"Trevor" wrote in message
...

"Marc Wielage" wrote in message
.com...
I do think it's problematic to use *any* operating system beyond 7-8
years,
because eventually, you're kind of on an isolated island where you're
unable
to upgrade and it gets harder and harder to get support. And when
mission-critical outboard peripherals fail, you eventually get forced
into
upgrading both hardware and OS.

Well XP is a lot older than that and still fine for most purposes, and
still used by a lot of people. Most people simply upgrade the OS when they
buy a new computer, you won't find a new one with XP on it any more even
if you wanted it. And you probably won't find al the necessary drivers if
you did want to downgrade.
Most people don't necessarily need to race out and upgrade their existing
Windows 7 computers to Windows 8 though.

Trevor.



Windows 7 outsells Windows 8 anyway, since business operations are heavily
invested in Windows and sees no reason to try to pretend that their
applications need to run on smartphones.

On Wed, 18 Dec 2013 03:00:45 -0800, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

"josephkk" wrote in message
.. .

Linux support does seem to expect some contribution to the
solution from the user, unlike the MS world where they cannot
trust the user to plug in the stuff.

Shouldn't /any/ device simply plug in and work, regardless of the expertise of
the user? The computer industry has a long way to go on this.

Not in the real world (this is _almost_ too harsh). No matter how you
slice it someone has to do the work to make it work, and "seamlessly"
could limit you to one or no provider.


More a different world view than a comparable situation.
Such is FOSS vs M$ viewpoint.

What's wrong with making money? Profit should be a strong spur to producing
the best-possible product. Of course, that assumes you /want/ to produce the
best-possible product.

There is nothing wrong with creating useful products nor profiting from
it. MS, like all large corporations, has no interest in producing "best"
anything, just an acceptable thing. Mediocraty reigns in the commercial
world more than the FOSS world by a little bit.

On Wed, 18 Dec 2013 06:58:24 -0800, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message ...

I used to use Partition Manager.

Whoops. Partition Magic.

And so totally cannot handle non-MS partition types. Assuming you are
talking about the pay ware product. The FOSS tools handle many more
partition types. Chose anything YOU want.

?-)

On Tue, 17 Dec 2013 23:59:10 -0500, Nil
wrote:

On 17 Dec 2013, "Trevor" wrote in rec.audio.pro:

Me too as a simple photo viewer, hardly the same thing though.
And was Irfanview originally ported from Linux to Windows, or vice
versa?

Irfanview is only a Windows program. There is no native Linux port.

That is what the real home page says. Surprised me. It works really well
in wine. Not as powerful as Image magic let alone GIMP, but much easier
to use. The normal tradeoff.

?-)

On Wed, 18 Dec 2013 06:20:26 -0800, dave wrote:

On 12/18/2013 03:07 AM, William Sommerwerck wrote:


By the way, I misstated. Microsoft did not require computer makers to
put DOS on all their machines. Rather, they had to pay the licensing fee
for every machine, whether or not it had DOS on it.

Let's not forget that Apple has a monopoly on its hardware and OS.

Apple is a closed garden, complete with fashion police, and a dress
code. They can have their little party. Android is taking over.

I wouldn't be too sure about that with all the security disasters they
have been having. Then again MS seems to have to survived them.

?-)

On Thu, 19 Dec 2013 00:32:32 -0800, Marc Wielage
wrote:

On Wed, 18 Dec 2013 03:07:41 -0800, William Sommerwerck wrote
(in article ):

Let's not forget that Apple has a monopoly on its hardware and OS.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

You ever see the Windows Phone, the Surface, or the Surface Pro?

Microsoft has stated in the last year that they're beginning to realize the
value of controlling both the hardware and the operating system, because then
they can tailor each in such a way as to optimize it in every possible way
without regard to weird, off-brand hardware using dodgy components.

An old pal of mine has told me for years that the main computers Microsoft
does use to fine-tune Windows are Dell models. I would consider those the de
facto models to get, almost the "IBM" of today. I never had a problem with
any of the Dells we've bought over the years.

I do think it's problematic to use *any* operating system beyond 7-8 years,
because eventually, you're kind of on an isolated island where you're unable
to upgrade and it gets harder and harder to get support. And when
mission-critical outboard peripherals fail, you eventually get forced into
upgrading both hardware and OS.

--MFW

In average business/office or home use that can work; in industrial land
20+ year life times are expected and often required. ISA machines are
still available to support that market.

?-)

"josephkk" wrote in message
...

Microsoft, like all large corporations, has no interest in producing
"best" anything, just an acceptable thing.

I beg to differ... Pioneer plasma. Nikon & Canon cameras. HP
just-about-anything (but calculators in particular). The SX-70.

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"josephkk" wrote in message
.. .

Microsoft, like all large corporations, has no interest in producing
"best" anything, just an acceptable thing.

I beg to differ... Pioneer plasma. Nikon & Canon cameras. HP
just-about-anything (but calculators in particular). The SX-70.

I'd definitely agree that the Nikon and Canon products had a lot of
corner-cutting going on... they were designed at a price point for a
market.

