beware of the updates you install

[dave]

On 12/18/2013 08:59 AM, Frank Stearns wrote:

dave <ricketzz@earthlink.net> writes:

On 12/18/2013 03:00 AM, William Sommerwerck wrote:
"josephkk" wrote in message


More a different world view than a comparable situation. Such
is FOSS vs M$ viewpoint.

What's wrong with making money? Profit should be a strong spur
to producing the best-possible product. Of course, that assumes
you /want/ to produce the best-possible product.

Profit actually forces companies to cut corners, advertise more
and apply the monopolistic pressures described upstream, rather
than put more resources actually into a product.

Partly true -- stupid companies cut corners. Smart companies have a
longer horizon; innovative companies with something truly worthwhile
can carve out a niche serving customers and make money, often by a
more thoughtful balance of re-investment and profit.

Profit motive, properly applied, is a remarkable engine. And, through
competition, faults can be self-correcting -- such as stupid
companies going out of business (assuming they are allowed to die;
too often now the state floats enterprises that perhaps ought not
continue).

Still, the beast is imperfect and sometimes messy. However, far
_less_ perfect and much more messy are "profitless" systems where you
hope your fellow man is doing something because s/he thinks well of
you, or the state has commanded people to do something (hopefully
good).

Problem is, when you overlay innate human avarice and greed on those
profitless systems, the despair is deeper and the corrections much
harder to make.

Frank Mobile Audio

Actually I was thinking of public corporations and their fiduciary duty
to maximize profits, and the executive bonus structure that rewards
doing unhealthy (long term) things to the business. The idea behind free
software is that it should be free to the end user, not that computer
companies shouldn't pay for developing OS, Utilities, protocols, etc.
(which already happens). Smart companies finance pure research.

 

[Peter Larsen]

William Sommerwerck wrote:

If you're going to criticize Microsoft on this point, it should be
for its failure to allow serial devices * to work with USB ports.

New to me, I have had three serial somethings on usb-things on cash register
computers.

Kind regards

Peter Larsen

 

[Marc Wielage]

On Wed, 18 Dec 2013 03:07:41 -0800, William Sommerwerck wrote
(in article <l8rvlv$67g$1@dont-email.me&gt:

Let's not forget that Apple has a monopoly on its hardware and OS.
------------------------------<snip>------------------------------

You ever see the Windows Phone, the Surface, or the Surface Pro?

Microsoft has stated in the last year that they're beginning to realize the
value of controlling both the hardware and the operating system, because then
they can tailor each in such a way as to optimize it in every possible way
without regard to weird, off-brand hardware using dodgy components.

An old pal of mine has told me for years that the main computers Microsoft
does use to fine-tune Windows are Dell models. I would consider those the de
facto models to get, almost the "IBM" of today. I never had a problem with
any of the Dells we've bought over the years.

I do think it's problematic to use *any* operating system beyond 7-8 years,
because eventually, you're kind of on an isolated island where you're unable
to upgrade and it gets harder and harder to get support. And when
mission-critical outboard peripherals fail, you eventually get forced into
upgrading both hardware and OS.

--MFW

 

[Scott Dorsey]

Peter Larsen <digilyd@hotmail.com> wrote:

William Sommerwerck wrote:

If you're going to criticize Microsoft on this point, it should be
for its failure to allow serial devices * to work with USB ports.

New to me, I have had three serial somethings on usb-things on cash register
computers.

Me too, however I have encountered counterfeit FTDI usb-to-serial devices
that were flaky. They did not have genuine chipsets but some cheap knockoff.
You know things are bad when the Chinese are knocking one another off.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

 

[William Sommerwerck]

"Peter Larsen" wrote in message
news:52b27e1c$0$4850$c3e8da3$8cc27719@news.astraweb.com...
William Sommerwerck wrote:

If you're going to criticize Microsoft on this point, it should be
for its failure to allow serial devices * to work with USB ports.

New to me, I have had three serial somethings on USB-things on
cash register computers.

I apologize for my sloppy writing. I meant "provide a systematic solution".

When I upgraded to a new computer, I found that even the adapters from
reputable companies would not work. The result was that I had to replace three
serial devices with USB equivalents. (Yes, the adapters were correctly
installed.)

The //apparent// reason is that they only work with software that //directly//
addresses the serial port. Stick a driver in there, and all bets are off.

 

[Scott Dorsey]

William Sommerwerck <grizzledgeezer@comcast.net> wrote:

I apologize for my sloppy writing. I meant "provide a systematic solution".

