OT.... but I need help

On Tue, 6 Nov 2012 00:20:21 +0000, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:

In message , Char Jackson
writes:
On Mon, 05 Nov 2012 10:55:36 -0700, Ken Blake
wrote:
[]
You probably are just asking jokingly, but my son, daughter-in-law,
and grandson all do, and I know *many* others who do.

Yes, at least half jokingly. Where I work, the dress is business
casual and roughly 95% of my coworkers wear short sleeves, usually
polo shirts with vendor logos. I can see at a glance that no one wears
a watch. Not one or two here and there, but no one in my area at all,
and that's a sample size of about 60-80 office workers. Since my day
job is in the telecom field, specifically wireless data, we usually
have our phones out and therefore accessible. When I'm in the car or

Since mine isn't, I don't.

on the motorcycle, I have a dashboard clock in front of me. When I'm
at home, I have clocks all over the place, with 4 in the kitchen alone
and others scattered throughout. Even two of the three bathrooms have
clocks. When I'm in front of the computer, there's yet another clock.

(By "bathroom" I presume you mean the US use of the word, one that
doesn't necessarily have a bath in it.)

I use the language of the country in which I reside. I admit, it can
be clumsy at times, but in this case not any more so than calling it a
water closet.

When I'm outside and don't want to pull out my phone, I can glance at
the sun and be within 30 minutes or so, plus there are always other

I can glance at the sun - very occasionally! I presume you live in
Florida, California, or similar.

Yes, because those are the only places where the clouds ever break.
;-) Not.

clues for people who wish to observe them. I know what time certain
people leave for work and arrive back home, I know what time the mail
carrier comes, and I know what time the UPS truck makes a swing down
my street, just to name a few, and that only scratches the surface.

Wow, you _have_ filled your mind with a lot of times! And perhaps don't
stray very far from where such things occur. Walking down the street in
most UK towns, I would say I'm _not_ in easy view of a public clock -
they're quite rare. The odd church tower, jeweller or similar shop - but
certainly not visible from, I'd say, over 95% of street positions;
certainly not ones that are less effort to find and see than just
turning my wrist. Let alone a walk in the country, which your 95%
presumably don't do!

You make some funny presumptions. :-)
Regarding your last point, I was trying to point out that you don't
usually need a clock on your wrist in order to know what time it is.
Or, at least I don't. Maybe I'm just more aware of my surroundings
than some others.

--

Char Jackson

On 06/11/2012 00:32, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , choro
writes:

On 05/11/2012 07:39, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , choro
writes:
On 04/11/2012 19:46, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
[]
And for those (wine, at least - can't say for liquor), the strange
unit
the centilitre (cl) is used, which isn't used anywhere else in the
metric system! (At least, in UK it is.)

cl = cc

No it doesn't. I'm glad you're not my doctor (-:

OK. My mistake, I admit...
1 cl = 10 cc

In the MKS and SI unit systems, the unit is ml, though 1 cc _does_ equal
1 ml.

Indeed. This was what was on my mind when I keyed in my original
response. I meant to key in..
ml = cc

For some strange reason ml doesn't come easy to me even though I am
perfectly aware of what it stands for. To this day I much prefer the use
of cc as a unit of measurement most probably because that's what I
learned at school as a teenager. I am perfectly happy using metres or
cc's as units of length but I just have to convert them in my mind to
inches etc to visualize them. Old habits die hard and it's not easy
teaching old dogs new tricks.

But hey, this is a W7 group and I for one will stick with W7 for as long
as possible. Metrication did bring in benefits but I can see no benefits
in upgrading to W8. For one thing my huge monitor screen is some 30+
inches (that's some 75+ cm) from where I sit and I can't even reach it
unless I get off my bum. This distance is necessitated not only by the
size of the screen but also by eyesight problems as one gets older.
--
choro
*****


cl is 1/100th of a litre as the name suggests; and cc is 1/1000th of a
litre. And don't worry. I am NOT in the medical profession!

I DO wish they'd stick either to one or the other for marking bottle
and can capacities in supermarkets. There is really no need to use
cl's. lt and cc will suffice. No need to complicate matters.

Indeed.

