Keith,
<Why do you love to bash Gates so much? At least he and his bum
<buddies do some constructive things like write a column in the new
<york times about technology, wrote a book called "The Road Ahead", has
<his own website, etc.
<
<What does McNealy do besides make jokes about Microsoft? Or Ellison?
Apparently the following email did not make it into a Ziff-Davis "Bill 'Tiny Basic' Gates we love you!" column. I guess while Bill is entertaining us with columns for the laymen, McNealy entertains us with usable network-based platforms for professionals.
Which re'vision' of "The Road Ahead" were you referring to? Bill's first attempt "The Road Not Taken/95" did not make it two years before he had to "keep up with the times" with "The Road Ahead/97". Bill's a reactionary not a visionary.
>Paul,
>
>I was thinking of the times at work when you
>were saying, "Netscape is just whining - what's
>wrong with bill adding some free software to Windoze
>??? More power to him!!!" In fact, if
>Bill is allowed to go any further, you'll have
>advertising on your root window, etc., etc., and
>the Xerox concept of a "Personal Computer" will
>actually be dictated by the evil one...
>
>Actually, we are using Windoze-NT as an x-station.
>It runs email, netscape, a calendar manager, and
>x-windows. All our programming is done using
>x-windows, luckily... :) :)
>
>- Don
>
At 08:57 AM 3/21/98 -0700, you wrote:
>
>>>
>>> So,
>>>
>>> I have a new NT machine. I am running Eudora, the #1
>>> email program for PC's. I drag Bill Gates's mailbox
>>> icon to the trash. Eudora is a better program.
>>> Windoze-NT complains, but it allows it.
>>>
>>> I am running Netscape. I drag IE to the trash. It
>>> comes back to life. I drag it to the trash again.
>>> Still, it is there on my desktop. I can't get the
>>> f*cking SW off the desktop without doing brain
>>> surgery on Windows-NT.
>>>
>>> I get smart. I drag Explorer to the folder. Windoze
>>> says, "You can't do that. Do you want to create a
>>> shortcut for IE???" No, i want to create a "throatcut"
>>> for Bill Gates... Too bad NT doesn't support it.
>>
>>This reminds me of a dripping faucet you try to
>>fix and try to fix and try to fix. Finally, you
>>give up and for the rest of your life in that home
>>that dripping is just ticking in the background
>>reminding you that you lost.
>>
>>>
>>> Burn in hell, bill gates...
>>
>>When I wrote those IP drivers for Spectrum Astro, the
>>development station I was assigned was an NT system
>>with WindRiver's Tornado development environment.
>>
>>First of all it was version 1.0 for Windows and was
>>buggy. Second I had to load the Goddamn thing along
>>with National Instruments version 1.0 of their VXI
>>software (to instrument and control the slot 0 VME
>>controller).
>>
>>Two weeks later the guy I'm working with at Spectrum
>>is wheeling out logic analyzers to test my drivers.
>>Fortunately, I had stacks of correspondences detailing
>>my quest to install the damn thing. Evidently nobody
>>can successfully write to that bloody API.
>>
>>Then I'm finally working and the first day I come
>>across the need to find a data structure type in one of
>>the headers. Oh, oh. The very patient can pull this
>>off. But to pull it off dozens of times a day
>>like I/we need to is unbelievably annoying.
>>
>>Fortunately, WindRiver's Tornado (on Windows it is
>>a Tornado only in the sense of the destruction it
>>reaps) uses GNU Make and gcc behind those "build"
>>buttons. By the time I was done, all that functionality
>>in Tornado was sitting idle (the makefile generator,
>>the builder, the editor, the browser) with the
>>exception of the shell. I had four text windows
>>open and was light years ahead.
>>
>>I've come to believe that I'm not mad at Bill for
>>his inadequecies, I'm mad at the people who actually
>>buy it. I told Spectrum that their little foray
>>with NT cost them at least 300 hours on what should
>>have been a 300 hour gig to begin with. And further
>>told them that any more extensive development on
>>my part should be done on a Sun. The next week
>>a Sun was in the lab and I was up and running that
>>afternoon.
>>
>>
>>Paul
>>
>>>
>>> - Don
>>> |
