It's the less mainstream stuff that's still missing. On Windows, I have some excellent topographic map software, nicely integrated with my GPS unit. I have some excellent birding software, with videos and birdsongs. Great genealogical software. Great sound editing software. Etc., etc. I looked pretty hard, but was not able to find Linux equivalents.
This may seem silly, but have you considered asking the software publisher if they would consider releasing a Linux version? Only by hearing from their users will a software publisher consider a new platform.
I've done this several times with software that I like. I've been using Linux at home 100% since 1998 but I still have a dual-boot laptop for work. So I sometimes see software for Windows that I might like to use under Linux. For me, that's mostly games. But this applies to all software, I think. I've written to the software publishers and asked if they have a Linux version. In all cases, the answer was at least "we're thinking about it, but haven't heard from enough Linux users yet". But in a few cases, the answer was "yes, one of our developers is working on that.. want to beta test it?"
I guess my point is that you need to talk to the software publishers if you want to use that software on Linux. They need to know that people want to use their software on Linux, then they'll release for Linux.
They could use your program, modify it for their own internal use, and never give anything for it while they reap the benefits of your software.
Yup, that's how the GPL works. If you modify then redeploy GPL'd software for internal use only (inside your company) you do not need to distribute the source code for that program to your end users. Reason: this is not considered distribution under the terms of the GNU GPL... as a corporate entity, you are not {technically speaking} redistributing it to anyone, so there is no requirement to distribute source code.
Also, "Free" has never meant "zero price". It means "Freedom". So it's also possible for an organization (like Microsoft) to give away or sell your GPL'd software (under the terms of the GNU GPL) and not pay you a dime.
{from article} SCO said that the termination of the AIX license means that all IBM Unix customers also have no license to use the software. "This termination not only applies to new business by IBM, but also existing copies of AIX that are installed at all customer sites. All of it has to be destroyed," Sontag said.
I think the courts will disagree with SCO. The term to apply here is called estoppel, which basically means that they can't retroactively change the terms of your license. IANAL. SCO can deny further use of the UNIX license to IBM for AIX, but that doesn't mean the copies of AIX that I am using now will in any way are "invalid".
You immediately got modded down (was "1, Offtopic" when I looked at it, now "-1, Offtopic" when I clicked "Reply"). I probably will be too, but I wanted to say I agree with you.
What is it with the editors? They posted an article like "here's some news, but don't bother reading it because the guy is wrong". Come on, guys!
If you sell someone the right to use a peice of software, you are essentially selling them intellectual "property" (gee, thus the term.) Unless the contract specifies otherwise, the grant is perpetual...
The term everyone is looking for is called estoppel, which basically means that they can't retroactively change the terms of your license. IANAL. SCO can deny further use of the UNIX license to IBM for AIX, but that doesn't mean the copies of AIX that I am using now will in any way become "invalid".
SCO seems to be out on a limb here. 6/13 deadline or not, this won't have an immediate impact on current AIX users.
Didn't Commander Keen already discover life on Mars? I remember running all over that place.
Billy Blaze, eight year-old genius, working diligently in his backyard clubhouse has created an interstellar starship from old soup cans, rubber cement and plastic tubing. While his folks are out on the town and the babysitter has fallen asleep, Billy travels into his backyard workshop, dons his brother's football helmet, and transforms into...
COMMANDER KEEN--defender of Earth!
In his ship, the Bean-with-Bacon Megarocket, Keen dispenses galactic justice with an iron hand!
The full text of the 2nd amendment is: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
I thought it was to arm Bears... damn, I've really screwed things up.
Synopsis:
An arctic research team on Earth discovers debris from an alien vessel, nearly a century old, buried in a glacier along with the bodies of two cybernetically enhanced humanoids. Once those beings are thawed for investigation, they come to life and abduct the scientists and their transport vessel. Enterprise is called to intercept, but Captain Archer and his crew find these cyborgs to be an intractable, insidious enemy.
Ah, I think I've seen this episode before on Dr Who: Ice Warriors.
Synopsis:
An arctic science team on Earth discovers an alien vessel, centuries old, buried in a glacier along with the bodies of two humanoid Martians. Once those beings are thawed for investigation, they come to life and abduct one of the scientists and attempt liftoff in their damaged Martian vessel. The Doctor is called upon to help, and there is a minor explosion which destroys the insidious enemy.
