My primary computer, a Dell Inspiron 530, purchased in April, 2008, is dead. Motherboard problem. Won’t even come out of POST (Power-On Self-Test). Guess I won’t be updating it to Windows 7 after all! Until I decide on a replacement, the little Acer Aspire One netbook keeps rockin’ on, and for heavier-duty stuff like scanning and editing audio/video I can use the old Dell Optiplex GX-260 that’s been idle since Eric got his Acer laptop last August.
Author: DOuG pRATt
Prattastic!
Denro points out this short but super-duper Superman cartoon by animator Robb Pratt. Can’t say I’m a blood relation, but I’m glad there’s somebody keeping the Pratt name in the business, since the death of Hawley Pratt.
RIP DEC
Digital Equipment Corporation is long gone. It was bought by Compaq, which in turn was acquired by Hewlett-Packard. But as long as DEC founder Ken Olsen was alive, the legendary Massachusetts minicomputer company wasn’t truly dead. Now Olsen is gone, leaving behind a legacy that is both classic and curious.
For years, DEC was second only to IBM (albeit a distant second), and its influence here in Massachusetts can’t be overstated. The so-called Massachusetts Miracle of the 1980’s was led by Ken Olsen and Digital, and the idea that DEC could disappear almost overnight was unthinkable; but like Prime, DG (Data General), and Wang, DEC was swept away by the rapid move business and industry made from minicomputers to microcomputers. Massachusetts endured a grueling recession in the first half of the 1990’s that was ended thanks to the Internet revolution.
Olsen left DEC but, unlike Steve Jobs, he never returned to the company he created. Once or twice Olsen was featured in the Boston Globe, saying he had an idea he was developing, but nothing came of it. For all practical purposes, Olsen was retired. One of the noteworthy things that Olsen did was to hire Bob Taylor in 1983, just as the Massachusetts Miracle was about to kick off. Taylor had left Xerox PARC, where he managed the development of a few innovations, including the Graphical User Interface, LASER printers, and Ethernet, and that was after his years managing the creation of a little thing called the Arpanet, the predecessor to the Internet.
Life in the shared lane
Network World, and IDG, its parent company, are around the corner from where I work. One of their columnists tells a tale of woe with his shared web hosting account on GoDaddy. (Having a shared account means you’re paying about $100/year to be on a computer with hundreds, or even thousands, of other web sites, usually on the same IP address.)
Dealing with the support people on the phone led the writer to a classic moment in technical support, where he says to the grunt on the other end of the line, “Let me get this straight. You want me to do something you didn’t understand, and you can’t tell me what it is, but you still expect me to do it?” That’s the thing about frontline support. One minute you’re talking to a newbie customer who’s easy to confuse and put off, and the next you’re confronted with a confident heavy-hitter who writes for a major tech publisher.
Damn ice dams
There’s nothing to be done about the ice dams on the roof. Everybody in this region with a house that’s not insulated perfectly underneath the roof has this problem. There’s water coming down along where the finished porch in back meets the house, and it was starting to get into my office in the basement, but it stopped after I stacked plywood boards on top of a long piece of 2×4 that’s leaning against the house. It seems to be helping direct the water away from the foundation. The only thing left to do is forget about it, with the help of Kahlua and chocolate milk.
Any Darn way to read Ayn Rand
Denro points out that comic book artist Joe Staton has illustrated a graphic novel adaptation of Ayn Rand’s novella Anthem. I’ve read The Fountainhead, and every single page of Atlas Shrugged too (well, maybe I skipped a few in John Galt’s redundant 60-page diatribe), but I have never read Anthem. Amazon has it for only $8.44 — less than the Kindle version.
Joe’s a busy guy, because he’s taking over the art chores for the classic comic strip Dick Tracy, although I’m sure for Joe it won’t be a chore, but a labor of love. I’m loving the revamped look. Bring back the Moon Maid and the flying garbage cans!
