Something I didn’t hear about, which happened earlier last year <https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/unix-pioneer-ken-thompson-announces-hes-switching-from-mac-to-linux.88451/>.
Ken Thompson, one of the original Bell Labs crew that created Unix, now
80 years old, was asked what OS he uses, and he replied:

I have, for most of my life — because I was sort of born into it —
run Apple.

Now recently, meaning within the last five years, I've become more
and more depressed, and what Apple is doing to something that
should allow you to work is just atrocious. But they are taking a
lot of space and time to do it, so it's okay.

And I have come, within the last month or two, to say, even though
I've invested, you know, a zillion years in Apple — I'm throwing
it away. And I'm going to Linux. To Raspbian in particular.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Sun, 25 Feb 2024 00:07:07 -0000 (UTC), Lawrence D'Oliveiro
<ldo@nz.invalid> wrote in <ure0bb$1f6cu$1@dont-email.me>:

Something I didn’t hear about, which happened earlier last year <https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/unix-pioneer-ken-thompson-announces-

hes-switching-from-mac-to-linux.88451/>.

Ken Thompson, one of the original Bell Labs crew that created Unix, now
80 years old, was asked what OS he uses, and he replied:

I have, for most of my life — because I was sort of born into it —
run Apple.

Now recently, meaning within the last five years, I've become more
and more depressed, and what Apple is doing to something that should
allow you to work is just atrocious. But they are taking a lot of
space and time to do it, so it's okay.

And I have come, within the last month or two, to say, even though
I've invested, you know, a zillion years in Apple — I'm throwing it
away. And I'm going to Linux. To Raspbian in particular.

Braben preserve us!

I wonder if he stuck with it.

--
-v

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Sat, 24 Feb 2024 19:18:06 -0500, Joel wrote:

Basically, Apple can stop pretending to be a cool Unix flavor ...

Remember that “Unix” is a trademark, and MacOS is just about the last platform left standing that has legally licensed the trademark.

But when people say “Unix”, they don’t think of the trademark, they think of the way an OS is traditionally supposed to work. And systems like Linux
and the BSDs do a better job of conforming to that paradigm than Apple’s platform can do.

To avoid the trademark issue, we can refer to this paradigm as “*nix”.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2024-02-25, Physfitfreak <Physfitfreak@gmail.com> wrote:

On 2/24/2024 6:07 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

Something I didn’t hear about, which happened earlier last year
<https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/unix-pioneer-ken-thompson-announces-hes-switching-from-mac-to-linux.88451/>.
Ken Thompson, one of the original Bell Labs crew that created Unix, now
80 years old, was asked what OS he uses, and he replied:

I have, for most of my life — because I was sort of born into it — >> run Apple.

Now recently, meaning within the last five years, I've become more
and more depressed, and what Apple is doing to something that
should allow you to work is just atrocious. But they are taking a
lot of space and time to do it, so it's okay.

And I have come, within the last month or two, to say, even though
I've invested, you know, a zillion years in Apple — I'm throwing
it away. And I'm going to Linux. To Raspbian in particular.

I wished he'd say what he was doing, not what OS he was using.

To be fair, did they say they were going to be developing for it?
--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote this copyrighted missive and expects royalties:

Something I didn’t hear about, which happened earlier last year

<https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/unix-pioneer-ken-thompson-announces-hes-switching-from-mac-to-linux.88451/>.

Ken Thompson, one of the original Bell Labs crew that created Unix, now
80 years old, was asked what OS he uses, and he replied:

I have, for most of my life — because I was sort of born into it —
run Apple.

Now recently, meaning within the last five years, I've become more
and more depressed, and what Apple is doing to something that
should allow you to work is just atrocious. But they are taking a
lot of space and time to do it, so it's okay.

And I have come, within the last month or two, to say, even though
I've invested, you know, a zillion years in Apple — I'm throwing
it away. And I'm going to Linux. To Raspbian in particular.

The follow-on bitching is fun to read.

And I did not know about the Apple M1 (been living in a cave, I guess).

