Working with useful computers (was: What's your specialty?)

From: Mike <dogas_at_bellsouth.net>
Date: Thu Feb 7 11:14:17 2002

From: R. D. Davis <rdd_at_rddavis.org>

> employer requiring one to work with those confounded annoyances called
> Micro$oft products?

These comments always make me chukkle. OK, always been the programmer and
never been network support but... I've had wonderful fun with MS BASIC on
many of my classic computers. Hey, PEEK, POKE, USR, and you're in *there*.
And later on PCs, function calls into MS's DOSes, the 3.1 SDK, Win32,
DirectX, and class calls into MFC, have always been a blast to play with
giving easy access to a machine that can be configured, as younger Carl
Sagan would say, in "hundreds and hundreds" of ways. Programming earliy
on on the PC, I felt that if I didn't hose the machine with some strange
code at least once a day, I wasn't working hard enough. These days my
nondescript underfed NT4.0 box chuggs away for a long time under
programming, server, and internet browsing loads. I, for one, thank you
Bill Gates!

Meanwhile. In a current thread nearby, I hear alot about the Apple OSes not
running very well just on Apple's own hardware.. Hey, only after the
Woz! ;)

> To get this message back on topic: How many here still work, for an
> income, with the types of vintage systems they collect?

Me, but I wouldn't call it income... But I do make a necessary 'lessened
outcome' by trickle selling some classic systems on ebay these days as
dogas. Hard work and fun. I add value by combining accumulated finds and
(try to) offer more fleshed out, ready to run old systems. I've got some
upside control for buyers getting a little silly by being able to usually
sweeten the deal with more hardware or software. My 'customers' seem very
happy to have their old (or a new) toy with no more effort than winning an
auction and making a purchase.

;)
- Mike: dogas_at_bellsouth.net
Received on Thu Feb 07 2002 - 11:14:17 GMT