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By: Da Sissop
Date: 2/12/98 10:09:58 PM
# Replies: 27
...but, guess what. I got a JOB. Wooo.
I'm signed for a 3-month contract to debug a piece-of-shit Access 97 application. Actually they *primarily* need me for February. By the end of the month they wanna deploy this thing in some sort of, uh, functional capacity. February is *heavy*. So heavy, in fact, that I may seem to disappear for stretches.
I'm learning that Access 97 and its particular flavor of Visual Basic (VBA) is designed primarily to suck the lifeforce out of programmers, thus providing more power to the database engine.
Is it just *me*, or does anyone else see the inherent danger in storing the code that manipulates a database IN THAT VERY SAME DATABASE? Isn't that like putting President Clinton in a closed room with a bunch of interns?
Response #1
By: rorschach
Date: 2/13/98 2:02:27 PM
sounds like a 60's recipe for AI. you know, the old thousand moneys tapping on a keyboard idea.... oops! i think we goofed....it wants it's mommy!
Response #2
By: Gowan McGland
Date: 2/14/98 1:07:33 AM
New job, eh?
I'll bet. I found THIS in a news brief I get from a mailing list I'm on:
Jim Porter of research firm Disk Trend predicts that Iomega won't throw in the towel quite yet, and will have its lawyers working hard to protect its business. Porter compares selling Zip drives and cartridges to selling razors and razor blades: "Iomega must make a significant contribution to its profit on the Zip disk cartridges or [it's] in trouble."
Response #3
By: Da Sissop
Date: 2/14/98 8:27:20 AM
Hey! They twisted my words all around!
A co-worker said I needed a shave, and I speculated as to whether or not I could use the protective metal sliding cover of a Zip disk I was carrying.
Response #4
By: Ralf
Date: 2/16/98 8:06:55 PM
You bastard. I just sold all my SyQuest stock and bought Iomega on YOUR recommendation.
Response #5
By: Zane T. Dark
Date: 2/17/98 10:59:57 AM
The SyQuest drive has actual 'platters' in a case...unlike this PD/CD I have, there aren't a maximum amount of reliable 'writes' in can withstand...I feel like a boob. It was that word 'optical' that lured me in...kind of like 'Lite' or 'Free' a few years ago....
Response #6
By: rorschach
Date: 2/17/98 4:44:52 PM
anybody hear about the "new" technology that segate claims to have developed? it a friggin MO drive! the only "development" they have made is making the optics small enough to fit on the RW head arm by using photolithography to etch fresnel lenses the size of a pinhead!
Response #7
By: Zane T. Dark
Date: 2/18/98 5:11:13 AM
Um...errr...you lost me after 'photolithography'...
(clap of thunder as the conversation breaks 'Missing Man Formation' over Zane's head)
Response #8
By: Da Sissop
Date: 2/18/98 7:27:21 AM
Lost me after "anybody"...
Response #9
By: rorschach
Date: 2/18/98 8:54:32 AM
ok for those technically challenged out there....
an MO drive (Magneto-Optical) is a hybrid magnetic/optical technology that has a recording media that a laser heats up then magnets pull the media one way or another to create a "pit" similar to those on CD's. it is rewritable because the pits can be reheated and pulled back straight with the magnets. it is read by a lower power laser exactly the same way cd's are.
this is OLD technology, at least ten years (ancient by computer standards) they have made 1 Gig MO drives for about 3 years now and 720 MB drives for the last 5 or so. fujitsu made em and they were fast scsi devices. they are even an ISO standard format which means everybody made disks for them.
only reason they didn't sell as well as Iomega and SyQuest was because they cost more because the optics were large and expensive. they also had problems with sustained writes (such as for backups and such) because they heated up and stopped working until the laser cooled back down again (poor package design, no airflow...) used to have a paralell port external 720 that I LOVED where i used to work.
fesnel lenses are the sort of flat sheets of plastic with concentric rings in em instead of smooth curved surfaces. they work off of interference patterns between the light waves.
