Why do you still use Windows XP?

On Thu, 16 Feb 2012 22:53:51 -0700, "Bill in Co"
wrote:

Char Jackson wrote:
On Thu, 16 Feb 2012 17:18:58 -0700, "Bill in Co"
wrote:

Char Jackson wrote:
On Thu, 16 Feb 2012 14:11:27 -0600, wrote:

On Thu, 16 Feb 2012 05:38:21 -0600, "BillW50" wrote:


You did a great job of comparing the versions of Windows.
3.1 sucked, 95 needed help, but 98 was and still is the best.

I guess we all have opinions, and it's no surprise that they differ. I
would say 98 was the best for a very short time, only until 98SE
became available. After that, 98SE was only best until 2000 became
available. Then XP became the best, and now 7 is the best. IMHO, WinME
and Vista never carried the crown, but it seems completely whack to
claim that an OS that was long ago obsolete was and is best. I guess
there's no single definition for 'best'.

Why is "7" the best? What does it offer over XP (besides extra bloat)
for
a seasoned veteran?

I find it interesting that you would put bloat into the "what does it
offer" category, as if that was an advantage.

No, I agree it's a distinctive DISADVANTAGE. But taking it literally, it
does "offer" that, but it's an "offer" I sure have no interest in. :-)

It's hard to say definitively whether it's more bloated or not, though.

I don't see how it's so hard. It IS (as are each of the succeeding OS's).

It's hard because the two things being compared aren't exactly the
same. There's no disagreement that 7 has a larger disk and memory
footprint, for example, but how much of that is because of new
functionality, more security, or whatever? It's hard to say, so a
comparison of respective bloat is equally hard. I certainly can't do
it.

Char Jackson wrote:
On Thu, 16 Feb 2012 22:53:51 -0700, "Bill in Co"
wrote:

Char Jackson wrote:
On Thu, 16 Feb 2012 17:18:58 -0700, "Bill in Co"
wrote:

Char Jackson wrote:
On Thu, 16 Feb 2012 14:11:27 -0600, wrote:

On Thu, 16 Feb 2012 05:38:21 -0600, "BillW50"
wrote:


You did a great job of comparing the versions of Windows.
3.1 sucked, 95 needed help, but 98 was and still is the best.

I guess we all have opinions, and it's no surprise that they differ. I
would say 98 was the best for a very short time, only until 98SE
became available. After that, 98SE was only best until 2000 became
available. Then XP became the best, and now 7 is the best. IMHO, WinME
and Vista never carried the crown, but it seems completely whack to
claim that an OS that was long ago obsolete was and is best. I guess
there's no single definition for 'best'.

Why is "7" the best? What does it offer over XP (besides extra
bloat)
for
a seasoned veteran?

I find it interesting that you would put bloat into the "what does it
offer" category, as if that was an advantage.

No, I agree it's a distinctive DISADVANTAGE. But taking it literally,
it
does "offer" that, but it's an "offer" I sure have no interest in. :-)

It's hard to say definitively whether it's more bloated or not, though.

I don't see how it's so hard. It IS (as are each of the succeeding
OS's).

It's hard because the two things being compared aren't exactly the
same. There's no disagreement that 7 has a larger disk and memory
footprint, for example, but how much of that is because of new
functionality, more security, or whatever? It's hard to say, so a
comparison of respective bloat is equally hard. I certainly can't do
it.

Well, but the point is, does it really matter what specifically it is
attributed to?
The bottom line is: it is "bloat". An OS is supposed to be just that: an
*operating system*, and that's all. Whiz bang effects, or eye candy, or a
so called "Media Center", don't count. :-) Just like XP was more bloated
(as an OS) than W98 was, and W98 is compared to W95, and, even more
dramatically, W95 is to Win 3.1. And finally, DOS. :-) And again, look
at their respective footprints (both in disk space AND resident memory
requirements. And what the extra bloat or fluff is attributed to is, (to
me), irrelevant, in this context.

"Bill in Co" wrote in
m:

Actually, there is no relationship between the amount of RAM installed
and that lousy system resource problem (64K heaps are insignificant in
terms of size). IOW, I don't care if you've got 500 MB or 1 GB of RAM
or whatever: it doesn't help that system resource limitation, which is
ever and always present, and can't ever be eliminated. There is no
relationship between the amount of RAM you've installed, and the system
resource problem. And you should know that.


W9X can support up to 32768 window handles. There are other limits (numbers
of 'device contexts' for drawing operations, etc, but unless I get deeper
into the API and C coding I'll likely not know what they all are.

Before anyone says that NT kernel OS's are 'better', the problem is the same:
waste of available capacity. If programs waste resources by displaying too
many tiny controls at once, spawning them in unconstrained loops, or even
just not letting them go when they've finished with them, the resources get
used up. Bad code is a problem for both types of Windows, good code is a
problem for neither.