I've always been iffy about the concept of using WINE to run any mission critical software from Windows world. It's the reason why I just use VNC to get to my Windows machine.
Were you defending the Microsoft EULA? Better check again. Since you agreed to the EULA, you are probably aware that you must also purchase a Windows2000 Workstation license in order to display a Microsoft application on any terminal / system other than the "host" system. Using VNC counts as a remote display. I believe Microsoft would consider running the app under WINE to also require a separate Windows2000 license (although I'm not sure.)
I know you purchased a license in order to run the Windows app on the host machine. But according to Microsoft's EULA, you must also purchase a separate Windows2000 license in order to view it remotely using VNC.
That's why I haven't used a Microsoft product in years on my home PC. At work, with RH8, I am also able to run Microsoft-free.
Personally, I thought that a Linux distro that used the Solaris package manager, and had a layout that was close to how Solaris is set up, and was managed the same way you managed a Solaris box, might be a cool thing for shops that ran a lot of Solaris but not a lot of Linux. Your Solaris admins could pick up this new Linux thing in a hurry, since it looked just like their other Solaris boxes. And you could run it very cheaply on the new "blades". But that wasn't where Sun wanted to go, and they said that to me very plainly.
That sounds like a good idea! Imagine the same Solaris GUI tools re-compiled to run on Linux. Sure, you wouldn't be able to do this with all Solaris tools (the underlying layer is different) but Sun could probably re-create a similar interface to do the same kinds of things on Linux as they do on Solaris. Admin a Linux server with the same tools you would use to admin a Solaris server. That would be cool.
We have bunches of Solaris machines where I work, and also a bunch of Linux boxes. Imagine how easy it would be to manage these if our admins could share skills.
But, sounds like that won't happen now. Gee - thanks, Sun!
[I'd mod you up, dude, but I don't have any points left.]
From the article:
My only gripe with OpenOffice is it has an annoying delay while loading up a module even on a very fast and current computer. Opening Microsoft Word in Windows XP on the same system is instantaneous compared to OpenOffice Writer. I guess some more work needs to be done in that department as this was the same in Red Hat 8.0, so hopefully in time this can improve. Once it's loaded, it's fine, but if you are in a hurry to read something in OpenOffice, then the delay can be tiresome.
This is something that a lot of people see, but they don't understand that when you install MS Office on MS Windows, most of the DLLs for Office get loaded by the operating system when it boots. The result? When you open MS Office, most of it is already loaded, so it starts really quickly.
The down-side is that you do have all those DLLs loaded, so if you're not running Office, you still use the memory for those DLLs. Ever wonder why Windows requires so much RAM? That's one big reason.
StarOffice and OpenOffice on Windows have the same problem as under Linux. They don't dump their DLLs into the Windows dir. So when you start StarOffice / OpenOffice on Windows, it has to load everything.
About the only way you could improve load time for OpenOffice on Linux is to do what StarOffice / OpenOffice does on Windows : let you start up a "launch icon" that loads 99% of the application into memory. Under Windows, you can do this by having OpenOffice load a quickstart icon into your system tray.
Probably the most irritating phrase I see as an open source software person is "thanking you in advance for your prompt reply!!" That just makes me want to not respond to your email right away. I am a coordinator for a fairly large and active project. I can't always get to your email right away all the time.
But seriously, some of the staff at my work seem to think that CC'ing my boss on emails is the same as "you will do my bidding.":-)
So overall, it's just plain old product placement. Purists may be upset with it (and may question the artistic integrity of the blogger over it), but there's no wrongdoing here barring future potential misconduct on the part of a blogger (such as lying about the product or utilizing a blog server that prohibits commercial content).
Okay, that makes sense then. It just had a bad taste to it (no pun intended.)
If I had mod points, I'd mod up your reply to me. But since I posted, mod points are gone.
Definition of payola:
The paying of cash or gifts in exchange for airplay. [...] the anti-payola statute was passed under which payola became a misdemeanor, penalty by up to $10,000 in fines and one year in prison.
Seems like the same thing to me, except we're talking about blog space instead of airplay. If I was a blogger who had this proposal come to me, I'd report them to the FBI. Or am I totally off base here?
I seem to remember some hassle that Bungie received after releasing the "Halo" game on the XBox. The idea was that the Halo was a knockoff of the Ringworld. It got to the point that Bungie's co-founder made a public statement about it at the time, decrying the Halo/Ringworld connection. I think your opinion was that you can't patent nor copyright a ring.