Photolithography is the the method that chips are made with as are printed circuit boards on a much larger scale. A film emulsion is spread over the surface of what you are going to etch. It is exposed to light using a photographic negative of the shape you want etched into the surface. The film is developed and the unexposed spots wash off and the exposed parts harden. Then the surface is etched with an acid. The spots under the exposed film are protected and the un-exposed spots are etched.
Any questions? No? Ok smart guys, put your books and notebooks under the desk, were having a pop quiz.....
Response #10
By: Ralf
Date: 2/18/98 6:16:35 PM
NOW.... Iomega has released the Click! Drive.
It's 40 megabytes of storage in a little MATCHBOOK-SIZED chiclette. They cost about $10 each. Woooo! NOW you can keep a few hundred megabytes in your pants WITHOUT tell-tale bulges or annoying edges poking you god-knows-where.
Thinkabout this: storage media is getting so small you can lose an entire BBS in the laundry.
Response #11
By: Da Sissop
Date: 2/18/98 6:19:49 PM
>NOW you can keep a few hundred megabytes in your pants
>WITHOUT tell-tale bulges or annoying edges poking you
>god-knows-where.
What, do ya just run the parallel cable outta yer fly?
Response #12
By: Zane T. Dark
Date: 2/18/98 7:54:12 PM
No, a fast, wide, ultra-SCSI...of course.
Response #13
By: sooz
Date: 2/19/98 7:01:36 PM
Men, pants, zippers, scuzzy.
Nah.
Response #14
By: Da Sissop
Date: 2/19/98 10:02:06 PM
Men, pants, scuzzy, ZIP drive? Nah....
Response #15
By: Zane T. Dark
Date: 2/20/98 7:15:19 AM
Men, pants, scuzzy, joystick? Yea, probably....
Response #16
By: Homer The Brave
Date: 2/22/98 1:00:50 AM
Men and anything with the prefix 'mega-' in it.
Response #17
By: Cleotis
Date: 2/22/98 11:39:36 AM
All those bytes have got to leave some scars!
Response #18
By: jjhitt
Date: 3/5/98 1:58:45 AM
> It's 40 megabytes of storage in a little
> MATCHBOOK-SIZED chiclette.
Hot Shit!!
Data Chiclettes!
Candy covered chewable stoarge media!
Just think! The entire whole of Western
Civilization stored in a single PEZ candy
doo-dad.
Response #19
By: Ralf
Date: 3/5/98 8:37:58 PM
"mmmMMMMmmm.. I've got Library of Congress flavor!"
Response #20
By: Homer The Brave
Date: 3/6/98 1:54:54 AM
"..my mouth is awash with the flavor of overthrown third-world governments!" --anonymous person chewing the CIA World Fact Book
Response #21
By: Da Sissop
Date: 3/6/98 7:37:15 AM
"Double your flavor, double your storage capacity!"
Response #22
By: Ralf
Date: 3/7/98 8:06:47 PM
CHEW ON THIS DISC, BIATCH!!!!!!!1!
Response #23
By: Zane T. Dark
Date: 3/13/98 8:00:26 AM
(SPIT) (GASP!)
"Ugh..mine's got a virus! My cavities are multiplying and I have this urge to bash my head against a cymbal..."
Response #24
By: Jay
Date: 5/7/98 3:11:45 PM
As I prepare to jump back into the employed status I figured I'd post the name and number for the headhunters that got me my sweet gig at Shell...they specialize in IT and MIS placement and offer a free dish sponge with every job filled. Ask for Steve Winter he's a dude.
Digital People
713-621-9220
Response #25
By: Capt. Spastic
Date: 5/7/98 10:05:06 PM
Hey Jay, you might be talking to me on the phone one day. Shell is one of our biggest customers!
Response #26
By: Jay
Date: 5/8/98 10:25:39 AM
cool...they promised me all the pest strips I can carry!
Response #27
By: Da Sissop
Date: 5/8/98 10:57:37 AM
"Fill it up. And check the fluids. And bring me the piss bucket, please, as I have to relieve myself."