--
October. This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks in. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August, and February.
-- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar"

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

Chris Ahlstrom <OFeem1987@teleworm.us> wrote:

Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote this copyrighted missive and expects royalties:

Something I didn’t hear about, which happened earlier last year

<https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/unix-pioneer-ken-thompson-announces-hes-switching-from-mac-to-linux.88451/>.

Ken Thompson, one of the original Bell Labs crew that created Unix, now
80 years old, was asked what OS he uses, and he replied:

I have, for most of my life — because I was sort of born into it —
run Apple.

Now recently, meaning within the last five years, I've become more
and more depressed, and what Apple is doing to something that
should allow you to work is just atrocious. But they are taking a
lot of space and time to do it, so it's okay.

And I have come, within the last month or two, to say, even though
I've invested, you know, a zillion years in Apple — I'm throwing
it away. And I'm going to Linux. To Raspbian in particular.

The follow-on bitching is fun to read.

And I did not know about the Apple M1 (been living in a cave, I guess).

M1 was released back in 2020, and Apple’s up to the M3 chip already. I’ve not paid much attention to how many variants on it, but I assume probably similar to what they’ve done with the M1 & M2, including the Pro/Max/Ultra architecture, where they can double them up to build some monsters.

-hh

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Wed, 28 Feb 2024 21:21:52 -0500, -hh wrote:

probably similar to what they’ve done with the M1 & M2, including the Pro/Max/Ultra architecture, where they can double them up to build some monsters.

Unfortunately, not upgradeable ones.

Basically, all Apple’s desktop machines now are just glorified laptops.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2024-02-29 12:44 a.m., Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

On Wed, 28 Feb 2024 21:21:52 -0500, -hh wrote:

probably similar to what they’ve done with the M1 & M2, including the
Pro/Max/Ultra architecture, where they can double them up to build some
monsters.

Unfortunately, not upgradeable ones.

Basically, all Apple’s desktop machines now are just glorified laptops.

The lack of upgradability is definitely a problem for me. However, some
of the features Apple provides for its users are so far ahead of what's
being offered by Windows and Linux that it's hard not to consider buying
their hardware anyway. Just yesterday, I misplaced my AirPods Pro. When
the power went out because of strong winds, I felt like listening to
something without bothering anyone else but didn't have them on hand.
Using the _stellar_ location features on the iPhone, I first found out
that the AirPods Pro were definitely in my house and its sensor helped
to pinpoint exactly where they were. I'm now looking at getting AirTags
for my car keys, wallet and suitcases in case something similar happens.

If anything, I'm upset that I've invested so heavily in movies and games
on the Windows side because I would very happily move over to Apple only
at this point.

--
RabidPedagog

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 07:43:02 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:

I'm now looking at getting AirTags
for my car keys, wallet and suitcases in case something similar happens.

https://hackaday.com/tag/apple-airtag/

Happy hacking!

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote at 18:26 this Thursday (GMT):

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 07:43:02 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:

I'm now looking at getting AirTags
for my car keys, wallet and suitcases in case something similar happens.

https://hackaday.com/tag/apple-airtag/

Happy hacking!

Neat, I may try one of these.
--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2/29/24 12:44 AM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:> On Wed, 28 Feb 2024
21:21:52 -0500, -hh wrote:

probably similar to what they’ve done with the M1 & M2, including the
Pro/Max/Ultra architecture, where they can double them up to build some
monsters.

Unfortunately, not upgradeable ones.

True, one can't do brain salad surgery and replace CPUs, but for most
folk, that sort of DIY work died out after the 1990s, or 25+ years ago.

And the trade-off of this are systems which because of their much higher
degree of SoC integration can kick ass on things like how much data they
can internally push around.

Case in point, Apple's base M1 chip, it has 66.67GB/s memory bandwidth,
which increases to 200GB/s bandwidth and to 400GB/s bandwidth on the M1
Pro and M1 Max chips respectively.

Looking around quickly (lazy) for 'desktop' CPUs, I found that the Intel
Core i9-13900K has a max memory bandwidth is 89.6GB/s when using DDR5
5600MHz memory. That's nice that it beats Apple's slowest M1, but the
M1 is IIRC discontinued and replaced with the M2, which is 100GB/sec,
plus we'll need to go find specs for the M3 as well to fully geek out.