When I upgraded to a new computer, I found that even the adapters from
reputable companies would not work. The result was that I had to replace three
serial devices with USB equivalents. (Yes, the adapters were correctly
installed.)

I've never seen that happen.

The //apparent// reason is that they only work with software that //directly//
addresses the serial port. Stick a driver in there, and all bets are off.

I would think it would be quite the opposite. The driver causes the port
to appear as a device file, and software that just opens up the device file
and writes to it will be fine.

If you need the device to be COM1: because that is what is hardcoded into
badly-written software, it's possible to do some device mapping to make the
USB device show up under a different name.

The problems would occur when software attempts to talk to the device
directly, which I _hope_ no Windows code would ever do. Old DOS code did a
lot of that, but Windows 95 finally brought I/O management into the 1970s
and removed any benefits to that kind of stuff.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

 

[Trevor]

"Marc Wielage" <mwielage@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:0001HW.CED7EF200144478EB01029BF@news.giganews.com...

I do think it's problematic to use *any* operating system beyond 7-8
years,
because eventually, you're kind of on an isolated island where you're
unable
to upgrade and it gets harder and harder to get support. And when
mission-critical outboard peripherals fail, you eventually get forced into
upgrading both hardware and OS.

Well XP is a lot older than that and still fine for most purposes, and still
used by a lot of people. Most people simply upgrade the OS when they buy a
new computer, you won't find a new one with XP on it any more even if you
wanted it. And you probably won't find al the necessary drivers if you did
want to downgrade.
Most people don't necessarily need to race out and upgrade their existing
Windows 7 computers to Windows 8 though.

Trevor.

 

[conklin]

"Trevor" <trevor@home.net> wrote in message
news:l90fj7$ups$1@speranza.aioe.org...

"Marc Wielage" <mwielage@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:0001HW.CED7EF200144478EB01029BF@news.giganews.com...
I do think it's problematic to use *any* operating system beyond 7-8
years,
because eventually, you're kind of on an isolated island where you're
unable
to upgrade and it gets harder and harder to get support. And when
mission-critical outboard peripherals fail, you eventually get forced
into
upgrading both hardware and OS.

Well XP is a lot older than that and still fine for most purposes, and
still used by a lot of people. Most people simply upgrade the OS when they
buy a new computer, you won't find a new one with XP on it any more even
if you wanted it. And you probably won't find al the necessary drivers if
you did want to downgrade.
Most people don't necessarily need to race out and upgrade their existing
Windows 7 computers to Windows 8 though.

Trevor.

Windows 7 outsells Windows 8 anyway, since business operations are heavily
invested in Windows and sees no reason to try to pretend that their
applications need to run on smartphones.

 

[josephkk]

On Wed, 18 Dec 2013 03:00:45 -0800, "William Sommerwerck"
<grizzledgeezer@comcast.net> wrote:

"josephkk" wrote in message
news:9n72b9taoor8m9j36aacr7jvm0m3j0i48e@4ax.com...

Linux support does seem to expect some contribution to the
solution from the user, unlike the MS world where they cannot
trust the user to plug in the stuff.

Shouldn't /any/ device simply plug in and work, regardless of the expertise of
the user? The computer industry has a long way to go on this.

Not in the real world (this is _almost_ too harsh). No matter how you
slice it someone has to do the work to make it work, and "seamlessly"
could limit you to one or no provider.

More a different world view than a comparable situation.
Such is FOSS vs M$ viewpoint.

What's wrong with making money? Profit should be a strong spur to producing
the best-possible product. Of course, that assumes you /want/ to produce the
best-possible product.

There is nothing wrong with creating useful products nor profiting from
it. MS, like all large corporations, has no interest in producing "best"
anything, just an acceptable thing. Mediocraty reigns in the commercial
world more than the FOSS world by a little bit.

 

[josephkk]

On Wed, 18 Dec 2013 06:58:24 -0800, "William Sommerwerck"
<grizzledgeezer@comcast.net> wrote:

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message news:l8scgp$g8u$1@dont-email.me...

I used to use Partition Manager.

Whoops. Partition Magic.

And so totally cannot handle non-MS partition types. Assuming you are
talking about the pay ware product. The FOSS tools handle many more
partition types. Chose anything YOU want.

?-)

 

[josephkk]

On Tue, 17 Dec 2013 23:59:10 -0500, Nil <rednoise@REMOVETHIScomcast.net>
wrote:

On 17 Dec 2013, "Trevor" <trevor@home.net> wrote in rec.audio.pro:

Me too as a simple photo viewer, hardly the same thing though.
And was Irfanview originally ported from Linux to Windows, or vice
versa?

