Re: .. never used .. ?
I was taught Algol at Uni in 1975, and I still have a copy of my project on paper tape in the attic. I have been meaning to create an Arduino based paper tape reader just to see what is on it!
13 publicly visible posts • joined 12 Mar 2009
Ahh, APL a write only language. Back in the 80's I once spent 4 hours on a transatlantic phone call (back when it was very expensive) talking to the developer of an APL accounting program trying to debug it - I had the terminal he was in a hotel with no access to a terminal or source. Try reading out APL code over the phone. We eventually got there finding a function where he had reset quad IO changing all the array indices and as a by product changing the number of months in a year....
I was walking through an assembly area for banking controllers back in the early 80's, these machines had several pint pot 1 farad capacitors on the power supply rails, when I saw a test technician take a dive off his stool and away from the freshly assembled machine he had just turned on. A second later and there was an almighty flash and bang as the power supply exploded.
After checking that he was OK I asked him how he knew it was going to explode, and he told me that although rare this was not they first one the line had experienced and that they were taught to listen to the high pitch whistle the supply made as it powered up - and if it did not sound normal then get out of the way bl**dy fast.
Nowadays H&S would have a hissy fit, but then..
I have never been a fanbois - the sheer price and current inability to upgrade or maintain apple kit yourself stifle that. But I switched to a second hand Macbook 5 years ago for work reasons and I have never wanted to go back. Why ?
It is fast enough for what I want it to do - the UI tricks that give it a seemingly fast response make it a joy to use. Things like, clicking on a button and getting an instant response - having multiple desktops - actually being able to run multiple programs - choosing when I want to install software patches - regular free OS upgrades that just work. Excellent power control - long battery life - mine is still on the original battery and going strong.
I do keep a desktop Windows machine but just for 1 purpose - to run a flight simulator - as the equivalent hardware from Apple would be 3 times the cost, and I am considering moving that to Linux so that I have control over the system updates..
I repair Windows PCs & Laptops for friends, family and a local school, I have lost count of the reinstalls I have to do from botched forced upgrades/patches or users who unwittingly run recovery and factory reset their machines. Programs/Printers that worked last week being uninstalled or broken by the latest OS patches. Ridiculous Boot times, never sure if it has accepted your click and just queued opening the app - then suddenly a minute or so later getting duplicate windows openinge... Or have all my clients just been conned into buying the cheapest machines that really are not capable of running Windows 10.
My current Macbook is the last of the upgradable Macbooks - mid 2012 - it should still be usable in 5 years time. I could sell it today for a minimal loss after 5 years, the 2nd hand prices being so high. But it will probably be my last apple purchase. I can't see me paying out that much again for a new apple box that I can not open simply and upgrade the memory or disk. Though if the 2018 mac mini proves to be upgradeable I will be keeping an eye on the second hand market in 5 years time !
I bought an Orange ZTE Blade aka San Fransico earlier this week and getting that up and running has been very painful (partly due to Orange and their SIM activation process failing abysmally) but a lot due to generic messages from Andriod that do not mean anything to a dumb user. "Sim card will not let you connect to that network" , finally got it connected and then received "Call Ended" every time I tried to dial out.....
Now I can not get past "validating phone number" when I try to open GMAIL !
Why does Market place keep giving me "A network error has occurred. Retry or cancel" when connected via my home broadband ?
Is there any real support ?