PBS: The Winter Of "It's Elementary!"

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Like many of you, I watched that lousy show on the Peoples Baloney Service (PBS) last night. Many folks have already outlined several serious flaws in the show but as a veteran computer programmer I will share my favorites:

The 2nd runner up was his idea that companies just "honor" existing or recent prices, quantities, etc and just go on conducting business until things get nicely sorted out. Almost lost it on that one. Apparently, Bozo has never worked anywhere near Corporate America. He is unaware that almost no companies will proceed in no business activity unless the lawyers have reviewed, chewed, and balleyhoooowed the contractual implications. Has anyone here ever, ever seen a layoff and/or a downsizing in their Corporate Legal department. Me either, and for good reason.

The 1st runner up was his assertion that accounting systems are not really important, and any company can still produce it's goods and services without the accounting systems working. It shows how far out of touch with business the Bozo really is. Accounting IS everything is business, and has been for hundreds of years.

The Winner though, was that part where the Bozo spoke of just setting the mainframe's date to 1972 and then hook a PC up to it's input to parse the data and change the dates as they come in (or out I suppose was implied). I suspect he the concept that someone would have to design and test interface files and programs never occurred to him, nor the reality of batch processing, process synchronization, etc. He must really believe that Jeff Goldblum can quickly crack into the Alien's computer infrastructure with that Mac PC and destroy them. My cat knows better for goodness sake.

I give the show a Thumbs-Down, and suggest that PBS get back to their real business of indoctrinating our children into the New Butt Order (NBO) with shows such as "It's Elementary".

-- Buffalo Bob (buff@hal.com), October 27, 1999

Answers

Even my daughter, who is a DWGI, laughed at some of the idiocy in that show!

-- Gypsy (GypsiGold@aol.com), October 27, 1999.

I didn't see the show, but a guy today mentioned that all "18" electrical power grids ahd NO embedded chips, and could not fail on rollover. Was that in this show also?

I guess it was all to placate the sheeples even more.

getting more tuna,

-- Bob P (rpilc99206@aol.com), October 27, 1999.


Just have your checkbook ready, and enjoy the new millenium!!

-- Robert X. Cringely (iwillbebroke@midnite.2000), October 27, 1999.

The jokes were funny, You have to know old computers to understand some of them. Most of the rest was good also. Did anyone notice the part where he went through BPA (the power plant) and didn't find computers running things? IT's have no concept about computing outside of information. I have worked on computers tied to hardware and it is an entire different ball game. No need for dates and nothing left to dingy IT's. We have to cause something to happen, we start from the hardware back through the I/O's decide what we need from individual bits back up to putting it into machine language - creating the software backwards to the way it is done in data processing.

Instead of writing "code" that is then turned into "machine language, we start with machine language and create the "code" out of it.

So if it runs by computer or an embedded system, it has probably been done this way, from the bit up. It is extremely precise where "code generators" use a lot of guesswork and do not understand what the code really does at machine leval.

The PBS Show was the most realistic one I have ever see. And I enjoyed they jokes. Especially the plane rid, when you think of the exactingly "correct" technology needed and used in aircraft flight, then you should realise all technology is hit and miss or Too "a day late and a dollor short" like some people like to say IT coding is.

Too bad so many watched the show with closed minds and did not appear to listen to the words. It seems some people watched it looking for things to bitch about from preconcieved views they gained by the "warning" they were given that it was a "polly piece".

Maybe some people watched it with an open mind.

The idea of setting the clock back on "some" computers, then changing the date in the I/O, especially those that are not IT orientated is a valad one. It's called emulation and data has been manipulated that way for decades. An emulator is used to interface data between IBM/MAC computers right now.

-- Cherri (sams@brigadoon.com), October 27, 1999.


Cherri; So yet another time you show your ignorance... Yep you did all that all right, so have I built it bit by bit till I had something to put in a port ... wrote the port... etc... blah... blan... but Cherri, may I ask you something? WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN BIOS GENREATES A NAN? Do you know what a NAN is Cherri? Do you realize that sometimes you get a HALT? Think it thru Cherri... Go back where you came from, please. Your brilliance is scaring me, are all EE's so stupid? Some EE that GETS IT please tell me this is an isolated fool. ...

-- (...@.......), October 27, 1999.


Cherri,

Just have your checkbook ready, and enjoy the new millenium!!

-- Robert X. Cringely (iwas@born.yesterday), October 27, 1999.


I caught the final 15 minutes and just about choked (especially the happy, feel good, leave your money in the bank, don't panic ending). As someone who used to work in communications, one thing that struck me as very annoying was the constant mirror imaging of the speakers (things facing one way, then next shot, facing the other). Question: was it planned or Y2K (subliminal messaging on the part of the producer?), or just plain bad communication (along w/the rest of the silly program)?

-- phread (lurking@y2k.com), October 27, 1999.

I may order some extra checkbooks. Never know when you might want some extra paper to start the fire...

-- Mad Monk (madmonk@hawaiian.net), October 28, 1999.

According to Gary North, Robert X. Cringely advised a year ago that everyone take a lot of cash out of the bank before the rollover. I suspect that some very nice person or corporation gave Mr. Cringely mucho dollaros to spout the party line. I suspect that Mr. Cringely took his payoff in small bills.

-- Mr. Adequate (mr@adequate.com), October 28, 1999.

...@...,

Don't get your gonads in an uproar. If you know everything now there will never be anything you will be willing to learn.

Your loss. I've met a lot who know it all.

Are you new hwere or what? I have posted a lot of my background here, so unless I am a good lier, I do know what I talk about.

Would you be so upset if my name was "George"?

-- Cherri (sams@brigadoon.com), October 28, 1999.



One of the most interesting things to me was seeing Koskinen. I have never seen footage of him before, just quotes. My husband found K. "contained." I've seen movie androids with more movement in them. I got the impression he is focusing so intensely on his use of words, and not slipping up, that his entire body is immobilized. Not somebody to buy a used car from.

-- Shivani Arjuna (SArjuna@aol.com), October 28, 1999.

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