Irfanview is only a Windows program. There is no native Linux port.

That is what the real home page says. Surprised me. It works really well
in wine. Not as powerful as Image magic let alone GIMP, but much easier
to use. The normal tradeoff.

?-)

 

[josephkk]

On Wed, 18 Dec 2013 06:20:26 -0800, dave <ricketzz@earthlink.net> wrote:

On 12/18/2013 03:07 AM, William Sommerwerck wrote:


By the way, I misstated. Microsoft did not require computer makers to
put DOS on all their machines. Rather, they had to pay the licensing fee
for every machine, whether or not it had DOS on it.

Let's not forget that Apple has a monopoly on its hardware and OS.

Apple is a closed garden, complete with fashion police, and a dress
code. They can have their little party. Android is taking over.

I wouldn't be too sure about that with all the security disasters they
have been having. Then again MS seems to have to survived them.

?-)

 

[josephkk]

On Thu, 19 Dec 2013 00:32:32 -0800, Marc Wielage <mwielage@yahoo.com>
wrote:

On Wed, 18 Dec 2013 03:07:41 -0800, William Sommerwerck wrote
(in article <l8rvlv$67g$1@dont-email.me&gt:

Let's not forget that Apple has a monopoly on its hardware and OS.
------------------------------<snip>------------------------------

You ever see the Windows Phone, the Surface, or the Surface Pro?

Microsoft has stated in the last year that they're beginning to realize the
value of controlling both the hardware and the operating system, because then
they can tailor each in such a way as to optimize it in every possible way
without regard to weird, off-brand hardware using dodgy components.

An old pal of mine has told me for years that the main computers Microsoft
does use to fine-tune Windows are Dell models. I would consider those the de
facto models to get, almost the "IBM" of today. I never had a problem with
any of the Dells we've bought over the years.

I do think it's problematic to use *any* operating system beyond 7-8 years,
because eventually, you're kind of on an isolated island where you're unable
to upgrade and it gets harder and harder to get support. And when
mission-critical outboard peripherals fail, you eventually get forced into
upgrading both hardware and OS.

--MFW

In average business/office or home use that can work; in industrial land
20+ year life times are expected and often required. ISA machines are
still available to support that market.

?-)

 

[William Sommerwerck]

"josephkk" wrote in message
news:nl8cb95g3u420rqdg3aodt1v6rk0tugn0a@4ax.com...

Microsoft, like all large corporations, has no interest in producing
"best" anything, just an acceptable thing.

I beg to differ... Pioneer plasma. Nikon & Canon cameras. HP
just-about-anything (but calculators in particular). The SX-70.

 

[Scott Dorsey]

William Sommerwerck <grizzledgeezer@comcast.net> wrote:

"josephkk" wrote in message
news:nl8cb95g3u420rqdg3aodt1v6rk0tugn0a@4ax.com...

Microsoft, like all large corporations, has no interest in producing
"best" anything, just an acceptable thing.

I beg to differ... Pioneer plasma. Nikon & Canon cameras. HP
just-about-anything (but calculators in particular). The SX-70.

I'd definitely agree that the Nikon and Canon products had a lot of
corner-cutting going on... they were designed at a price point for a
market.

HP is weird, though. HP was a large corporation that didn't act so much
like a large corporation, because even when it was public it was still
managed basically as a private operation by actual engineers who made
products for other engineers. HP is very much the exception to the rule,
or at least it was until Carly wrecked it.

Polaroid is another one of those oddities, a company actually driven by
engineering. Unfortunately a side-effect of that was making a lot of
ingenious and amazing products that nobody wanted, like Polavision.
The SX-70 was interesting too; in terms of image quality it was a step
down from the older 2-part pack technology, but Polaroid found out what
the market really wanted and made it for them and if it wasn't necessarily
the best image quality that was fine.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

 

[Les Cargill]

josephkk wrote:

On Wed, 18 Dec 2013 03:00:45 -0800, "William Sommerwerck"
grizzledgeezer@comcast.net> wrote:

"josephkk" wrote in message
news:9n72b9taoor8m9j36aacr7jvm0m3j0i48e@4ax.com...

Linux support does seem to expect some contribution to the
solution from the user, unlike the MS world where they cannot
trust the user to plug in the stuff.

Shouldn't /any/ device simply plug in and work, regardless of the expertise of
the user? The computer industry has a long way to go on this.

Not in the real world (this is _almost_ too harsh). No matter how you
slice it someone has to do the work to make it work, and "seamlessly"
could limit you to one or no provider.

