mjmooney Posted July 2, 2018 Author VT Supporter Share Posted July 2, 2018 One thing that used to strike me about I.T. was that very often jobs that the end user thought would be easy, weren't. And vice versa. They'd come along and say "Look, could you just quickly make this little change..." and it would be something horrendous. Or, "Look, sorry, I know this is a big ask, but do you think it would even be possible to..." At which I would suck my teeth, shake my head slowly, and say "Weeeelll, I'll try, but it could take a while...", knowing full well it was a five minute job, and I could put my feet up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BOF Posted July 2, 2018 Moderator Share Posted July 2, 2018 12 minutes ago, mjmooney said: One thing that used to strike me about I.T. was that very often jobs that the end user thought would be easy, weren't. And vice versa. They'd come along and say "Look, could you just quickly make this little change..." and it would be something horrendous. Or, "Look, sorry, I know this is a big ask, but do you think it would even be possible to..." At which I would suck my teeth, shake my head slowly, and say "Weeeelll, I'll try, but it could take a while...", knowing full well it was a five minute job, and I could put my feet up. I went to add a feature to a program the other day. Turns out I already added it. 12 years ago. I just never turned it on. Bloody genius though, future-proofing for myself way back 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted July 2, 2018 Share Posted July 2, 2018 5 minutes ago, mjmooney said: One thing that used to strike me about I.T. was that very often jobs that the end user thought would be easy, weren't. And vice versa. They'd come along and say "Look, could you just quickly make this little change..." and it would be something horrendous. Or, "Look, sorry, I know this is a big ask, but do you think it would even be possible to..." At which I would suck my teeth, shake my head slowly, and say "Weeeelll, I'll try, but it could take a while...", knowing full well it was a five minute job, and I could put my feet up. I still get a chuckle to this day when I remember how I was at a customer site and just installed a shiny new laser printer for them , the end user was all excited and came out to load the paper tray with A4 sheets of coloured paper , and I politely informed them they couldn't put colour paper in it as it was a black and white printer .. they looked quite distraught as they'd told me they'd bought reams and reams of colour paper and it wasn't cheap 30 years on and I still find a lot of people are still naive when it comes to technology ... though tbf I'm crap with anything mechanical and would probably believe a mechanic telling me my rocket sproggle had gone on my car and i needed a new one 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BOF Posted July 2, 2018 Moderator Share Posted July 2, 2018 14 minutes ago, tonyh29 said: would probably believe a mechanic telling me my rocket sproggle had gone on my car and i needed a new one They do go every 10,000km or so. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lapal_fan Posted July 3, 2018 Share Posted July 3, 2018 17 hours ago, BOF said: I went to add a feature to a program the other day. Turns out I already added it. 12 years ago. I just never turned it on. Bloody genius though, future-proofing for myself way back I'm disgusted that you still use anything which is 12 years old and related to I.T. GET WITH THE TIMES GRANDAD! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjmooney Posted July 3, 2018 Author VT Supporter Share Posted July 3, 2018 Legacy code. It'll outlive me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BOF Posted July 3, 2018 Moderator Share Posted July 3, 2018 40 minutes ago, lapal_fan said: I'm disgusted that you still use anything which is 12 years old and related to I.T. GET WITH THE TIMES GRANDAD! Code is code. The platform has changed *gone from UNIX to Linux. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lapal_fan Posted July 3, 2018 Share Posted July 3, 2018 5 minutes ago, BOF said: Code is code. The platform has changed *gone from UNIX to Linux. pfft. get a smartphone, they do everything. or a tablet. I can snapchat/whatsapp/tweet and throw out crazee youtube videos to all my lapalfanS out there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
il_serpente Posted July 3, 2018 VT Supporter Share Posted July 3, 2018 Probably not the right thread for this, but it's related to the last few posts. How many of you who deal with IT ever had to program using punch cards? My first and only computer science class required this. My first use of a keyboard/CRT interface was on a Commodore Pet with a whopping 4KB of memory and a casette tape recorder. Lapal_fan would have to make his crazee youtube videos in 8-bit and they'd be only a few frames long. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted July 3, 2018 Share Posted July 3, 2018 1 minute ago, il_serpente said: Probably not the right thread for this, but it's related to the last few posts. How many of you who deal with IT ever had to program using punch cards? My first and only computer science class required this. My first use of a keyboard/CRT interface was on a Commodore Pet with a whopping 4KB of memory and a casette tape recorder. Lapal_fan would have to make his crazee youtube videos in 8-bit and they'd be only a few frames long. No. You're beyond old. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
il_serpente Posted July 3, 2018 VT Supporter Share Posted July 3, 2018 (edited) 5 minutes ago, snowychap said: No. You're beyond old. Ha. Joke's on you. You've never gotten to experience the sense of giddy anticipation after the card reader has sucked in all the cards (thwump! thwump! thwump!thwump! thwump! thwump! thwump!) and you wait for the sys admin to slide the printout into your slot, or the horror when they tell you they've had to terminate your job because of an infinite loop and you find you've used your entire semester's CPU budget on one job that accomplished nothing. Edited July 3, 2018 by il_serpente grammar, because anal 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjmooney Posted July 4, 2018 Author VT Supporter Share Posted July 4, 2018 7 hours ago, il_serpente said: Probably not the right thread for this, but it's related to the last few posts. How many of you who deal with IT ever had to program using punch cards? My first and only computer science class required this. My first use of a keyboard/CRT interface was on a Commodore Pet with a whopping 4KB of memory and a casette tape recorder. Lapal_fan would have to make his crazee youtube videos in 8-bit and they'd be only a few frames long. Me. Obviously. We had manual card punch machines, too. Only used the cards for programs' runtime parameters, though. Actual data was held on magnetic tape or (sophisticated, this) hard discs - disc drives the size of washing machines. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seat68 Posted July 4, 2018 Share Posted July 4, 2018 I worked at the inland revenue in Telford as was and not punch cards but only one generation away. Mag tape and green screens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tegis Posted July 4, 2018 VT Supporter Share Posted July 4, 2018 44 minutes ago, mjmooney said: Actual data was held on magnetic tape or (sophisticated, this) hard discs - disc drives the size of washing machines. The old mans job at the Swedish tax-agency I got to work/play around those. Awesome things and put me on a IT track. 200 megabytes on those badboys And of course the Univac tape-drives. Loading them was the highlight of a young kids day 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjmooney Posted July 4, 2018 Author VT Supporter Share Posted July 4, 2018 2 hours ago, Tegis said: The old mans job at the Swedish tax-agency I got to work/play around those. Awesome things and put me on a IT track. 200 megabytes on those badboys Looks like ICL kit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amsterdam_Neil_D Posted July 4, 2018 Share Posted July 4, 2018 2 hours ago, Seat68 said: Mag tape and green screens. Same as me. I have never seen one of those punch card things but I would just to see how it worked. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amsterdam_Neil_D Posted July 4, 2018 Share Posted July 4, 2018 What is the storage capacity of "The Cloud" ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tegis Posted July 4, 2018 VT Supporter Share Posted July 4, 2018 45 minutes ago, mjmooney said: Looks like ICL kit. Probably is. They used Bull but I couldnt find a image of them 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xela Posted July 4, 2018 Share Posted July 4, 2018 It's like Last of the Summer Wine in here! 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coda Posted July 4, 2018 Share Posted July 4, 2018 14 hours ago, Seat68 said: I worked at the inland revenue 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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