Date   : Mon, 25 Jul 2011 20:38:12 +0100
From   : jgh@... (J.G.Harston)
Subject: Risc PC (Was 'Minitel in France')

Mike Pepper wrote:
> When I look at the number of programs that broke or needed upgrading as we
> went from Win3.11, to Win 95, it was mad. I can't even reckon what I had to
> chase for Win ME. All the direct driven hardware broke from Windows 2000
> onwards.

"What do you mean, you want a centronics printer port? Just use the USB
port. What do you mean, your printer doesn't have a USB port, chuck it
away and replace it."

"Look, you little ****, I am NOT throwing away a ?15,000 programmable
multi-colour high-volume duplicating printer just because your ?200
piece of **** doesn't have a proper printer port!!!"

Grrr....

> They all do it - I remember finding a mail order company that was having
> slow response problems with the mainframe, and it turned out that the
> original software was running on a emulation of the orginal hardware and OS,
> because no-one wanted to risk the debugging that would come with
> re-compiling the COBOL for the newer 'frame.

The job booking system at %BIGCORP% runs in a terminal session in the
background that a GUI frontend grabs the focus of and moves between
various text boxes and "types" into because they are terrified of
tampering with the original code and killing it. ;)

-- 
J.G.Harston - jgh@...