wlindley

6 ms·

1.
by wlindley 1mo ago
Excellent that Control Data is contributing! Oh wait, I'm a few decades out of sync
2.
by wlindley 4mo ago
Isn't it odd to read "curly" braces? Every printed dictionary I have, up through the 1990s at least, says that braces are {these}, brackets are [these], and parentheses are (these). Saying "curly brace" is as redund
3.
by wlindley 5mo ago
The real mystery is why anyone remotely aware of the Free Software movement would have ever been duped into advocating for handheld computers so hostile to their own goals.
4.
by wlindley 7mo ago
"Self-driving cars" and Fusion power also come to mind. With the advent of photography, it was widely believed that drawing and painting would vanish as art forms. Radio would obsolete newspapers, becoming obsolete themselves with
5.
by wlindley 10mo ago
What does "compute" mean here? It is supposed to be a verb, but here seems to be a noun. I have recently started seeing it apparently mean "computational capacity" but here it seems to mean "an instance of a virtua
6.
by wlindley 10mo ago
As an emacs user since the mid-80s, I do note this functionality would be nice as a Major Mode, if one were an avid Lisp programmer. As a Perl Monger since 1994, and as a developer who has used and extended Org::Parser from CPAN, I am happy
7.
by wlindley 11mo ago
The original IBM PC could be purchased either with 160KB/180KB single-sided floppy drives, or the 320KB/360KB double-sided. Some early IBM PC users still needed the "flippy" trick! See IBM advert, https://arc
8.
by wlindley 1y ago
"...whenever 'a software' doesn't...." Ugh. "A software package" or "a piece of software" or perhaps "a program" but you don't have "one software" any more than you can
9.
by wlindley 1y ago
My company "Lindley Systems" did all this from 1980 (when I was 14) until the mid 90s, in the Heathkit (later Heath/Zenith) arena. I still have master diskettes and original manuals ready for taking to the Xerox shop, and onl
10.
by wlindley 2y ago
And again, There is no cloud, only someone else's computer.
11.
by wlindley 2y ago
Thank you, and all the best for a long-awaited and much-needed update to the book!
12.
by wlindley 2y ago
Also "napkin" (from nappe, old for "tablecloth"). See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napkin#Etymology_and_terminolo...
13.
by wlindley 2y ago
Listed is "HTML & XHTML: The Definitive Guide (6th ed.)" by Chuck Musciano and Bill Kennedy from 2006. However there was a 7th edition, ISBN 9781449302597, published 2011. Yet nowhere online can I find a copy to purchase. Doe
14.
by wlindley 2y ago
Garbage in, garbage out. Code spewed by a random generator that has not the slightest understanding of what it is doing, whacked at by a hammer until it seems to be working. What is this supposed to produce other than a mass of bugs and vul
15.
by wlindley 2y ago
According to: https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/house-bill/8038... "FOREIGN ADVERSARY CONTROLLED APPLICATION.—The term “foreign adversary controlled application” means a website, desktop appli
16.
by wlindley 2y ago
What exactly is being forbidden here? Outlawing installing a program ("app" being short for "application program") on your computer (even if it is called a "telephone" it is obviously a computer)? Surely there
17.
by wlindley 2y ago
It's a program. "App" is a word, short for "Application Program," publicized by Apple for its handheld computers that masquerade as (and are euphemistically called) "telephones." "App" effectivel
18.
by wlindley 2y ago
Most shocking of all is how almost every free-software, anti-big-government, anti-big-business, and libertarian advocate swallowed these allegedly "smart" alleged "telephones" -- which are obviously computers that someon
19.
by wlindley 2y ago
In the 1940s, the Army used a phonetic alphabet starting Able, Baker, Charlie. My late father was on the first two postwar atomic bomb tests (the first after Trinity, and at Hiroshima, Nagasaki) which were Able and Baker. Able was an air bu
20.
by wlindley 2y ago
a/k/a It is all a clever scam. True, or true?
21.
by wlindley 2y ago
And this is why it is so shocking that even folks who should know better, who are technically savvy in the slightest, would ever consent to use such a brain-damaged computer system that runs nonfree software.
22.
by wlindley 2y ago
Indeed. Wouldn't be surprised if San Francisco tried to ban software, and criticism too. Perhaps "Software, critics, and software critics seek to ban San Francisco."
23.
by wlindley 2y ago
I have a kitchen phone and a desk phone (both VOIP), a Linux workstation, a DSLR camera, a radio, and read real books and play CDs. Also an RCA Orthophonic High Fidelity phonograph for 78, 45, and 33⅓. After the last Star Trek went off the
24.
by wlindley 2y ago
"De-skilling" would be a better way to write this. I was halfway through before realizing it wasn't about "desk-killing" or the pretending that workers are incorporeal gossamer entities that do not have to physicall
25.
by wlindley 2y ago
Heath/Zenith's ZBASIC on the MSDOS-but-not-PCDOS Z-100 used a similar format but with at least different keywords. Somewhere I had a set of programs I had written in ZBASIC but could never load after selling that computer. Wonder
26.
by wlindley 2y ago
Much of the world apparently believed that wearing a muzzle and living like a hermit instead of outdoors, exercise, vitamins, and a normal lifestyle would prevent the common cold. Pure magic over rational science. One wonders what the next
27.
by wlindley 2y ago
After a few more revisions, you can make an RK05 ! (for the youth: That's a DEC joke)
28.
by wlindley 2y ago
Bottom line: Pay cash if you want to support your local shops. Use credit cards if you love enriching your local megacorporation.
29.
by wlindley 2y ago
Butter in the USA is sold in 1-pound boxes, each containing four quarter-pound "squares" that are marked with tablespoon and fractional-cup gauges. Simply slice off five tablespoons. (There are "Eastern" and "West
30.
by wlindley 2y ago
With just one quadruple-thick blanket ('duvet') you are either broiling or freezing, with no ability to peel back or add just one layer at a time. Can't understand how anyone can be comfortable with that.

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