Hey, if you have old PC hardware like this, you might consider contributing to the FreeDOS Project. Part of our goal is to support older hardware like this. Even though you don't find a lot of 286's in people's homes anymore (at least, not turned on) you still find a fair number of 286's in embedded systems.
Please consider testing FreeDOS on your older hardware. You'd be helping out our little project.
Steven Levy, well-known fan of the Macintosh (and unfan of Microsoft) [..]
Steven Levy not a fan of Microsoft? Since when??? All the articles of his that I ever read in Newsweek have been overwhelmingly supportive of Microsoft, almost to the point of gushing.
The site is slashdotted right now, so I can't read&comment on the article (but when has that stopped someone on Slashdot?)
I had this happen to me a few years ago. Some spammer (not for porn, tho') used my webmaster @freedos.org address as his "From" address. When I fetched my email the next morning, I had 150 new emails (bounces).
I was able to track the guy down somewhat, but only to the open mail relay he had used. I contacted the admins for the box being used to relay the spam, posted a "not me" message on my web site, and created a "delete" filter for my Inbox.
I think this will continue to be a potential problem for anyone who owns a domain.
Its interesting to note that the certification effort was made for the more proprietary (and costlier) Red Hat Advanced Server and not the basic Red Hat distribution
Yes, it costs more. But it's about the same as (or less than) support & licensing costs for "big UNIX" like Solaris.
I think it's incorrect to label RHAS as "proprietary". It's based on a Red Hat Linux boxed set, but I believe they bundle in software from partners.
Each release of RHAS has a longer lifecycle (something like 14-18 months) so you don't have to upgrade every 6 months when the new Red Hat Linux comes out. You do get a "stepped-up" version of their Red Hat Network support, which we currently use on their boxed sets to stay up to date with erratas.
Maybe that's because you don't have to admin anything important. An annual upgrade treadmill is a huge burden on IT staffs [..]
Then maybe you should consider Red Hat Advanced Server. That's what we're doing. The lifespan for that product is a lot longer... Advanced Server releases will occur approximately every 12-18 months. I don't know the EOL for a particular version (we're looking into it) but AL should help ease the pain of keeping our servers up to date.
Of course, you do pay more for it. But if you run other production systems (UNIX, Windows,...) the price isn't out of line with other platforms. We're planning on Base support for dev and test systems, and higher-level support for our production.
-jh
Re:Prices are out of whack for 1991
on
The 1991 "X-Box"
·
· Score: 1
I didn't price this out in 1991, only did the research recently when I found the notes to figure out if such a game system would have been possible to build at a reasonable price.
Prices were grabbed from builditdoc.txt
(Can't find the original anymore.. link is into Google's cache.) The author wrote it in 1989, updated 1990, updated 1991. The pricing shows:
My thoughts exactly. The author is either misinformed, has an extremely bad memory, or is making it up. As for which I believe to be true, well, those papers look a little too well preserved to have been created in 1991 IMHO (how many of you keep doodlings you made 12 years ago?).
I still have all my old physics lab notebooks, for example.
CD-ROM drives in 1991 were OUTRAGEOUSLY expensive, as were sound cards. Flash ROM? In 1991? Affordable? Please...
Things like this didn't concern us at the time. We were running through "what if" scenarios, like we'd do with any topic. "What would the universe look like if you were travelling at the speed of light?" "Would you be able to make a game system on DOS?" Geez... didn't you guys ever read Niven when you were in college, and want to be that smart guy at parties who suggested things like "what can you do with chocolate manhole covers?" We were just coming up with ideas to hash them out. Typical college stuff.
An EGA card that can also output NTSC video (whether s-video or composite) would have been unheard of, namely because there wouldn't have been any point: EGA cards could do 640x200, but only in black & white (1-bit color). They could do up to 16 colors (4-bit color) in a different video mode, but only at 320x200. Yeah, that's right, 320x200, not 320x240. Oops, did somebody just get caught?
See http://www.madchat.org/esprit/old_txt/builditdoc.t xt for a list of pricing that I used when I put this page together. It's amazing what you can find on Google. As for the EGA info, I found all that through searches on Google.
Slashdot Mirror
It's the less mainstream stuff that's still missing. On Windows, I have some excellent topographic map software, nicely integrated with my GPS unit. I have some excellent birding software, with videos and birdsongs. Great genealogical software. Great sound editing software. Etc., etc. I looked pretty hard, but was not able to find Linux equivalents.
