I cannot see the worth of an IBM microdrive in a Palm - no Palm generates the amount of data that would require one of these, to be honest.
Wasn't there some guy named Gates who said something similar about RAM? 640 something...
All right, I feel the need to address this.
Yes, it's true, Gates did say something about "who needs more than 640k ram?". We all look back on it now, and think, "boy, was that dumb... who in their right minds would only have 640k ram?" My Palm IIIxe has 8M! But you have to remember the context of the argument. I believe that both these quotes are valid, in a way. First, I would side with the one who said, "why have a microdrive in a palm?" For my uses, in my context, a microdrive would be way overkill. In fact, the 8M my Palm IIIxe has is more than enough for my uses. At the same time, I can think of a few applications (mapping, remote data searching, etc.) that would require the use of a large amount of data (yes, perhaps even 1G...) Remember the context. At the time Gates made his statement, nobody was processing nearly the same amount of data that we are now. Any more memory than 640k was simply not needed - nobody would ever fill up to 640k under most circumstances. I would not buy a microdrive for my palm, any more than I would buy a 16k memory chip for my desktop.
No, you don't get it. One of the main reasons why he hasn't done so well is because he didn't make it through college. College is the time when you learn all the stuff you don't want to learn. Yes, it sounds dumb - but just listen. Having the patience to finish school says a lot about a person. It is obvious from just reading the descriptions of Gates and his personality that he is not a very patient or methodical person. This isn't to say that everyone who goes to college somehow magically becomes patient... it's just that it speaks highly towards that person's patience and determination.
Bill Gates was a shooting star. Yeah, he was brilliant - perhaps not in coding, but certainly in winning people over to his side. But he lacks the strength and determination to do the job right.
I'm sure all you coders out there know what I'm talking about. There's a big difference between doing the job fast (ie. what Gates did - build up an industry in an incredibly short time) and doing it right - with stability and a support structure.
Just imagine what the personal computer industry would have been like had it been given forty years to mature - slowly, and carefully.
Not every computer user has a floppy drive... consider all those iMacs out there.
Seriously, though, when I bought my new computer this past summer (Thinkpad i 1200) it didn't come with a floppy disk. An external USB floppy was optional - and, I opted out. Instead, I bought a iomega USB ZipCD and a stack of CDs. Now, if I need to give a file to someone, I can either send it over the Internet (storage space at school) or burn it to a CD if net access isn't available. The only time I have ever needed a floppy, *ever*, is when I bought my network card - the drivers were on floppy. Ironic, I thought... I would have normally chosen to ftp the drivers onto the computer. But by then I had my CD writer, and I simply hooked it to my parents' computer and copied the drivers onto CD.
Coming back from winter break, I brought up an old headless Linux box from home. That computer has a floppy in it - so, if I ever need one, now I can just use that. But CDs are so popular now, and the Internet is so easy to access, floppies are almost worthless.
By the way, for you out there concerned about alternate boot media, yes, I can burn bootable CDs. And they're much more useful (ie. you can fit much more on them) than the standard 1.44M floppy.
You have to realize that before this was published in "some limey tabloid", it was published in Epidemeology, which is a quite reputable scientific journal. We should never take any of these studies as "truth" - in fact, no amount of scientific studies can ever prove something as true. They only offer more or less correlation between two things. The study offers a possible correlation between microwave radiation and cancer - that's all. It warrants further investigation.
Other sources of electromagnetic radiation such as high-voltage lines, electrical machines, complex electrical environments, visual display terminals, or radar units were not associated with uveal melanoma.
I think they had a large enough study and control group, and were able to factor out those other sources of radiation.
You have to remember (if you read the article) that they said they only have 4 terabytes of online storage (which they plan on expanding to ten later) and the rest is tape storage - "thousands of tapes" using DMF. Still, four terabytes is plenty of space...
not possible with Windows minesweeper - for a map H high by W wide, you can only have a maximum of (H-1)*(W-1) mines and a minimum of 10 mines.
Sorry...
