Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!husc6!seismo!uunet!iscuva!randyg
From: randyg@iscuva.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: What's a PC?
Message-ID: <525@iscuva.ISCS.COM>
Date: Fri, 22-May-87 07:38:15 EDT
Article-I.D.: iscuva.525
Posted: Fri May 22 07:38:15 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 23-May-87 08:38:17 EDT
References: <839@vu-vlsi.UUCP> <3610@jade.BERKELEY.EDU> <683@mipos3.UUCP> <3650@jade.BERKELEY.EDU>
Reply-To: randyg@iscuva.UUCP (Randy Gordon)
Distribution: na
Organization: ISC Systems Corporation, Spokane, WA
Lines: 48

In article <3650@jade.BERKELEY.EDU> mwm@eris.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (My watch has windows) Meyer) writes:
>Nah, a Personal Computer is a machine that you can reboot whenever you
>want to, without notifying anyone. At least, that's the quick&easy
>test. The idea is that a personal computer is personal: "one's own".
>Something that only you will be using, and can therefore do with as
>you want. The "who do I have to tell if I reboot it" is the qad test.
>


I used a PDP-8I in 1973. It is about the size of an AT, with the power of
a good pocket calculator. You rebooted it by entering four commands via
the front panel, and feeding a paper tape through the teletype paper reader.
You then prayed for ten minutes. If you were without sin, the paper tape
didn't tear. You then loaded in more paper tapes. once in a while, you
managed to get everything in. You never shut off the machine after that.

I vaguely remember working with a HP computer ( with core, nonetheless!)
about the size of a packing crate that was a single user in the late 
'60's/early '70's. Anyone else remember that?

I don't mind drug testing(assuming they exclude junk food, I am 50% McDonalds
by weight) but the potential for abuse in office politics is mind boggling.

A lot of companies avoid litigation problems by handling such things sub-rosa.

An employee might be accused,demoted, fired or degraded, without ever knowing
that the real reason was that he flunked a drug test...or someone SAID he did.
(Companies like that are notorious for never checking validity of complaints).
Everyone has thier own horror stories about office politics, and I bet there
are very few folks that are particularly happy adding an atomic bomb class
weapon like drug testing to the office wars. I would be very nervous about
working for a company like that unless they were quite serious about due
process and employee rights. Getting trashed is something that happens to
everyone occasionally... ending up a nuclear shadow on the wall is another
matter entirely.


(P.S. To the  person who asked an applicant about Symdeb vs printf... the best
answer should have been Pfix plus for 3.0 and Codeview for 4.0, tho an
occasional printf helps ... I can't imagine ANYONE preferring Symdeb. What
were you doing asking an middle level manager that question anyways? Only
immediate managers of programmers should be knowledgable of technical details,
otherwise they'll be irresistably tempted to use thier position to play Guru,
without having the current knowledge to qualify. A lot of companies have gone
down the tubes because a VP made a decision that should have been left to a
programmer).

Randy Gordon     "Tao ku tse fun pee"