This may seem silly, but have you considered asking the software publisher if they would consider releasing a Linux version? Only by hearing from their users will a software publisher consider a new platform.
I've done this several times with software that I like. I've been using Linux at home 100% since 1998 but I still have a dual-boot laptop for work. So I sometimes see software for Windows that I might like to use under Linux. For me, that's mostly games. But this applies to all software, I think. I've written to the software publishers and asked if they have a Linux version. In all cases, the answer was at least "we're thinking about it, but haven't heard from enough Linux users yet". But in a few cases, the answer was "yes, one of our developers is working on that .. want to beta test it?"
I guess my point is that you need to talk to the software publishers if you want to use that software on Linux. They need to know that people want to use their software on Linux, then they'll release for Linux.
-jh
They could use your program, modify it for their own internal use, and never give anything for it while they reap the benefits of your software.
Yup, that's how the GPL works. If you modify then redeploy GPL'd software for internal use only (inside your company) you do not need to distribute the source code for that program to your end users. Reason: this is not considered distribution under the terms of the GNU GPL ... as a corporate entity, you are not {technically speaking} redistributing it to anyone, so there is no requirement to distribute source code.
Also, "Free" has never meant "zero price". It means "Freedom". So it's also possible for an organization (like Microsoft) to give away or sell your GPL'd software (under the terms of the GNU GPL) and not pay you a dime.
-jh
{from article} SCO said that the termination of the AIX license means that all IBM Unix customers also have no license to use the software. "This termination not only applies to new business by IBM, but also existing copies of AIX that are installed at all customer sites. All of it has to be destroyed," Sontag said.
I think the courts will disagree with SCO. The term to apply here is called estoppel, which basically means that they can't retroactively change the terms of your license. IANAL. SCO can deny further use of the UNIX license to IBM for AIX, but that doesn't mean the copies of AIX that I am using now will in any way are "invalid".
You immediately got modded down (was "1, Offtopic" when I looked at it, now "-1, Offtopic" when I clicked "Reply"). I probably will be too, but I wanted to say I agree with you.
What is it with the editors? They posted an article like "here's some news, but don't bother reading it because the guy is wrong". Come on, guys!
If you sell someone the right to use a peice of software, you are essentially selling them intellectual "property" (gee, thus the term.) Unless the contract specifies otherwise, the grant is perpetual ...
The term everyone is looking for is called estoppel, which basically means that they can't retroactively change the terms of your license. IANAL. SCO can deny further use of the UNIX license to IBM for AIX, but that doesn't mean the copies of AIX that I am using now will in any way become "invalid".
SCO seems to be out on a limb here. 6/13 deadline or not, this won't have an immediate impact on current AIX users.
-jh
Didn't Commander Keen already discover life on Mars? I remember running all over that place.
Billy Blaze, eight year-old genius, working diligently in his backyard clubhouse has created an interstellar starship from old soup cans, rubber cement and plastic tubing. While his folks are out on the town and the babysitter has fallen asleep, Billy travels into his backyard workshop, dons his brother's football helmet, and transforms into... COMMANDER KEEN--defender of Earth! In his ship, the Bean-with-Bacon Megarocket, Keen dispenses galactic justice with an iron hand!
Do you mean, like this one? Playa - The AAC Decoder/Player
The full text of the 2nd amendment is: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
I thought it was to arm Bears ... damn, I've really screwed things up.
Synopsis:
An arctic research team on Earth discovers debris from an alien vessel, nearly a century old, buried in a glacier along with the bodies of two cybernetically enhanced humanoids. Once those beings are thawed for investigation, they come to life and abduct the scientists and their transport vessel. Enterprise is called to intercept, but Captain Archer and his crew find these cyborgs to be an intractable, insidious enemy.
Ah, I think I've seen this episode before on Dr Who: Ice Warriors.
Synopsis:
An arctic science team on Earth discovers an alien vessel, centuries old, buried in a glacier along with the bodies of two humanoid Martians. Once those beings are thawed for investigation, they come to life and abduct one of the scientists and attempt liftoff in their damaged Martian vessel. The Doctor is called upon to help, and there is a minor explosion which destroys the insidious enemy.
I've always been iffy about the concept of using WINE to run any mission critical software from Windows world. It's the reason why I just use VNC to get to my Windows machine.
