped collecting long ago and purged 100s of machines he was so excited i couldn't turn him down. It qualifies as a 'find' i guess, just unintentional one.

 

( of course has zero to do with apple...  man this thread went sideways :) )

 

All i really have left are a couple of portables .  The PX-8 is too special ( was a NOS we found in Canada perhaps 15 years ago, was a anniversary gift.  )  but the Kaypro II is just collecting dust and needs to go to a new home. Kept a few HP calculators and my newton, but they were small.  Its amazing how much shelf space they were taking up. I just stood there one day looking at it, 'this needs to stop'. and it did :)

Wed Dec 23 2020 15:09:49 EST from ParanoidDelusions @ Uncensored



I also was once at a family gathering in Bakersfield, we were eating at this Mexican place, I went out into the parking lot for a smoke, saw a Goodwill, walked in, and walked out with an Intelivision in immaculate shape for $5.95. 
 

 

 



 



 



[#] Wed Dec 23 2020 18:06:31 EST from ParanoidDelusions

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I'll take whatever you've got. 

This never happens to me anymore. Last thing like that which has happened to me is that a guy gave me a TI994/A he owned as a kid. 

This is my current collection/display/museum