Basically, all Apple’s desktop machines now are just glorified laptops.

Where said 'glorified laptops' are posting pretty damn good performance numbers. Of course, Intel PC laptops also became 'good enough' desktop replacements over a decade ago for the general use case, which is why
laptops outsell desktops in the USA by roughly 4:1

<https://www.statista.com/statistics/670172/united-states-installed-base-desktops-laptops-tablets/>

-hh

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 16:06:29 -0500, -hh wrote:

On 2/29/24 12:44 AM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:> On Wed, 28 Feb 2024

21:21:52 -0500, -hh wrote:

probably similar to what they’ve done with the M1 & M2, including
the Pro/Max/Ultra architecture, where they can double them up to
build some monsters.

Unfortunately, not upgradeable ones.

True, one can't do brain salad surgery and replace CPUs...

But you expect to be able to upgrade things like RAM, or stick in a new graphics card, at least on a desktop machine.

And the trade-off of this are systems which because of their much higher degree of SoC integration can kick ass on things like how much data they
can internally push around.

Yes, we know all that. But there is still a need for workstation-class
machines that are adaptable to a range of workloads, like the old Mac Pro. Unfortunately Apple has effectively given up on that market.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2/29/2024 7:43 AM, RabidPedagog wrote:

Using the _stellar_ location features on the iPhone, I first found out
that the AirPods Pro were definitely in my house and its sensor helped
to pinpoint exactly where they were.

My wife dropped her iPhone in a Publix parking lot, or left it on top of
the car before driving away, and we were 10 minutes away when she
realized her phone was missing.

Did the "Find my IPhone" thing and it showed the device was in the grass
median of a big road we went down, just a few blocks from the Publix.
The graphic/map was very specific about where it was in the median, and
showed nearby businesses and a big church. We parked in the church
driveway, about 50 yards away from where it said the phone was, and I
went up and down the median twice, and suddenly spotted her phone laying
there in the grass, virtually exactly where the map showed! Ho Lee Fuk!
What a relief.

We still don't know if someone picked it up from the parking lot and
discarded it after realizing they couldn't hack into it, or if it
finally slid off the top of the car, hit the road and bounced up onto
the grass median.

Either way, it's a great feature, well implemented.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2024-02-29 1:26 p.m., rbowman wrote:

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 07:43:02 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:

I'm now looking at getting AirTags
for my car keys, wallet and suitcases in case something similar happens.

https://hackaday.com/tag/apple-airtag/

Happy hacking!

In the end, just about everything can be hacked. I've gotten to a point
where I refuse to stop myself from having a convenience because some
asshole somewhere might ruin it for me.

--
RabidPedagog
Catholic paleoconservative

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2024-02-29 4:35 p.m., DFS wrote:

On 2/29/2024 7:43 AM, RabidPedagog wrote:

Using the _stellar_ location features on the iPhone, I first found out
that the AirPods Pro were definitely in my house and its sensor helped
to pinpoint exactly where they were.

My wife dropped her iPhone in a Publix parking lot, or left it on top of
the car before driving away, and we were 10 minutes away when she
realized her phone was missing.

Did the "Find my IPhone" thing and it showed the device was in the grass median of a big road we went down, just a few blocks from the Publix.
The graphic/map was very specific about where it was in the median, and showed nearby businesses and a big church.  We parked in the church driveway, about 50 yards away from where it said the phone was, and I
went up and down the median twice, and suddenly spotted her phone laying there in the grass, virtually exactly where the map showed!  Ho Lee Fuk!
 What a relief.

We still don't know if someone picked it up from the parking lot and discarded it after realizing they couldn't hack into it, or if it
finally slid off the top of the car, hit the road and bounced up onto
the grass median.

Either way, it's a great feature, well implemented.

That's what I've noticed in using Apple's software: it's a bunch of
features that are all well implemented. Most people don't even realize
that they're there until they absolutely need them and once they do,
they're overjoyed that a company helped them out so effortlessly. It's
going to be _very_ difficult to stay in the PC camp despite the fact
that I invested so much into Windows-exclusive software and media.

