Category: General

General thoughts that defy categorization.

Farewell to OS/2

So farewell then, OS/2 – Windowed to death, finally. ‘Better Windows than Windows’ Losedows [The Register]

“…Now the legacy is over. Man, it was a sweet OS!!” [Tom’s Blog]

Back in the day I worked in the mainframe department of a large semiconductor company. Only a couple of select individuals had PCs. Everyone else had dumb terminals. And this was 1992. When we got our first PCs, they were loaded with OS/2. I think OS/2 had a better terminal emulation or something. We were always thumbing our noses at the Windows folks. OS/2 was for people with “serious” technical needs. I learned REXX on OS/2 and loved it. I used it for a lot of different tasks, much like Perl or Python is used today. Then, slowly, our systems became dual-boot because there were Windows apps we had to run that wouldn’t run on OS/2 for some reason. Eventually, we were all-windows. Forced by The Man to use a “sub-par” operating system.

Mississippi Students Build Their Own PC’s

Mississippi Students Build Their Own PC’s. Mississippi couldn’t afford to put PC’s in every classroom. So students are building them as part of an ambitious effort to add computer engineering to the curriculum. By Michel Marriott. [New York Times: Education]

I think it is awesome that these kids are cranking out machines, especially with the goal of putting one in every classroom in Mississippi. They are learning a ton and helping their school and community But, they are paying over $600 per machine just for the parts. Didn’t I see that for $199 you can get a Lindows box at Wal-Mart? If Lindows is a problem they can pony up another $100 for the one that comes with XP.

Aggregator not stable

Why does my News Aggregator wig out every now and then? I was just deleting some stories and all of a sudden all of my stories are gone. Also, when I tried to post a story to my blog I got a strange macro error. Something’s fishy.

635 is the Devil’s Highway

635 is the Devil’s Highway. I’ve only been run into twice on the highway and both times have been on 635. This morning’s incident was classic. Rush hour. Bumper-to-bumper. Minding my own business, listening to a little Jay Ferrar when wham! I didn’t even see him coming. Ah, the joys of the indefinite trip to the body shop and budget rental car that await!

Loving AA self-service

American Airlines’ self-service check-in has got to be one of the greatest improvements made available to the flying public in recent history. I’d even put it above the “more legroom in coach” improvement and I’m a tall guy. Flying Public, why do you continue to wait in line at the checkout counter? You can check bags, sign up for stand-by, pick out seats, get boarding passes, and get a receipt all by simply tapping a few choices on the self-service kiosk. And because you continue to shun this incredible timesaver, I never have to wait in line–a benefit previously only known to the uppity First Class types. So, on second thought, please do not use self-service check-in. It sucks.

Back into blogging a year later

I’m back. A year ago I gave this a shot and decided it would be cool to investigate for personal as well as corporate use as a knowledge management tool. My thirty day license expired and my attention span turned elsewhere.

But then I saw Ray Ozzie’s weblog. And I noticed several other technology leaders were getting into it. The straw that broke the back was a group on Yahoo dedicated to blogging as a Knowledge Management tool. That cinched it. I persuaded my co-worker Tom Pierce to download a copy of Radio and now we’re both ready to see if we can get a critical mass of folks at the firm using it.

Will my interest wane as it did a year ago? Or is this the beginning of a substantial change in how we communicate at the company? We’ll see.