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The Squamidian Report – Nov. 30 / 13
Issue #601
Including: The Ontarion Hi All, 'The Wife' was rummaging around in one of the closets the other day, doing whatever it is wives do, tidying up or cleaning or something, when she pulled out a huge stack of old 1.44 diskettes and CD R's dating back years. These were old backups and program disks that had accumulated over our past 20 years of computing. The floppies dated back to 1993 and contained backups of our personal data files and business files. Many of those file would be in formats that no longer even existed, assuming that the disks themselves were even still viable. And of course, we don't even have floppy drives on our computers anymore to try them on. The program disks included the installation files for Windows 3.1 and DOS 6.0 with the upgrade for 6.1. Really cools stuff way back then but there is no hardware around these days that could run them. The CD's were basically the same kind of thing, just a bit less old. So, no point in hanging on to this old stuff any longer but we couldn't just though them out. We needed to destroy them first. If we simply dumped them into the garbage someone could find them and if they had an old enough computer, could possible access the private data, assuming the information was still readable. The solution was to simply destroy them. Thats actually quite easy. For the diskettes we simply slid the metal slide over and stabbed a hole through the circular mylar media. That easy, they are no longer usable or readable. For the CD's we simply cut them in half. No way they can be read from now. This whole thing lead to an interesting conversation about some of the early computer courses we took and how computers and computing has changed. We started 'computing' in the days when MS Windows was starting to overtake basic DOS as the computing interface. So, we had taken DOS courses which were quite fun at the time as well as Windows 3.1 courses. We learned early spreadsheet programs like Lotus 123, and early word possessors like Word Perfect. We took early Internet courses once they became available where we learned to hand code our own primitive web pages that were mostly text. The only pictures in those days were .gif format. Not real pictures at all, just basic drawings. Real pictures took up too much bandwidth to transmit over phone lines for normal people to ever use on their web sites. We used Q Basic to hand code little programs that actually ran in DOS. We had a lot of fun and learned a lot. For years we kept right up with the cutting edge of home or small office computing. Now, most of its way over our heads. Everything is much easier to use and do but I no longer have a clue as to how it works. It just does. We don't have to know and in fact we are not supposed to know. It used to be very 'hands on'. Now its sophisticated software running on mind-boggling sophisticated nano hardware. It used to verge on complicated just to hook up a mouse. It took installing the mouse drivers and program, stored on one or two diskettes, as well as some configuring and tweaking. Often the early mouses would conflict with the graphics drivers or sound drivers. IRQ's had to be sorted out and allocated. Now, you can hot swap a cordless optical mouse or keyboard in a couple of seconds while on the fly. The first computer I bought came with two meg of RAM. Yes, MEG, not GIG. Mind you, Windows 3.1 fit on five diskettes. The first major upgrade I ever did was to double my RAM, all the way up to four meg. That 486 SX almost performed like a DX after that. Would you believe that two meg of extra RAM cost me $286. Now you can buy a whole computer for that. That first computer also came with a hard drive that was just under 200 MEG in capacity and due to the limitations of the old FAT 16 allocation system, some of that was not usable. Now HD's are measured in Terabytes, a term that didn't exist back them and would have been none comprehendable if it did. In fact, hard drives hadn't even been in computers for that long, you could still get a pc without one where you simply juggled diskettes back and forth between your A and B drives. No one ever dreamed we'd all be storing picture files in jpg or raw formats that would be multi megabytes in size. Even the most innovative developers and designers could have never foreseen where computers and computer would go. Makes you wonder where the next 20 years will take computers and their users. *
Something to look forward to: there is a new 'destination'
being built just down the highway, between the Chief and Shannon Falls
called 'Sea to Sky Gondola'. It is scheduled to be open, up and running
next May. It would have been done sooner but some very short sighted
factions of Squamish council are against any kind of progress and had
stalled the development as long as they could regardless of the fact
that pretty well the rest of the world was delighted to see the Gondola
be built. And its going to be very cool. The base area is right beside
the highway where the old gravel pit used to be. The lift towers are
all in and the cables are in place. There is a restaurant, washrooms,
hall, gift shops etc at the top. The top is a thousand feet higher than
the Chief and over looks it as well as Howe Sound, with a view of all
the surrounding mountains. There is a suspension bridge over a canyon