If you plug a USB memory stick into just about any
computer, it'll figure out what to do with it.

So no - this doesn't limit you to just one vendor.

More a different world view than a comparable situation.
Such is FOSS vs M$ viewpoint.

What's wrong with making money? Profit should be a strong spur to producing
the best-possible product. Of course, that assumes you /want/ to produce the
best-possible product.

There is nothing wrong with creating useful products nor profiting from
it. MS, like all large corporations, has no interest in producing "best"
anything, just an acceptable thing.

There are different kinds of companies. Some produce "bests"; some are
aggregators. M$ is an aggregator. Microsoft "impedance matched"
large-box retail better.

Things are also path-dependent. Because Microsoft did things a certain
way, they ended up being an early platform for audio software. So - in
a way - that's a "best".

There is come conceptual "shear" between "best" and "quality". Apple
played the "quality" game and didn't do as well until the iWhatever in
mass consumer space, but won in pro graphics and pro audio ( because
ProTools ).

But of you want diamond-like precision, SFAIK the answer is still RADAR,
and it's anything but mass market.

Mediocraty reigns in the commercial
world more than the FOSS world by a little bit.

FOSS culturally redesigned itself as a heresy against Microsoft.
That was largely a mistake.

--
Les Cargill

 

[William Sommerwerck]

"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message news:l9770j$9v0$1@panix2.panix.com...
William Sommerwerck <grizzledgeezer@comcast.net> wrote:

"josephkk" wrote in message
news:nl8cb95g3u420rqdg3aodt1v6rk0tugn0a@4ax.com...

Microsoft, like all large corporations, has no interest in producing
"best" anything, just an acceptable thing.

I beg to differ... Pioneer plasma. Nikon & Canon cameras. HP
just-about-anything (but calculators in particular). The SX-70.

I'd definitely agree that the Nikon and Canon products had a lot of
corner-cutting going on... they were designed at a price point for a
market.

Not their "best" products. They're better than "acceptable".

HP is weird, though. HP was a large corporation that didn't act so much
like a large corporation, because even when it was public it was still
managed basically as a private operation by actual engineers who made
products for other engineers. HP is very much the exception to the rule,
or at least it was until Carly wrecked it.

I was thinking more of their consumer products. Their current calculators --
mostly designed in Australia -- are high in features and low in elegance.

Polaroid is another one of those oddities, a company actually driven by
engineering. Unfortunately a side-effect of that was making a lot of
ingenious and amazing products that nobody wanted, like Polavision.

The company was driven by Dr Land's vision, which had no regard whatever for
what people might or might not want. Polavision was his one error, and it cost
him his position at the company. Up to then, everything was a success -- and
Polaroid had spent not one penny on market research.

The SX-70 was interesting too; in terms of image quality it was a step
down from the older 2-part pack technology...

Yes, but...

The SX-70 was Land's -- not the market's -- idea of what an ideal camera
should be. As a piece of engineering, it remains startling, much more than
"acceptable".

PS: You said nothing about Pioneer plasma.

 

[josephkk]

On Sun, 22 Dec 2013 11:37:40 -0600, Les Cargill <lcargill99@comcast.com>
wrote:

But of you want diamond-like precision, SFAIK the answer is still RADAR,
and it's anything but mass market.

What is RADAR and what does it do?

Mediocraty reigns in the commercial
world more than the FOSS world by a little bit.


FOSS culturally redesigned itself as a heresy against Microsoft.
That was largely a mistake.

I must, to my distaste, agree here.

--
Les Cargill

 

[John Williamson]

On 31/12/2013 10:06, josephkk wrote:

On Sun, 22 Dec 2013 11:37:40 -0600, Les Cargill <lcargill99@comcast.com
wrote:


But of you want diamond-like precision, SFAIK the answer is still RADAR,
and it's anything but mass market.

What is RADAR and what does it do?

It's a standalone digital sound recorder and editor. It does exactly
what it says on the box no more, no less.

http://tapeop.com/reviews/gear/56/radar-24-radar-v/


--
Tciao for Now!

John.

 

[Scott Dorsey]

josephkk <joseph_barrett@sbcglobal.net> wrote:

On Sun, 22 Dec 2013 11:37:40 -0600, Les Cargill <lcargill99@comcast.com
wrote:


But of you want diamond-like precision, SFAIK the answer is still RADAR,=
=20
and it's anything but mass market.

What is RADAR and what does it do?

It's a digital audio workstation that is designed like a tape machine. It
was designed by people who understood the studio workflow and did not want
to alter it, just to make it faster.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."