At first Microsoft decided simply to deny access to the trespasser, and shut down the new accounts on Oct. 20, a Friday, Schmidt said. But the intruder returned on Monday through the same route and created more accounts.
Now, I'm no hacker, but if I had created accounts, and they had mysteriously disappeared, I would be a bit suspicious. I don't think I'd go out and do the same thing again... it would have been obvious that they detected my presence. Does anybody else think this smells a bit funny?
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, it's true, Gates did say something about "who needs more than 640k ram?". We all look back on it now, and think, "boy, was that dumb... who in their right minds would only have 640k ram?" My Palm IIIxe has 8M! But you have to remember the context of the argument. I believe that both these quotes are valid, in a way. First, I would side with the one who said, "why have a microdrive in a palm?" For my uses, in my context, a microdrive would be way overkill. In fact, the 8M my Palm IIIxe has is more than enough for my uses. At the same time, I can think of a few applications (mapping, remote data searching, etc.) that would require the use of a large amount of data (yes, perhaps even 1G...) Remember the context. At the time Gates made his statement, nobody was processing nearly the same amount of data that we are now. Any more memory than 640k was simply not needed - nobody would ever fill up to 640k under most circumstances. I would not buy a microdrive for my palm, any more than I would buy a 16k memory chip for my desktop.
-Karl /dos]# file msdos.sys
---------
[root@kgutwin
-Karl /dos]# file msdos.sys
-----------------
[root@kgutwin
CaCO3(s) -> Ca+(aq) + CO3-(aq) (dissociation)
CO2(g) + H20(l) -> H+(aq) + HCO3-(aq) (carbonic acid)
HCO3-(aq) -> H+(aq) + CO3-(aq) (second part of carbonic acid)
-Karl /dos]# file msdos.sys
[root@kgutwin
Bill Gates was a shooting star. Yeah, he was brilliant - perhaps not in coding, but certainly in winning people over to his side. But he lacks the strength and determination to do the job right.
I'm sure all you coders out there know what I'm talking about. There's a big difference between doing the job fast (ie. what Gates did - build up an industry in an incredibly short time) and doing it right - with stability and a support structure.
Just imagine what the personal computer industry would have been like had it been given forty years to mature - slowly, and carefully.
-Karl /dos]# file msdos.sys
------------
[root@kgutwin
Seriously, though, when I bought my new computer this past summer (Thinkpad i 1200) it didn't come with a floppy disk. An external USB floppy was optional - and, I opted out. Instead, I bought a iomega USB ZipCD and a stack of CDs. Now, if I need to give a file to someone, I can either send it over the Internet (storage space at school) or burn it to a CD if net access isn't available. The only time I have ever needed a floppy, *ever*, is when I bought my network card - the drivers were on floppy. Ironic, I thought... I would have normally chosen to ftp the drivers onto the computer. But by then I had my CD writer, and I simply hooked it to my parents' computer and copied the drivers onto CD.
Coming back from winter break, I brought up an old headless Linux box from home. That computer has a floppy in it - so, if I ever need one, now I can just use that. But CDs are so popular now, and the Internet is so easy to access, floppies are almost worthless.
By the way, for you out there concerned about alternate boot media, yes, I can burn bootable CDs. And they're much more useful (ie. you can fit much more on them) than the standard 1.44M floppy.
-Karl /dos]# file msdos.sys
----------------
[root@kgutwin
void digHoleToChina() /* this function does not return */
...
/dos]# file msdos.sys
{
[root@kgutwin
You have to realize that before this was published in "some limey tabloid", it was published in Epidemeology, which is a quite reputable scientific journal. We should never take any of these studies as "truth" - in fact, no amount of scientific studies can ever prove something as true. They only offer more or less correlation between two things. The study offers a possible correlation between microwave radiation and cancer - that's all. It warrants further investigation.
/dos]# file msdos.sys
-Karl
----------
[root@kgutwin
-Karl
------------
[root@kgutwin
-Karl
-Karl
not possible with Windows minesweeper - for a map H high by W wide, you can only have a maximum of (H-1)*(W-1) mines and a minimum of 10 mines.
Sorry...
-Karl
-Karl