--
RabidPedagog
Catholic paleoconservative

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote this copyrighted missive and expects royalties:

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 16:06:29 -0500, -hh wrote:

On 2/29/24 12:44 AM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:> On Wed, 28 Feb 2024

21:21:52 -0500, -hh wrote:

probably similar to what they’ve done with the M1 & M2, including
the Pro/Max/Ultra architecture, where they can double them up to
build some monsters.

Unfortunately, not upgradeable ones.

True, one can't do brain salad surgery and replace CPUs...

+1 for the "Brain Salad Surgery" reference.

--
Small things make base men proud.
-- William Shakespeare, "Henry VI"

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Feb 29, 2024 at 6:07:28 PM EST, "Chris Ahlstrom" <OFeem1987@teleworm.us> wrote:

Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote this copyrighted missive and expects royalties:

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 16:06:29 -0500, -hh wrote:

On 2/29/24 12:44 AM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:> On Wed, 28 Feb 2024

21:21:52 -0500, -hh wrote:

probably similar to what they’ve done with the M1 & M2, including
the Pro/Max/Ultra architecture, where they can double them up to
build some monsters.

Unfortunately, not upgradeable ones.

True, one can't do brain salad surgery and replace CPUs...

+1 for the "Brain Salad Surgery" reference.

Welcome back my friends, to the show that never ends...

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 16:06:29 -0500, -hh wrote:

True, one can't do brain salad surgery and replace CPUs, but for most
folk, that sort of DIY work died out after the 1990s, or 25+ years ago.

Yeah, well it was a couple of weeks ago when I slapped a core i5 processor
in my Dell box to replace the original Pentium. I also added a couple of sticks of DDR3 8GB RAM and a Crucial SATA SSD.

The hardest part was getting those damn tiny screws started to mount the
SSD in the 3.5 adapter.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 16:35:55 -0500, DFS wrote:

Either way, it's a great feature, well implemented.

But not really a recommendation for buying a macOS machine, is it?

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Feb 29, 2024 at 8:53:45 PM EST, "Lawrence D'Oliveiro" <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 16:35:55 -0500, DFS wrote:

Either way, it's a great feature, well implemented.

But not really a recommendation for buying a macOS machine, is it?

What makes you think you need a Mac for this? Another iPhone is all you need.
Do you think he was driving around with a Mac in his car?

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Fri, 01 Mar 2024 02:18:31 +0000, Tyrone wrote:

On Feb 29, 2024 at 8:53:45 PM EST, "Lawrence D'Oliveiro"
<ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 16:35:55 -0500, DFS wrote:

Either way, it's a great feature, well implemented.

But not really a recommendation for buying a macOS machine, is it?

What makes you think you need a Mac for this?

Because that is what the thread is about. It’s about Unix pioneer Ken Thompson giving up on Apple Macs in favour of a Linux machine.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Feb 29, 2024 at 10:14:40 PM EST, "Lawrence D'Oliveiro" <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

On Fri, 01 Mar 2024 02:18:31 +0000, Tyrone wrote:

On Feb 29, 2024 at 8:53:45 PM EST, "Lawrence D'Oliveiro"
<ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 16:35:55 -0500, DFS wrote:

Either way, it's a great feature, well implemented.

But not really a recommendation for buying a macOS machine, is it?

What makes you think you need a Mac for this?

Because that is what the thread is about. It’s about Unix pioneer Ken Thompson giving up on Apple Macs in favour of a Linux machine.

Which has nothing to do with finding iPhones.

There is this thing called thread drift. Next time, try to pay attention.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2/29/2024 8:53 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 16:35:55 -0500, DFS wrote:

Either way, it's a great feature, well implemented.

But not really a recommendation for buying a macOS machine, is it?

No, but that feature saved my wife's company probably $500.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Fri, 1 Mar 2024 13:23:51 -0500, DFS wrote:

On 2/29/2024 8:53 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

But not really a recommendation for buying a macOS machine, is it?

No, but that feature saved my wife's company probably $500.

You can see why Ken Thompson got disillusioned though, can’t you.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 3/2/2024 4:51 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

On Fri, 1 Mar 2024 13:23:51 -0500, DFS wrote:

On 2/29/2024 8:53 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

But not really a recommendation for buying a macOS machine, is it?