Char Jackson wrote in
:

On Thu, 16 Feb 2012 22:33:35 -0600, Lostgallifreyan
wrote:

Char Jackson wrote in
m:

You haven't kept up with what's available in the last 5-8 years or so.
NAT is a breeze to set up now, not like it was 15 years ago. Any kid
can do it. Heck, most of my customers are adults, many of them senior,
and they can do it.



Got a Linksys thinger (wireless access point, but it can do other stuff
too), and NAT in the BT hub. Both recent devices. I still like LnS
better.

If by LnS you mean this place, http://www.looknstop.com, then I'll
pass. The vague marketing claims disguised as "features", the lack of
technical details, the broken English, and just the fact that it runs
on the host you're trying to protect all lead me to the same
conclusion: no thanks. If you mean something else, let me know and
I'll be glad to take a look.



You know I meant that one, you just want to kick it, for whatever reason. The
guy's french, give him a break. Unlike the usual firewall firms, there's a
lot of open exhange about how it works and what it can do, on the Wilder's
security forums. The whole point of a single PC firewall is that it IS
supposed to run on its host. This isn't a weakness. You could always run it
on a 486 as a dedicated firewall if you wanted. Even OpenBSD is run this way
for its pf (packet filter) firewall in many cases, and if the method is good
enough for them it should be good enough for anyone. Also, as LnS is very
good for stopping internal attempts to go online, what would be the point of
expecting it to run on anything BUT the host? Chose targets carefully when
kicking, or eventually you just hurt your foot. You evidently want to appear
strong and sane in your closures of argument, but right there you picked a
silly stance to take. If you don't like LnS, no-one's forcing you to do
anything but choose what you want, but as far as I can see, your choices will
be limited, and likely unwise.

Char Jackson wrote in
:

On Thu, 16 Feb 2012 22:15:03 -0600, Lostgallifreyan
wrote:

Char Jackson wrote in
m:

That little word "if" is the key. The vast majority of computer users
don't want or care about any APIs. APIs are used by developers, not by
end users.

Actually, they just don't know they want it. If it vanished, they'd soon
be asking why all the things they took for granted vanished like bad
metaphysics.

I repeat, end users don't care one bit about APIs. They don't use
them, don't know what they are, and don't care if they come or go. If
the Windows APIs vanished, (why should they?), there wouldn't be a
whole lot of new software, but end users wouldn't make the connection
between that and a missing API.



You love an argument, don't you? If they don't care enough to to at least
know there IS some deep structure that gives them all those little controls
they need to get stuff done, that doesn't make me 'wrong'. It just makes them
'stupid'. Now why would you want to side with that mentality? Are you busy
making money out of it and trying to justify yourself?

Bill in Co wrote:

I found 512 MB of RAM more than sufficient for everything
(in Win98SE). Granted, I wasn't running 10 apps at once,
however. But who would?? Especially with that darn system
resource heap problem, which could often turn up at the most
unexpected moments.

Bill, you and I have discussed these win-98 heap issues several times in
the past.

Here is how I answered you back in May 2011:

=================

Bill in Co wrote:

You mean like running out of resources due to the 64K heaps? :-)

The 32-bit User Window, User Menu, and User GDI heaps are 2 mb each, not
64 kb. It's only the 16-bit User heap and 16-bit GDI heaps that are 64
kb.

The fact that you continuously refer to these heaps as a bottleneck
indicates that your experience with Win-98 is probably with older
software that made more use of 16-bit code which might have been more
common 10 years ago. Or your experience is based on "buggy" software
circa 10 years ago (that maybe you still use) that suffers from GDI
leaks.

"Bill in Co" wrote in
m:

Well, but the point is, does it really matter what specifically it is
attributed to?
The bottom line is: it is "bloat". An OS is supposed to be just that:
an *operating system*, and that's all. Whiz bang effects, or eye
candy, or a so called "Media Center", don't count. :-) Just like XP
was more bloated (as an OS) than W98 was, and W98 is compared to W95,
and, even more dramatically, W95 is to Win 3.1. And finally, DOS. :-)
And again, look at their respective footprints (both in disk space AND
resident memory requirements. And what the extra bloat or fluff is
attributed to is, (to me), irrelevant, in this context.


Even when all the redundant file caches are discounted, and all the
wallpapers or other flimflammery, there is extra bloat. And it does all come
back to the increasing distance too many people put between themsleves and
the API. I know what Mister Jackson thinks about this but I disagree with it.
I'm NOT denying that it is happening, we KNOW it's happening, but that
doesn't make it any more 'right' that breeding a nation of kiddies who think
milk grows in little polymer-lined cardboard boxes.

The more people take leave of the basic realites that support their
existence, the weaker and more bloated they grow. It's a basic fact of life
that should not be ignored, and people should not be encouraged in that
ignorance unless they want other people to wonder about their motives in
doing so. You can;t help people be as free as you want to be if you're
willing to keep them fat and stupid in their gilded cages.

