> From: Bill Pechter <pechter_at_pechter.dyndns.org>
>
>
> >You're in good company:
>
>
> Keep in mind I had little touch with leadign edge tech back
> in 70/71 when I made my school choices. I was fixing tube
> based equippment mostly and an IC was rather crude stuff.
>
> >"There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in their
> >home."
> > -- Ken Olson, President of DEC, World Future Society
> > Convention, 1977
>
>
> In one sense he was right but the desktop and killer apps
> like spreadsheets and user friendly databases were phase
> one and new. It took more than that to get the kitchen
> computer real. The internet or more correctly the ubiqious
> communications it represents was phase two.
>
Well, I think he was figuring the killer app was a smart terminal device
(PDT or better with small local hard disk) and a fast network connection
to a timesharing operation (kind of like a cross between Compuserve
and a kind of Network Utility Company which would maintain the storage
and apps, fix bugs and supply you with a service.
This would keep Joe User from having to become their own System
Admin/System Manager/Development Programmer/Hardware Support Tech.
I think the Oracle Network Computer venture and NetAppliance was close
to what Ken Olson would've envisioned. ('Course it would've been Vax
Clusters on the server end...)
>
> > difference -- the beauty of UNIX is it's simple; and the beauty of VMS
> > is that it's all there.
> > -- Ken Olsen, president of DEC, DECWORLD Vol. 8 No. 5, 1984
> >
>
>
> Around the same time I got a Unix the unsystem teeshirt. UNIX in
> a no symbol (red slashed circle). By time it was getting somewhat
> worn AT&T made unix a DOD standard and Ultrix was hot soon after.
Kool... wish It was scanned somewhere... The color printer here could
do a pretty good iron-on xfer 8-).
Bill
>
>
> Allison
>
>
>
--
bpechter_at_monmouth.com | Microsoft: Where do you want to go today?
| Linux: Where do you want to go tomorrow?
| BSD: Are you guys coming, or what?
Received on Tue Sep 26 2000 - 09:05:55 BST