No, but that feature saved my wife's company probably $500.

You can see why Ken Thompson got disillusioned though, can’t you.

I cannot.

--------------------------------------------------------------------
"I have, for most of my life — because I was sort of born into it —
run Apple.

Now recently, meaning within the last five years, I've become more
and more depressed, and what Apple is doing to something that
should allow you to work is just atrocious. But they are taking a
lot of space and time to do it, so it's okay.

And I have come, within the last month or two, to say, even though
I've invested, you know, a zillion years in Apple — I'm throwing
it away. And I'm going to Linux. To Raspbian in particular."
--------------------------------------------------------------------


"...what Apple is doing to something that should allow you to work is
just atrocious"

huh? I have NO idea what that means. Apple hardware/software doesn't
allow him to work? He can run Linux on his Apple using Parallels vm.


And his claim that he was "born into Apple" is strange, since he was
most likely around 40 when he got his first bit of Apple hardware.
Maybe he means his first personal computer was an Apple?

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Sat, 2 Mar 2024 17:50:07 -0500, DFS wrote:

And his claim that he was "born into Apple" is strange, since he was
most likely around 40 when he got his first bit of Apple hardware. Maybe
he means his first personal computer was an Apple?

That's what I assumed. Even the most diehard people seldom had a PDP-11 in
the bedroom. The Apple II came out in '77 which would be about right for
the timing. Personally, I was working with the Z80 which channeled me into
the CP/M world rather than Apple's 6502.

I found the Raspian comment to be more interesting.

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/03/how-two-volunteers- built-the-raspberry-pis-operating-system/

I've thought about getting a Pi. It's a natural for a distributed
architecture where Arduinos are handling the low level tasks. The RPi pico
is also very interesting at the uC level.

https://www.raspberrypi.com/products/raspberry-pi-pico/

It can use MicroPython. I've been using CircuitPython, a derivative, with
one of the Adafruit offerings. However I have a Arduino Nano 33 BLE Sense
Rev2 sitting on the shelf and that can also use MicroPython after jumping through a few hoops.

But back to the original thread, did Thompson mean he is using a RPi? He's always been interested in space but I don't know about embedded. It's not
a stretch to say that running his 'Space Travel' game on Multics might be responsible for Unix.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 16:06:29 -0500, -hh wrote:

True, one can't do brain salad surgery and replace CPUs, but for most
folk, that sort of DIY work died out after the 1990s, or 25+ years ago.

Yeah, well it was a couple of weeks ago when I slapped a core i5 processor
in my Dell box to replace the original Pentium. I also added a couple of sticks of DDR3 8GB RAM and a Crucial SATA SSD.

A Pentium? They were in Intel’s product lineup for 30 years, so just how
old
was this machine?

The hardest part was getting those damn tiny screws started to mount the
SSD in the 3.5 adapter.

Well yeah, that’s an age factor as well: the screws aren’t getting smaller,
but we lose dexterity in fingertips as we age.

-hh

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

On Thu, 29 Feb 2024 16:06:29 -0500, -hh wrote:

On 2/29/24 12:44 AM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:> On Wed, 28 Feb 2024

21:21:52 -0500, -hh wrote:

probably similar to what they’ve done with the M1 & M2, including
the Pro/Max/Ultra architecture, where they can double them up to
build some monsters.

Unfortunately, not upgradeable ones.

True, one can't do brain salad surgery and replace CPUs...

But you expect to be able to upgrade things like RAM, or stick in a new graphics card, at least on a desktop machine.

For the small market share of surviving desktops.

Plus when one has wicked fast memory access & fast NVMe storage, the performance hit of using virtual memory due to inadequate RAM just isn’t
as painful as it was years ago.

And the trade-off of this are systems which because of their much higher
degree of SoC integration can kick ass on things like how much data they
can internally push around.

Yes, we know all that. But there is still a need for workstation-class machines that are adaptable to a range of workloads, like the old Mac Pro. Unfortunately Apple has effectively given up on that market.

So have a lot of the other traditional builders: try pricing out a serious
PC workstation and you’ll see that they’re not anywhere close to cheap anymore .. I think the last one I did was ~$4K.