and several kilometers of rather scenic hiking trails. There is access
to the high alpine back country that had for years been unreachable by
us normal people.The Sea to Sky Gondola web site had announced a while back that on November 28 they would be posting lift prices as well as making a limited number of season passes available. We were all concerned that when the pricing came out it would be prohibitively expensive as are so many other things in the Vancouver / Whistler area. I was very relieved and surprised when the ticket and pass costs were revealed and promptly purchased passes for both of us. A season pass is about the same price as 3 single day tickets and we sure intend to ride up the gondola and hike around a lot more than 3 times over the season. Also, anyone purchasing a day ticket will receive a 20% discount when a season pass holder is with them. The season passes cost $99. That barely buys a cup of coffee in Whistler. 'The Wife' might have to cover her eyes when riding up the lift because it climbs right up the side of the mountain but aside from that, it should be a lot of fun. The lift cars are small, 8 person enclosed bubbles with lots of windows so even that part should be great. Here's the link to their site if you are curious. http://www.seatoskygondola.com doug
**** **** THE ONTARION REPORT Hello everyone! The 600th edition of the Squamidian was indeed a success and I thank the participants for their interesting input. I hope that more of you will contribute in the near future! It’s interesting to hear whatever you might have to say so please don’t be shy! Whenever you feel like sharing your thoughts or adventures with the rest of the Squid Group, please feel free to jot it down and send it on out to Doug! * Every once in a while a new craze springs up and this year is no different. The latest but in my mind not so great idea to pop up within the commercial retail flogging of “holiday promotional items” is none other than “The Elf On The Shelf”! “The Elf On The Shelf” began as a character in a book by an American author named Carol Aebersold. She wrote the book in 2005 and it was the story of one of Santa’s elves sent out by Santa a month before Christmas to visit the homes of children around the world to see how they were behaving. This elf would sit in an inconspicuous location in each home and watch the behavior of the children and listen to what they had to say. He would then report back to Santa every evening after the children were fast asleep. Judging by the report Santa received from the “Elf On The Shelf” Santa would place each child’s name on either the Nice or the Naughty List. This list as we all know determines whether or not you get rewarded on Christmas morning with toys to your liking or a big black lump of coal! Of course all kids dread the idea of being placed on the “Naughty List”! Once the popularity of “The Elf On The Shelf “ book morphed into an actual toy elf that parents could purchase and take home weeks before Christmas, this new “Fad” became more of a threat than a cute little Christmas Story! This little character has only this year hit the shelves in Canada and the Facebook contributions are now filled with stories of mothers and fathers using this little elf to strike feelings of fear in the hearts and minds of their kids to keep them in line from now until Christmas! The “Elf On The Shelf” is taken home and the kids and parents can actually go on line and register their adoption of each “Elf” as a family member in their household. Then the “Elf” is placed somewhere different each night and sits in that position for the following 24 hour period to watch the behavior of the children so he can report them to Santa each night. The kids in my opinion are being terrorized by the threat of this little “Elf” squealing to Santa for every little indiscretion they may make each day. I liken this set up to threatening to “send your kids to ‘The Home” if they don’t behave! Or even picking up the phone and threatening to “Call the Police if you don’t behave”! What a naughty way to control your kid’s behavior for a few weeks up till Christmas. I don’t agree with this new fad one bit! I think it’s more of a sadistic method of making them behave than it is a cutsie-pie Christmas Story to turn into a family tradition and I think it should be taken off the shelves of Canadian stores altogether! After all, who wants to adopt a “rat” that squeals to Santa so he’ll put a lump of coal in your stocking Christmas morning rather than some lovely new toys you’ve wished for so hard all year! Any parent that would resort to “The Elf On The Shelf” method of scaring their children into good behavior just can’t be bothered putting in the proper loving effort to teach their children the difference between Naughty and Nice and in my opinion deserves a great big lump of coal in their stocking come Christmas morning! Now all you parents who have bought into “The Elf On The Shelf” idea dig out those receipts and take “The Elf” back to the store you bought him at! That’s it for this week folks!
Thanks for tuning in and I’ll look forward to talking to you all again next week in The Ontarion Report! Bye for now … Greg PS: Something To Think About> Where is the Elf on your shelf? **** Have a good one.. the doug http://www.thedougsite.net The Fine Print! The articles in these issues are the sole property of the persons writing them and should be respected as such. |