OS's will not start shrinking until SOMETHING puts that right. To some extent
the deman, the raw need, for mobility, is forcing this to happen in the shape
of ARM chips, and RISC coding for them, to fit phones and PDA's but they
still use exactly the same type of API as a desktop machine, near as damnit,
and people should NOT be encouraged to remain ignorant just because it suits
a marketeering mindset. Those people ARE the market, and should be treated
with more respect. Fortunately these new devices are being introduced into
school teaching, so maybe the current bloated classes will be seen as a 'lost
generation' eventually, and rightly so.

On Fri, 17 Feb 2012 07:26:53 -0600, Lostgallifreyan
wrote:

You love an argument, don't you? If they don't care enough to to at least
know there IS some deep structure that gives them all those little controls
they need to get stuff done, that doesn't make me 'wrong'. It just makes them
'stupid'. Now why would you want to side with that mentality? Are you busy
making money out of it and trying to justify yourself?

So 99.9999999999999999999999999999999% of computer users are stupid,
by your standard? I call that stupid, and I call you wrong.

(I'm being generous there with the percentage. It's probably even
closer to 100% than that.)

Not knowing how something works doesn't make a person stupid. The word
you might be looking for is ignorant, but that's not a serious
liability, either, when your goal is to be a user. Fortunately, you
usually don't have to know how something works in order to use it.

Char Jackson wrote in
:

Not knowing how something works doesn't make a person stupid. The word
you might be looking for is ignorant, but that's not a serious
liability, either, when your goal is to be a user. Fortunately, you
usually don't have to know how something works in order to use it.


True, and that was always why I wanted something like wxLua instead of C,
until I learned than I was a victim of my own desires. I don't care that it
is hard to adapt to the underlying reality, the problems arise because people
won't! There are limits to how often people can pass the buck for the results
of their own (often indolent) decisions.

Case in point:

An example of the detachment with the API or other core details in computers:
http://home.roadrunner.com/~jgglatt/tech/lowmidi.htm
Search on that page for this bit... "Warning: There are some badly written
drivers out there, especially for Windows NT/2000/XP."

What's happened is laziness. It's all well-hidden, or course, in words like
'productivity', 'leverage' and 'solutions', but it is laziness, coders
wanting fast cheap ways to do more, faster, without having to do it
themselves. It appears to work, until it STOPS working, at which point few if
any are willing to fix it, so they reach for other workrounds, bigger newer
systems that promise to bypass the breakages in the old, and it all spirals
out like the growing of a rolling snowball that eventually falls apart under
its own weight.

The right way to handle this is to cut to the chase, go to the core, and
start over. This is not an admission of defeat, but the opposite. It's the
only way a coder can take much pride in their work these days. It's not as if
I found this lesson easy to learn, it took me years to accept C coding
instead of trying to find other ways. Maybe it's bad education, or propretary
pushing that has led people into bloat, but whatever it is, the balance is
missing. That's undeniable given increasing OS sizes, but I thought it was
interesting to explore why it's happening.

People need to be careful what they wish for. Ask too much, and they GET too
much. And it's no use complaining. Better to figure out what's important and
ask less. People can't do that if they are 'encouraged' to remain ignorant.

On Fri, 17 Feb 2012 07:40:49 -0600, Lostgallifreyan
wrote:

Even when all the redundant file caches are discounted, and all the
wallpapers or other flimflammery, there is extra bloat. And it does all come
back to the increasing distance too many people put between themsleves and
the API. I know what Mister Jackson thinks about this but I disagree with it.
I'm NOT denying that it is happening, we KNOW it's happening, but that
doesn't make it any more 'right' that breeding a nation of kiddies who think
milk grows in little polymer-lined cardboard boxes.

The more people take leave of the basic realites that support their
existence, the weaker and more bloated they grow. It's a basic fact of life
that should not be ignored, and people should not be encouraged in that
ignorance unless they want other people to wonder about their motives in
doing so. You can;t help people be as free as you want to be if you're
willing to keep them fat and stupid in their gilded cages.

OS's will not start shrinking until SOMETHING puts that right. To some extent
the deman, the raw need, for mobility, is forcing this to happen in the shape
of ARM chips, and RISC coding for them, to fit phones and PDA's but they
still use exactly the same type of API as a desktop machine, near as damnit,
and people should NOT be encouraged to remain ignorant just because it suits
a marketeering mindset. Those people ARE the market, and should be treated
with more respect. Fortunately these new devices are being introduced into
school teaching, so maybe the current bloated classes will be seen as a 'lost
generation' eventually, and rightly so.

Have you seen that new TV show called Doomsday Preppers? You sound
like one of the folks on that show. I'm sure they don't see themselves
as kooky, but they sure look strange from the outside looking in.

You seem stuck in a time long past, when things were smaller, leaner,
simpler. Well guess what, time marches on, and it looks like it's left
you far behind. You seem to be ok with that, so who am I to argue?