-hh

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Sat, 2 Mar 2024 20:53:02 -0500, -hh wrote:

A Pentium? They were in Intel’s product lineup for 30 years, so just
how old was this machine?

About 10 years old. It started life as Windows 7 and quickly became
OpenSUSE 13.2. The processors are 4th gen with the Haswell architecture.

Well yeah, that’s an age factor as well: the screws aren’t getting smaller,
but we lose dexterity in fingertips as we age.

The eyes don't help either. Since December I've been through two cataract surgeries and a macular hole repair. Hopefully that's behind me but I'm
not planning to build boards with surface mount components not that I ever
did. I was out of hardware by the time that technology came it. Took all
the fun out of wire-wrapping a working Z80 computer on the kitchen table.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 3/2/2024 6:59 PM, rbowman wrote:

On Sat, 2 Mar 2024 17:50:07 -0500, DFS wrote:

And his claim that he was "born into Apple" is strange, since he was
most likely around 40 when he got his first bit of Apple hardware. Maybe
he means his first personal computer was an Apple?

That's what I assumed. Even the most diehard people seldom had a PDP-11 in the bedroom. The Apple II came out in '77 which would be about right for
the timing. Personally, I was working with the Z80 which channeled me into the CP/M world rather than Apple's 6502.

I found the Raspian comment to be more interesting.

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/03/how-two-volunteers- built-the-raspberry-pis-operating-system/

I've thought about getting a Pi. It's a natural for a distributed architecture where Arduinos are handling the low level tasks. The RPi pico
is also very interesting at the uC level.

https://www.raspberrypi.com/products/raspberry-pi-pico/

I've thought about getting one too, possibly to host a homegrown
security / camera monitoring system at my house.

It can use MicroPython. I've been using CircuitPython, a derivative, with one of the Adafruit offerings. However I have a Arduino Nano 33 BLE Sense Rev2 sitting on the shelf and that can also use MicroPython after jumping through a few hoops.

Damn. Is there any technology you haven't been involved with?

But back to the original thread, did Thompson mean he is using a RPi? He's always been interested in space but I don't know about embedded. It's not
a stretch to say that running his 'Space Travel' game on Multics might be responsible for Unix.

I doubt he uses a Raspberry Pi as his main system. Probably he's
trolling a little bit.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Sun, 3 Mar 2024 11:42:17 -0600, Physfitfreak wrote:

On 3/2/2024 10:06 PM, rbowman wrote:

Since December I've been through two cataract surgeries and a macular
hole repair.

Eat less frequently.

What does that have to do with anything?

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Sun, 3 Mar 2024 10:35:23 -0500, DFS wrote:

It can use MicroPython. I've been using CircuitPython, a derivative,
with one of the Adafruit offerings. However I have a Arduino Nano 33
BLE Sense Rev2 sitting on the shelf and that can also use MicroPython
after jumping through a few hoops.

Damn. Is there any technology you haven't been involved with?

I like playing around with microprocessors. That's pretty much where I
started but for the last 24 years I've been doing work that isn't hardware oriented. Now I'm down to about 10 hours a week and have more time to
play.

The MicroPython with the Rev2 board has some limitations. I'm getting
output from the accelerometer, gyroscope, magnetometer, temperature,
humidity, and pressure but not the ambient light, proximity sensor, pr microphone that I can get from C++.

The R-Pi pico and other boards that work with MicroPython don't have those sensors so it's lagging a bit. MicroPython is also behind regular Python
so it doesn't have the match case statement or the f"" string
interpolation format. Still, it's interesting. The Arduino MicroPython is
a little rough and I don't think the PlatformIO plugin for VS Code is
ready for prime time so I'll most likely go back to C++.

Thompson may be trolling but the Raspberry Pi 5 isn't a slouch.

https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/raspberry-pi-5

It's a Debian branch so if you want to try Linux on a ARM processor it's viable. There are some kits on Amazon for around $170 that have a case,
power supply, active cooling, and other trinkets or you can roll your own.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:

On Sat, 2 Mar 2024 20:53:02 -0500, -hh wrote:

A Pentium? They were in Intel’s product lineup for 30 years, so just
how old was this machine?