Were you defending the Microsoft EULA? Better check again. Since you agreed to the EULA, you are probably aware that you must also purchase a Windows2000 Workstation license in order to display a Microsoft application on any terminal / system other than the "host" system. Using VNC counts as a remote display. I believe Microsoft would consider running the app under WINE to also require a separate Windows2000 license (although I'm not sure.)
I know you purchased a license in order to run the Windows app on the host machine. But according to Microsoft's EULA, you must also purchase a separate Windows2000 license in order to view it remotely using VNC.
That's why I haven't used a Microsoft product in years on my home PC. At work, with RH8, I am also able to run Microsoft-free.
-jh
Aha! Finally, it is revealed that the rutan landing at Fang Rock, from Dr Who, was in fact real event! The truth can come out.
Personally, I thought that a Linux distro that used the Solaris package manager, and had a layout that was close to how Solaris is set up, and was managed the same way you managed a Solaris box, might be a cool thing for shops that ran a lot of Solaris but not a lot of Linux. Your Solaris admins could pick up this new Linux thing in a hurry, since it looked just like their other Solaris boxes. And you could run it very cheaply on the new "blades". But that wasn't where Sun wanted to go, and they said that to me very plainly.
That sounds like a good idea! Imagine the same Solaris GUI tools re-compiled to run on Linux. Sure, you wouldn't be able to do this with all Solaris tools (the underlying layer is different) but Sun could probably re-create a similar interface to do the same kinds of things on Linux as they do on Solaris. Admin a Linux server with the same tools you would use to admin a Solaris server. That would be cool.
We have bunches of Solaris machines where I work, and also a bunch of Linux boxes. Imagine how easy it would be to manage these if our admins could share skills.
But, sounds like that won't happen now. Gee - thanks, Sun!
[I'd mod you up, dude, but I don't have any points left.]
-jh
From the article: My only gripe with OpenOffice is it has an annoying delay while loading up a module even on a very fast and current computer. Opening Microsoft Word in Windows XP on the same system is instantaneous compared to OpenOffice Writer. I guess some more work needs to be done in that department as this was the same in Red Hat 8.0, so hopefully in time this can improve. Once it's loaded, it's fine, but if you are in a hurry to read something in OpenOffice, then the delay can be tiresome.
This is something that a lot of people see, but they don't understand that when you install MS Office on MS Windows, most of the DLLs for Office get loaded by the operating system when it boots. The result? When you open MS Office, most of it is already loaded, so it starts really quickly.
The down-side is that you do have all those DLLs loaded, so if you're not running Office, you still use the memory for those DLLs. Ever wonder why Windows requires so much RAM? That's one big reason.
StarOffice and OpenOffice on Windows have the same problem as under Linux. They don't dump their DLLs into the Windows dir. So when you start StarOffice / OpenOffice on Windows, it has to load everything.
About the only way you could improve load time for OpenOffice on Linux is to do what StarOffice / OpenOffice does on Windows : let you start up a "launch icon" that loads 99% of the application into memory. Under Windows, you can do this by having OpenOffice load a quickstart icon into your system tray.
-jh
Probably the most irritating phrase I see as an open source software person is "thanking you in advance for your prompt reply!!" That just makes me want to not respond to your email right away. I am a coordinator for a fairly large and active project. I can't always get to your email right away all the time.
But seriously, some of the staff at my work seem to think that CC'ing my boss on emails is the same as "you will do my bidding." :-)
I didn't see a Debian link on the page I got, but at the bottom under 'Sponsored Links' I did see a link for Microsoft and a few for NEC. :-)
So overall, it's just plain old product placement. Purists may be upset with it (and may question the artistic integrity of the blogger over it), but there's no wrongdoing here barring future potential misconduct on the part of a blogger (such as lying about the product or utilizing a blog server that prohibits commercial content).
Okay, that makes sense then. It just had a bad taste to it (no pun intended.)
If I had mod points, I'd mod up your reply to me. But since I posted, mod points are gone.
Thanks!
Definition of payola: The paying of cash or gifts in exchange for airplay. [...] the anti-payola statute was passed under which payola became a misdemeanor, penalty by up to $10,000 in fines and one year in prison.
Seems like the same thing to me, except we're talking about blog space instead of airplay. If I was a blogger who had this proposal come to me, I'd report them to the FBI. Or am I totally off base here?
