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My first computer was the VIC 20, then the C64 by which time I also coded on the BBC micros at school. The C64 (and VIC 20) was great because it's BASIC was limited (the same reason many hated it) and so it forced you to use machine code / assembly language to do the exciting stuff like animated sprites. I am glad I coded on it because it taught me a lot about low-level programming and how computers work. These days you can too easily avoid all that (I code mostly in Java these days, with a bit of C++/C#) but I still find it useful to have an insight into the inner workings, and besides it's interesting. Modern PCs are surprisingly (or not) similar in basic architecture. The BBC had better BASIC and I used it to write a database management program at school (just simple creation, search and editing features). I enjoyed using all three of these computers. In the end my C64 and VIC 20 failed in the way they usually did - the power supply adapter failed. I do occasionally dabble on a C64 emulator for nostalgic and academic reasons. I never did become a fully-fledged professional coder (I always found the industry a bit too scary!), though I do code a lot as part of my academic teaching role.
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Way back I had a TI 99-4A. Loved that little machine. Still have the BASIC programming guide as a keepsake. Also a TRS-80 Model 100 portable, which I guess was the first laptop computer. Worked on a gob of D batteries and had a big old 4 line / 40 column screen. It's in my closet and still works if I spend a fortune on batteries.
Sometimes the true reward for completing a task is not the money, but instead the satisfaction of a job well done. But it's usually the money.
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Flying friend confuses bent killer (6, 4)
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Tinker Bell
anagram of bent killer
Peter pans flying friend.
(I'd have posted earlier, but I needed to come up with a clue for tomorrow first )
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Yep, well done
Your turn to try and keep up this seemingly difficult theme tomorrow.
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Ahhhh - brings back my child secondhood.
Ravings en masse^ |
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"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein | "If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010 |
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It's just as well it's not the grandpa who "tinkled on a tree"; nowadays he would be risking having to register himself in some sexual predator database for "exposing himself".
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What do you mean ? Was there a squirrel hole in the tree?
CQ de W5ALT
Walt Fair, Jr.PhD P. E.
Comport Computing
Specializing in Technical Engineering Software
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Just saying that nowadays you pretty much can't even do what the kid in the last panel of the comic mentioned doing without risking getting yourself into some trouble.
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Over the years, I have used, and largely adapted to, a number of laptop keyboards of different layouts. I largely "hunt and peck" for home/page up etc, so their meanderings don't concern me too much. One that I really couldn't come to terms with had the up-arrow of the inverted T snuggled in where my right pinkie expected to find the shift key. I eventually took to using an external keyboard with that machine whenever I could.
But one I've started using recently is proving quite unsettling. It has an extra column of "multimedia" keys down the left edge of the keyboard. Every other keyboard I have ever used has tab/caps lock/shift/ctrl as the leftmost. (And I still remember the pain of adapting when caps lock and ctrl got swapped.) My (probably incorrect, but by now incorrigible) resting position has my left pinkie on the inner part of the shift key and if I glance down the joint of my pinkie aligns with the edge of a "normal" keyboard. On this keyboard, being "one key inboard" looks wrong out of the corner of my eye, and makes me stop to recalibrate. It really does disrupt my typing. I'll give it go for a while, but it might soon be time to break out an external keyboard.
</not quite a rant>
Peter
Software rusts. Simon Stephenson, ca 1994. So does this signature. me, 2012
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I know what you mean - my current KB has the CAPS key just a fraction too low, so if I'm not paying attention I hit it when I press SHIFT, and end up SHOUTING at people...
Sent from my Amstrad PC 1640
Never throw anything away, Griff
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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used some lenovos with a Fn key right where I expect Ctrl to be
cut (thinking I pressed ^C but got Fn+C), paste (^V)... paste... Paste! PASTE PASTE!!!
... WHAT'S WRONG WITH THIS PASTE???
OH, IT'S THAT F*N Fn key
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I too have a Lenovo (a nice shiny P1). I too found the Fn/Ctrl positioning a pain.
Then I found the setting in the Lenovo Vantage app that lets you swap them... Thank gawd! There might be a BIOS setting that also does that...
Java, Basic, who cares - it's all a bunch of tree-hugging hippy cr*p
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The keyboards I can't stand are the ones with FN/function keys reversed. By this I mean you can't just press F1, you have to press FN-F1.
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While laptop keyboards don't bother me, I think there should be some sort of IEEE standard regarding layout as far as relative key positions are concerned. Given the highly variant laptop sizes available, it would be impossible to specify how big keys are, or their dimensional position on the keyboard plane.
You can get compact keyboards, but if you travel a lot, the keyboard will eventually (and sooner rather than later) get mangled and broke, so IMHO, the juice ain't worth the squeeze.
Having said all that, the best advice I can offer is that you man-up and stop whining.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010 ----- You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010 ----- When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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Assuming you had some voice in the matter, why do you buy a laptop with a screwy keyboard arrangement?
<br?
<div class="signature">Ravings en masse^ |
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"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein | "If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010 |
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Laptops and other toys make their way into this retiree's cave by a number of means, none of which involve significant quantities of $$.
Software rusts. Simon Stephenson, ca 1994. So does this signature. me, 2012
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I'm forever swearing at one of my lappies, because it has a key that opens the calculator where the Del key goes.
Eight or nine copies of the calculator popping up when you want to delete an identifier is not at all helpful.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
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I once had a full-size desktop keyboard with Power key right under the Delete...
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Nasty!
My previous keyboard had a "hibernate" button, and the cat was the only person who could find it ...
Sent from my Amstrad PC 1640
Never throw anything away, Griff
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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Keyboard quality & layout was one of the biggest factors in my latest laptop purchase (a Lenovo P1 - very nice). Hate the Dell(s) I get from work, HPs are dreadful, and so are Macs now (I have a 2009 MacBook Pro, which has the best laptop keyboard I’ve ever used, but the current ones are lousy).
But none of them are as good as my mechanical keyboard...
Java, Basic, who cares - it's all a bunch of tree-hugging hippy cr*p
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Laptop vendors considering their special keys more important than the standard keys sadly ain't news. Having to press Fn to access keys like F5 because lowering the brightness is obviously more important than getting things done is pretty much the standard nowadays. And smuggling the Fn key where the Ctrl key should be (and putting Ctrl in place of Fn) goes back years as well.
I dare to claim that this cancer ain't new either but rather metastasis of the older issue: Software pack-ins. Every friggin' system vendor wants to differentiate itself by filling the preinstalled system with their crap instead of differentiating themselves by simply providing a work environment out-of-the-box.
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Keybpard layouts are not even similar across locales. For instance the French layout of keyboards top line is AZERTY... no QWERTY. If we are lucky we all take our own kit and learn the layout.
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A previous laptop had PAGE UP and PAGE DOWN keys arranged side by side in a horizontal layout on the right side of the keyboard. I was accustomed to scrolling through my PowerPoint presentations by using those keys. Unfortunately, the keyboard on my docking station had the same two keys in a _vertical_ layout with PAGE DOWN and DELETE side by side. I deleted quite a few slides before I realized what was going on. I solved the problem by adding a control to “Disable/Enable Delete Key” to my caps lock controller utility.
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