About 10 years old. It started life as Windows 7 and quickly became
OpenSUSE 13.2. The processors are 4th gen with the Haswell architecture.

Something I’ve read with chip transplants is that the motherboard may be
old enough to be a bottleneck that limits the new CPU; hopefully that’s not the case for you, or that there’s enough other benefits that still make it worthwhile.

Well yeah, that’s an age factor as well: the screws aren’t getting
smaller, but we lose dexterity in fingertips as we age.

The eyes don't help either. Since December I've been through two cataract surgeries and a macular hole repair.

I’m going to need cataract surgery soon; think I’m off to the Ophthalmologist later this week for a checkup and update.

Hopefully that's behind me but I'm
not planning to build boards with surface mount components not that I ever did. I was out of hardware by the time that technology came it. Took all
the fun out of wire-wrapping a working Z80 computer on the kitchen table.

It’s been over a decade since I was on the kitchen table with a soldering iron; that was for assembling the circuits for a (scuba) Nitrox oxygen
sensor kit for $150 instead of the $300 retail price they were going for
back then.

-hh

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Sun, 3 Mar 2024 15:07:54 -0500, -hh wrote:

Something I’ve read with chip transplants is that the motherboard may be old enough to be a bottleneck that limits the new CPU; hopefully that’s
not the case for you, or that there’s enough other benefits that still
make it worthwhile.

No, it's replacing a 2 core Pentium with a 4 core i5 that operated at the
same speed. It's not a fantastic upgrade but for $17 I figured why not.
There are hotter processors that would fit the LGA 1150 but it only has a
300w PS and I didn't want to push it. It has twice the cache and a little better GPU. It was sitting there using power so I figured I might as well spruce it up. It was about $100 for the SSD, RAM, and processor.

I’m going to need cataract surgery soon; think I’m off to the Ophthalmologist later this week for a checkup and update.

I put it off too long. The harder the cataract becomes the greater the
chance of complications but it went smoothly for me. The actual procedure
takes about 10 minutes and other than a regimen of eye drops you're good
to go.

The macular hole fix is more bothersome. The vitreous fluid is removed and
the eye inflated with sulfur hexafluoride to hold everything in place. For
two or three days after the surgery you maintain a face down posture,
staring at your toes and sleeping face down. The bubble is slowly replaced
with fluid. Right now it occupied about half of my visual field and being
a bubble it's bouncy which can be distracting.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Sun, 3 Mar 2024 13:29:22 -0600, Physfitfreak wrote:

On 3/3/2024 12:12 PM, rbowman wrote:

On Sun, 3 Mar 2024 11:42:17 -0600, Physfitfreak wrote:

On 3/2/2024 10:06 PM, rbowman wrote:

Since December I've been through two cataract surgeries and a macular
hole repair.

Eat less frequently.

What does that have to do with anything?

It has to do with health.

https://www.nei.nih.gov/learn-about-eye-health/eye-conditions-and- diseases/cataracts

Your risk for cataracts goes up as you get older. You’re also at higher
risk if you:

Have certain health problems, like diabetes
Smoke
Drink too much alcohol
Have a family history of cataracts
Have had an eye injury, eye surgery, or radiation treatment on your upper
body
Have spent a lot of time in the sun
Take steroids — medicines used to treat some health problems, like
arthritis or allergies

I do not have diabetes and I neither smoke or drink alcohol. Guilty of spending a lot of time in the sun, often at high altitudes. I got better
about eye protection with age but the process may have been in motion by
them.

The eye surgery I had 7 years ago is known to hasten the formation of cataracts.

My BMI is within the normal weight range although being a Neanderthal it
is toward the high end rather than down with the gracile little ectomorphs
that make up your Modern Men.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Sun, 3 Mar 2024 23:42:41 -0600, Physfitfreak wrote:

My frequency of eating is 1/8th of how frequent you guys eat. The amount
of food I take in is about 1/4th of what you eat in 48 hours. So I'm
eating 1/4th of the carcinogens that you're putting in your bodies. And that's just for carcinogens. There are all sorts of other benefits also.

You have no idea how or what I eat.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)