I seem to remember some hassle that Bungie received after releasing the "Halo" game on the XBox. The idea was that the Halo was a knockoff of the Ringworld. It got to the point that Bungie's co-founder made a public statement about it at the time, decrying the Halo/Ringworld connection. I think your opinion was that you can't patent nor copyright a ring.
Mr Niven: what do you think?
Hey, if you have old PC hardware like this, you might consider contributing to the FreeDOS Project. Part of our goal is to support older hardware like this. Even though you don't find a lot of 286's in people's homes anymore (at least, not turned on) you still find a fair number of 286's in embedded systems.
Please consider testing FreeDOS on your older hardware. You'd be helping out our little project.
Thanks.
-jh
Steven Levy, well-known fan of the Macintosh (and unfan of Microsoft) [..]
Steven Levy not a fan of Microsoft? Since when??? All the articles of his that I ever read in Newsweek have been overwhelmingly supportive of Microsoft, almost to the point of gushing.
What a hack.
-jh
The site is slashdotted right now, so I can't read&comment on the article (but when has that stopped someone on Slashdot?)
I had this happen to me a few years ago. Some spammer (not for porn, tho') used my webmaster @freedos.org address as his "From" address. When I fetched my email the next morning, I had 150 new emails (bounces).
I was able to track the guy down somewhat, but only to the open mail relay he had used. I contacted the admins for the box being used to relay the spam, posted a "not me" message on my web site, and created a "delete" filter for my Inbox.
I think this will continue to be a potential problem for anyone who owns a domain.
-jh
Its interesting to note that the certification effort was made for the more proprietary (and costlier) Red Hat Advanced Server and not the basic Red Hat distribution
Yes, it costs more. But it's about the same as (or less than) support & licensing costs for "big UNIX" like Solaris.
I think it's incorrect to label RHAS as "proprietary". It's based on a Red Hat Linux boxed set, but I believe they bundle in software from partners.
Each release of RHAS has a longer lifecycle (something like 14-18 months) so you don't have to upgrade every 6 months when the new Red Hat Linux comes out. You do get a "stepped-up" version of their Red Hat Network support, which we currently use on their boxed sets to stay up to date with erratas.
Maybe that's because you don't have to admin anything important. An annual upgrade treadmill is a huge burden on IT staffs [..]
Then maybe you should consider Red Hat Advanced Server. That's what we're doing. The lifespan for that product is a lot longer ... Advanced Server releases will occur approximately every 12-18 months. I don't know the EOL for a particular version (we're looking into it) but AL should help ease the pain of keeping our servers up to date.
Of course, you do pay more for it. But if you run other production systems (UNIX, Windows, ...) the price isn't out of line with other platforms. We're planning on Base support for dev and test systems, and higher-level support for our production.
-jh
I didn't price this out in 1991, only did the research recently when I found the notes to figure out if such a game system would have been possible to build at a reasonable price. Prices were grabbed from builditdoc.txt (Can't find the original anymore .. link is into Google's cache.) The author wrote it in 1989, updated 1990, updated 1991. The pricing shows:
Memory- 18 1M 80NS Chips New Show $162.00 $108.00
100 / 18 ~= 5.
-jh
My thoughts exactly. The author is either misinformed, has an extremely bad memory, or is making it up. As for which I believe to be true, well, those papers look a little too well preserved to have been created in 1991 IMHO (how many of you keep doodlings you made 12 years ago?).
I still have all my old physics lab notebooks, for example.
CD-ROM drives in 1991 were OUTRAGEOUSLY expensive, as were sound cards. Flash ROM? In 1991? Affordable? Please...
Things like this didn't concern us at the time. We were running through "what if" scenarios, like we'd do with any topic. "What would the universe look like if you were travelling at the speed of light?" "Would you be able to make a game system on DOS?" Geez ... didn't you guys ever read Niven when you were in college, and want to be that smart guy at parties who suggested things like "what can you do with chocolate manhole covers?" We were just coming up with ideas to hash them out. Typical college stuff.
An EGA card that can also output NTSC video (whether s-video or composite) would have been unheard of, namely because there wouldn't have been any point: EGA cards could do 640x200, but only in black & white (1-bit color). They could do up to 16 colors (4-bit color) in a different video mode, but only at 320x200. Yeah, that's right, 320x200, not 320x240. Oops, did somebody just get caught?
See http://www.madchat.org/esprit/old_txt/builditdoc.t xt for a list of pricing that I used when I put this page together. It's amazing what you can find on Google. As for the EGA info, I found all that through searches on Google.
-jh