{"id":2845,"date":"2009-01-21T10:31:10","date_gmt":"2009-01-21T15:31:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=2845"},"modified":"2009-01-21T10:31:10","modified_gmt":"2009-01-21T15:31:10","slug":"forward-bravely-into-the-past","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2009\/01\/forward-bravely-into-the-past\/","title":{"rendered":"Forward Bravely, into the Past!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Bogus<\/a><\/p>\n

This March — the 12th, and isn’t it interesting I remember the exact date? — marks my 30th year as a computer guy.<\/p>\n

When I started out at AT&T, my job title was Member of Programming Staff (with a digression into Managerhood); at my present job, I’ve been a Distributed Systems Specialist, a Business Systems Analyst, and a Database Analyst. (Oh, and throw in whatever you call a departmental Webmaster, too. Probably exactly that.)<\/p>\n

And then I’ve built and maintained other Web sites, as well, and RAMH<\/em> is, like, my fourth or fifth blog since 1999-2000 or so.<\/p>\n

By now, you might think, I’d be right up there in the vanguard doing the Pied Piper thing, urging everyone else to join the cyber\/systems\/virtual revolution.<\/p>\n

Er, no.<\/p>\n

Into my Inbox recently drifted a plaintive email from a young guy with a computing question. In purchasing a new computer, it seems that he had to choose between two options: a souped-up whiz-bang up-to-the-minute model? or scale back on the computer itself, and spring for a really nice monitor?<\/p>\n

I counseled him to choose Door #2, introducing it with the (perhaps surprising) claim:<\/p>\n

I tend to be conservative in matters of computer hardware: I don’t want my computer to make my heart race; I want it to be INVISIBLE.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That pretty much sums it up.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Which is why I haven’t bought a new computer in (…counting…) five years. It’s why I finally started, a couple years ago, to wean myself of Microsoft Windows (at home, anyway — at work there’s no choice). Going with Apple’s operating system would, of course, require that I replace much or all of my accumulated hardware, a pricey non-option. So I work at home mostly in Linux — falling back on Windows only when I need software for which there is no (easy) Linux alternative.<\/p>\n

(I hope this doesn’t attract much attention among Linux aficionados, who — honestly out of the goodness of their hearts — may beset me with a lot of questions about that software I “allegedly” “need,” so that they may direct me to this Linux-based alternative which is almost as good or is ACTUALLY as good, if I’m just willing to spend a little time tinkering and researching and… Invisible, right? As much as possible, I. Don’t. Want. To. See. The. Computer.<\/em>)<\/p>\n

\"\"The image at left is that of a crdl<\/em> (rhymes with “riddle”), a desktop toy (in the vein of those swinging-and-clicking steel or chrome ball bearings called Newton’s cradles<\/a>) manufactured in the late 1970s. (I almost fell over when I found a picture of one on the Web.) The crdl consisted of a round and somewhat heavy black base, maybe four inches across, and a heap of little stainless-steel diamond-shaped… uh… not filings, really… let’s just say flat little stainless-steel diamonds. You could slowly, carefully pick up a string of these little diamonds and suspend it in space, or you could gouge a thumb into the pile, even shape it to a certain extent, because the reason the crdl’s base was heavy was that it consisted almost entirely of a big, strong magnet<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I used to own a crdl — wouldn’t be surprised to find it still around in one box or another. I received it as a gift from a friend when AT&T first hired me as a programmer trainee.<\/p>\n

“See?” she said, demonstrating. “You put it on your desk.”<\/p>\n

“I’m not sure I’ll even have a desk,” I said.<\/p>\n

“Then you can just put it on your computer!”<\/p>\n

I tell this story not to demonstrate my friend’s naivet\u00e9, as in:<\/p>\n

Put a strong MAGNET on top of my computer? You mean this computer here, the one with all its data stored on a MAGNETIC hard drive? Are you CRAZY?<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Back then, after all:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Nobody, least of all programmer trainees, even had<\/em> desktop computers — and they sure as hell weren’t gonna allow me into the main computer room to set the thing down on a mainframe<\/a> or high-powered mini<\/a>.<\/li>\n
  2. And, honestly, I myself didn’t know any better. (At that point, I wasn’t sure what a computer even looked like, although I knew enough to know that it didn’t resemble HAL’s glowing red eye.) I probably just laughed like a doofus — Huh huh huh<\/em> — and in my mind’s eye pictured myself doing exactly as she suggested: mounding up all the little diamond thingumabobs while waiting for my computer to, er, compute.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    No, I tell the story to highlight the thin line which separates technological knowingness from innocence. Especially, note the knee-jerk instinct (even I didn’t suppress it in the telling above) to regard knowingness as inherently superior to innocence, and cleverness to charm.<\/p>\n

    For the important lesson of a story like this, ultimately, isn’t (or shouldn’t be): Can you believe Person X didn’t know that about computers? Isn’t it great that we know better?
    \n<\/em><\/p>\n

    The lesson of such a story should be just: Look — I have a friend!<\/em><\/p>\n

    Computers can be tremendously cool and fun to play around and sometimes even work with; on balance, I have to say I’m glad I “know” them. But they’re also stubborn as hell when they’re not functioning just so<\/em>. The hardware, software, and network technology’s always changing, roiling, rocketing off in new directions. (Even Bill Gates was caught with his pants down — and egg on his face — when the Internet came along for real in the mid- to late 1990s.)<\/p>\n

    Oh sure, it’s possible to keep up with technology, if you just put aside things like books, art, conversation, and (yes) even spare cash.<\/p>\n

    But I’m damned if I want to put aside such things. Compared to them — compared to nearly everything, except other computers — computers are just as dull as dirt.<\/p>\n

    _____________________<\/p>\n

    [About the photo at the top of this post: The caption begins, “Scientists from RAND Corporation have created this model to illustrate how a ‘home computer’ could look in the year 2004.” This isn’t a hoax, exactly, but the photo does <\/em>not depict what it claims to depict. See the invaluable snopes.com<\/a> for the story behind the picture, which still surfaces<\/em> from time to time<\/em> in “Gee whiz, those wacky but good ol’ days!” chain-letter emails.]<\/em><\/p>\n

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    This March — the 12th, and isn’t it interesting I remember the exact date? — marks my 30th year as a computer guy. When I started out at AT&T, my job title was Member of Programming Staff (with a digression into Managerhood); at my present job, I’ve been a Distributed Systems Specialist, a Business Systems […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","h5ap_radio_sources":[],"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[38,17,22,23,21,18,19,20],"tags":[916,917],"class_list":{"0":"post-2845","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-backwards","7":"category-04_technology","8":"category-windows","9":"category-linux","10":"category-oses","11":"category-computers","12":"category-internet","13":"category-programmingetc","14":"tag-technology-vs-real-life","15":"tag-why-i-am-not-more-of-a-programmer","16":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kZSG-JT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2845"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2845\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2931,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2845\/revisions\/2931"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}