HP is weird, though. HP was a large corporation that didn't act so much
like a large corporation, because even when it was public it was still
managed basically as a private operation by actual engineers who made
products for other engineers. HP is very much the exception to the rule,
or at least it was until Carly wrecked it.

Polaroid is another one of those oddities, a company actually driven by
engineering. Unfortunately a side-effect of that was making a lot of
ingenious and amazing products that nobody wanted, like Polavision.
The SX-70 was interesting too; in terms of image quality it was a step
down from the older 2-part pack technology, but Polaroid found out what
the market really wanted and made it for them and if it wasn't necessarily
the best image quality that was fine.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

josephkk wrote:
On Wed, 18 Dec 2013 03:00:45 -0800, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

"josephkk" wrote in message
...

Linux support does seem to expect some contribution to the
solution from the user, unlike the MS world where they cannot
trust the user to plug in the stuff.

Shouldn't /any/ device simply plug in and work, regardless of the expertise of
the user? The computer industry has a long way to go on this.

Not in the real world (this is _almost_ too harsh). No matter how you
slice it someone has to do the work to make it work, and "seamlessly"
could limit you to one or no provider.


If you plug a USB memory stick into just about any
computer, it'll figure out what to do with it.

So no - this doesn't limit you to just one vendor.



More a different world view than a comparable situation.
Such is FOSS vs M$ viewpoint.

What's wrong with making money? Profit should be a strong spur to producing
the best-possible product. Of course, that assumes you /want/ to produce the
best-possible product.

There is nothing wrong with creating useful products nor profiting from
it. MS, like all large corporations, has no interest in producing "best"
anything, just an acceptable thing.


There are different kinds of companies. Some produce "bests"; some are
aggregators. M$ is an aggregator. Microsoft "impedance matched"
large-box retail better.

Things are also path-dependent. Because Microsoft did things a certain
way, they ended up being an early platform for audio software. So - in
a way - that's a "best".

There is come conceptual "shear" between "best" and "quality". Apple
played the "quality" game and didn't do as well until the iWhatever in
mass consumer space, but won in pro graphics and pro audio ( because
ProTools ).

But of you want diamond-like precision, SFAIK the answer is still RADAR,
and it's anything but mass market.

Mediocraty reigns in the commercial
world more than the FOSS world by a little bit.


FOSS culturally redesigned itself as a heresy against Microsoft.
That was largely a mistake.

--
Les Cargill

"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message ...
William Sommerwerck wrote:
"josephkk" wrote in message
.. .

Microsoft, like all large corporations, has no interest in producing
"best" anything, just an acceptable thing.

I beg to differ... Pioneer plasma. Nikon & Canon cameras. HP
just-about-anything (but calculators in particular). The SX-70.

I'd definitely agree that the Nikon and Canon products had a lot of
corner-cutting going on... they were designed at a price point for a
market.

Not their "best" products. They're better than "acceptable".


HP is weird, though. HP was a large corporation that didn't act so much
like a large corporation, because even when it was public it was still
managed basically as a private operation by actual engineers who made
products for other engineers. HP is very much the exception to the rule,
or at least it was until Carly wrecked it.

I was thinking more of their consumer products. Their current calculators --
mostly designed in Australia -- are high in features and low in elegance.


Polaroid is another one of those oddities, a company actually driven by
engineering. Unfortunately a side-effect of that was making a lot of
ingenious and amazing products that nobody wanted, like Polavision.

The company was driven by Dr Land's vision, which had no regard whatever for
what people might or might not want. Polavision was his one error, and it cost
him his position at the company. Up to then, everything was a success -- and
Polaroid had spent not one penny on market research.


The SX-70 was interesting too; in terms of image quality it was a step
down from the older 2-part pack technology...

Yes, but...

The SX-70 was Land's -- not the market's -- idea of what an ideal camera
should be. As a piece of engineering, it remains startling, much more than
"acceptable".

PS: You said nothing about Pioneer plasma.

On Sun, 22 Dec 2013 11:37:40 -0600, Les Cargill
wrote:


But of you want diamond-like precision, SFAIK the answer is still RADAR,
and it's anything but mass market.

What is RADAR and what does it do?

Mediocraty reigns in the commercial
world more than the FOSS world by a little bit.


FOSS culturally redesigned itself as a heresy against Microsoft.
That was largely a mistake.

I must, to my distaste, agree here.

--
Les Cargill

On 31/12/2013 10:06, josephkk wrote:
On Sun, 22 Dec 2013 11:37:40 -0600, Les Cargill
wrote:


But of you want diamond-like precision, SFAIK the answer is still RADAR,
and it's anything but mass market.

What is RADAR and what does it do?

It's a standalone digital sound recorder and editor. It does exactly
what it says on the box no more, no less.

http://tapeop.com/reviews/gear/56/radar-24-radar-v/


--
Tciao for Now!

John.

josephkk wrote:
On Sun, 22 Dec 2013 11:37:40 -0600, Les Cargill
wrote:


But of you want diamond-like precision, SFAIK the answer is still RADAR,=
=20
and it's anything but mass market.

What is RADAR and what does it do?

It's a digital audio workstation that is designed like a tape machine. It
was designed by people who understood the studio workflow and did not want
to alter it, just to make it faster.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."