Faulty hardware found on shuttle

In article ,
Derek Lyons wrote:
But quality control is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay down on the
[Microsoft] priority list.

*Right*. That's why millions of people around the world use it on a
daily basis. It's far from perfect, but it does work, people hold it
to an unrealistic standard and them complain when it fails to meet
that standard.

Nothing unrealistic about the standard at all. All it takes is a certain
amount of *attention* to things like stability and security. There are
several other systems which are at least an order of magnitude better in
those respects.

The reason why millions of people around the world use Windows on a daily
basis has nothing to do with technical quality. Microsoft was simply the
only major software supplier which didn't drop the ball badly at the
crucial time -- the late 1980s -- when there was a huge pent-up market
demand for a Mac-ish GUI-based system running on commodity PC hardware.
Microsoft had to struggle desperately for years to produce something half
usable -- Windows 1.x was junk and 2.x wasn't much better -- but the other
major players, mostly notably IBM with OS/2, fumbled the job so totally
and so disastrously that Microsoft had the time it needed.
--
MOST launched 30 June; science observations running | Henry Spencer
since Oct; first surprises seen; papers pending. |

"Henry Spencer" wrote in message
...

The reason why millions of people around the world use Windows on a daily
basis has nothing to do with technical quality. Microsoft was simply the
only major software supplier which didn't drop the ball badly at the
crucial time -- the late 1980s -- when there was a huge pent-up market
demand for a Mac-ish GUI-based system running on commodity PC hardware.
Microsoft had to struggle desperately for years to produce something half
usable -- Windows 1.x was junk and 2.x wasn't much better -- but the other
major players, mostly notably IBM with OS/2, fumbled the job so totally
and so disastrously that Microsoft had the time it needed.


I tried to use Lotus 1.0 under Windows 3.0 I think it was. 2nd worst piece
of commercial software I ever used. (the first for those curious was a
Novell dial-in program...) Forget questions about MS having access to the
Windows API, etc. Lotus simply was NOT stable. It was a completely useless
piece of crap. Considering there were other non-MS spreadsheets out there
that didn't crash every 5 minutes, it's evident that their QA was very
questionable. (Though to be fair, Lotus had bet a lot on OS/2.)

In any case, Excel won the spreadsheet wars not because it had access to
APIs or shipped with computers (every customer I set up at that time had Ami
Pro and Lotus come with the computers for free.)

This is not to deny that MS marketing and their business deals with computer
vendors didn't play a role in MS's dominance of the market, but it certainly
wasn't the sole reason.


--
MOST launched 30 June; science observations running | Henry Spencer
since Oct; first surprises seen; papers pending. |

(Henry Spencer) wrote:

In article ,
Derek Lyons wrote:
But quality control is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay down on the
[Microsoft] priority list.

*Right*. That's why millions of people around the world use it on a
daily basis. It's far from perfect, but it does work, people hold it
to an unrealistic standard and them complain when it fails to meet
that standard.

Nothing unrealistic about the standard at all. All it takes is a certain
amount of *attention* to things like stability and security. There are
several other systems which are at least an order of magnitude better in
those respects.

Given the stability and security of my Windows box, an order of
magnitude better simply isn't needed for my day to day work. 99%
percent of all Windows problems can be traced to poor installation,
configuration, and maintenance. (Admittedly Microsoft could make
things easier however.) Windows has problems, but they are not
insurmountable to anyone willing to put in a little time and effort.

It's equally possible to have a *nux system be insecure if you are not
fully conversant with the installation and configuration process.
*nix tends not to have those problems because it's generally run by
knowledgeable people. Unsurprisingly, Windows systems run by
knowledgeable people have fewer stability and security problems as
well.

The key problem is less Microsofts coding, than the impression they
leave the customer that all is automagically taken care of.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.