illys

7 ms·

1.
by illys 1y ago
It requires a different way of coding: bug-free is a serious target, as far as it can be approached. It is a permanent concern while coding, with a lot of testing, and releases are hard releases, not agile output. No titanic effort there, j
2.
by illys 2y ago
Well, my 2-cent is that you can laugth of everything but not with everybody... So defying the norms with Easter Eggs sent to the wild can be an issue. You have to know your audience to properly chose your level of impertinence.
3.
by illys 2y ago
Small fix: the IBM System/23 Datamaster was based on Intel 8085, an improved version of the 8080 (binary compatible, more features, requiring less electronics around).
4.
by illys 2y ago
I love the story... But don't forget this story is the proper selection of events with textual glue and interpretation to make it feel like a novel. Some statements belong more to the glue than to History, and they should remind us thi
5.
by illys 3y ago
If two friends ask you to judge a dispute, and you don't accept... You might loose two friends since both of them think they are right and will not understand you do not support them.
6.
by illys 3y ago
Probably because the so-called "low level" work and skills are underrated: Have you ever wondered why your modern computer makes you wait for so many things? ... while you or other people were doing so many of the same things like
7.
by illys 3y ago
A cool DIY computer project could be a free re-creation of computers of the past. I believe it would make sense re-running the path of computer history, but pushing more and more open-source in it. You already can buy a NuXT, based on Serge
8.
by illys 3y ago
I found a treasure on eBay this year and I shared it on Archive.org (link above, scroll down below the image) and Minuszerodegrees (Manuals > Third parties > Compaq). It is a Compaq internal document of 1986, a full technical document
9.
Compaq Deskpro 386/16 Original Design Specification with Schematics 1986(archive.org)
2 points by illys 3y ago|1 comments
10.
by illys 3y ago
"Between them IBM and MS traded performance for forced standardisation" Maybe I misunderstand, but for me it is a strange statement: * IBM fought standardization: they initially released a PC compatible with nothing, even in their
11.
by illys 3y ago
That logic is like breaking windows to feed the glazier's family... Or puncture tires to feed the garage owner's family. It does not make any sense: it is fake work while there is so much real work to do.
12.
by illys 3y ago
I understand your feeling: I have a vague uneasy feeling when I see DOSbox or other emulations running. It is a great achievement to allow legacy software to remain alive and executable... But still it seems fake. Nothing to do with the rea
13.
by illys 3y ago
The author states: "the risk of dying from the screening exam was 1/660" And demonstrates with: "This involves a radiation dose of about 30 milli-Sieverts. The usual rule of thumb is that one extra Sievert = 5% higher ri
14.
by illys 3y ago
Frédérick's career started even earlier, with 8088 PC and CGA: He is also behind PopCorn, the very best CGA bricks-breaker. All done with his friend Christophe Lacaze in assembly with great graphics, transitions, smoothness, gameplay..
15.
by illys 3y ago
Your question seems provocative... but that's a very good question. I've always liked assembly programming and I got very puzzled when I discovered the processor metal have gone very far from the x86 instruction set I was writing.
16.
by illys 3y ago
Yes, but the Afghan "elite" did not commit to the reconstruction plan, they just behaved like to drain as much money as possible to their clans. Nothing serious was ever built and everything collapsed as soon as the withdrawal sta
17.
by illys 3y ago
"Hard to enjoy my hobbies when I'm in debt to the bank and my mortgage isn't paid." You are young and worried for a mortgage to complete... and that prevents you to enjoy what you like in life? What will you say when you
18.
by illys 4y ago
I am confortably working on hardware 10 to 15 years old. So do all the people of my family and the non-technical friends I help. This is possible with Linux and software resulting from the free and open source communities. With proprietary
19.
by illys 4y ago
Nice. But please, if you are in IT, don't mix up kb and kB. There is a x8 size factor from the bit to the byte! [Edit: and "kilo" is a lowercase k]
20.
by illys 4y ago
I don't think wood-burning is a real emission issue since wood growing/burning is a carbon-cycle and not a fossil taken in the ground and injected forever in the atmosphere... As long as the wood is coming from tree plantations, n
21.
by illys 4y ago
Add 20 bucks, some work... and you may get a nice tiny monitor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7KKEXS0huA https://www.ebay.fr/itm/153588266295?var=453608366546
22.
by illys 4y ago
I remember using a 800x600 16 color generic SVGA driver with early Windows (3.11 or 95?). At registry level, I guess the mode was made mostly standard as a derivate of the 640x480 16 color standard VGA mode. Indeed both modes fit within th
23.
by illys 4y ago
Pretty nice table here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metric_prefix "(...) he had the idea for the update when he saw media reports using unsanctioned prefixes for data storage such as brontobytes and hellabytes.
24.
by illys 4y ago
Could you develop? Kind of toxicity? As traces in food? Source? I put vinegar in my salad sauce, I would not dare with glyphosate.
25.
by illys 4y ago
I saw on one of the illustrations that the spray is made of acetic acid. Pretty natural product, aka vinegar at low concentration. Well targeted as they seem to do, I guess it is a good product to preserve the soil and wanted plants with no
26.
by illys 4y ago
"... everyone knows the trick"... Everyone who read the tweet or commented here at this current point in time. Not sure most people who might be future leakers of classified stuff and targetted by this trick will be aware of it.
27.
by illys 4y ago
You could edit them and decide to delete them (most of the time) or rename them and get back some content (for text files at least). Those files were created by chkdsk from orphan files (with no entry point in the directories) in the File A
28.
by illys 4y ago
Greetings Professor Falken
29.
by illys 4y ago
Disk space was scarce in that time, sustaining the usage of DoubleSpace... and write errors were common (chkdsk always found some FILE00XX.CHK lost data). When DoubleSpace was active, it was often a full partition crash instead. I've l
30.
by illys 4y ago
You speak about needs, the question is about what you miss. It is about nostalgia, about time-travel... Emulation is good for just running software. But it has nothing to do with old sofware running on an old blowing PC, with a CRT monitor

More ›