BTW, I also detest markings of sizes in mm rather than the more easily
remembered cm's. One can, after all, use a decimal point if more
precision is required in giving out size measurements.
41.9 x 26.7 is certainly more easy to remember than
419x267

Not sure I'd agree with the last point, but certainly using mm for
everything is daft; do they do that in US too? I always thought it was
only British industry that did that. I imagine a conversation went
something like this: "we've got to go metric." "OK - what's the metric
unit of distance?" "The millimetre." "OK, we'll use millimetres." With
the result that _everything_ is done in mm - I've even seen a switchyard
(the area outside an electricity substation) dimensioned in mm
(thousands of them, of course); these people obviously don't understand
one of the main points of the metric system, the use of prefixes (m-,
k-, and so on).

and rulers and tape measures are marked in cms in any case with
divisions for the mm's.--
choro
*****
[]
--
You need a space after the two dashes.
choro
*****
You also need a newline befo It has to be: newline, dash, dash,
space, newline. Or, to put it another way, "dash dash space on a line by
itself."

Gene Wirchenko wrote:
On Mon, 05 Nov 2012 22:24:22 +0000, Ed Cryer
wrote:

[snip]

Apropos which, I've just found this picture.
LOL.
http://tinyurl.com/brpjvee

They do not look to be stacked very securely. How many seconds
until they tumbled down?

Sincerely,

Gene Wirchenko

Normally, they're stored in boxes of 2000. Anyone who
has worked with punch cards, wouldn't treat them like that.

The boxes of 2000, stack very nicely, as shown in this photo.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...orage.NARA.jpg

The 80 column punch card, isn't entirely user data.
Columns 72-80 can contain a sequence number. And if
you ever drop a deck on the floor, that's how
you get it back in order.

That's not a free lunch, because you have to type
in that sequence number while you're writing your program.
It means some extra work up-front, to protect you from
a clumsy mistake later.

Paul

In message , Gene E. Bloch
writes:
On Mon, 5 Nov 2012 07:40:31 +0000, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
[]
Although wasn't that the origin of the computer "bug in the program" -
insects in the relays?

No.

OK, what was?
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

`And a constant sound of flushing runneth from Windows...' (from a poem by John
Betjeman, quoted by Paul Bray in `Computing' 27 February 1997.)

In message , Char Jackson
writes:
On Tue, 6 Nov 2012 00:20:21 +0000, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:

In message , Char Jackson
writes:
[]
and others scattered throughout. Even two of the three bathrooms have
clocks. When I'm in front of the computer, there's yet another clock.

(By "bathroom" I presume you mean the US use of the word, one that
doesn't necessarily have a bath in it.)

I use the language of the country in which I reside. I admit, it can
be clumsy at times, but in this case not any more so than calling it a
water closet.

Wow, I've never heard anyone call it that! Though at least that is
accurate (I think - I think WC refers to part of the mechanism);
bathroom, to UK ears, sounds as if one is being coy about why one is
going there.

When I'm outside and don't want to pull out my phone, I can glance at
the sun and be within 30 minutes or so, plus there are always other

I can glance at the sun - very occasionally! I presume you live in
Florida, California, or similar.

Yes, because those are the only places where the clouds ever break.
;-) Not.

No, but I certainly wouldn't expect to be able to rely on the sun's
position to tell the time here - on more than 50% of days at this time
of year.

clues for people who wish to observe them. I know what time certain
people leave for work and arrive back home, I know what time the mail
carrier comes, and I know what time the UPS truck makes a swing down
my street, just to name a few, and that only scratches the surface.

Wow, you _have_ filled your mind with a lot of times! And perhaps don't
stray very far from where such things occur. Walking down the street in
most UK towns, I would say I'm _not_ in easy view of a public clock -
they're quite rare. The odd church tower, jeweller or similar shop - but
certainly not visible from, I'd say, over 95% of street positions;
certainly not ones that are less effort to find and see than just
turning my wrist. Let alone a walk in the country, which your 95%
presumably don't do!

You make some funny presumptions. :-)
Regarding your last point, I was trying to point out that you don't
usually need a clock on your wrist in order to know what time it is.
Or, at least I don't. Maybe I'm just more aware of my surroundings
than some others.

Now _you_ are making odd presumptions. However aware of my surroundings
I might be, I still find a "clock on my wrist" quicker. Another case:
walking along the corridor at work; no clocks. In the canteen: ditto.
(OK, some of the screens show the news channel, but I'm not always
sitting near - or with a good angle - to see one of those.)

But I'm not saying you have to wear a clock; I'm just rather resenting
the implication that I am (and others here who do are) strange for doing
so.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

`And a constant sound of flushing runneth from Windows...' (from a poem by John
Betjeman, quoted by Paul Bray in `Computing' 27 February 1997.)

In message , choro
writes:
[]
Indeed. This was what was on my mind when I keyed in my original
response. I meant to key in..
ml = cc

I guessed as much (-:

For some strange reason ml doesn't come easy to me even though I am
perfectly aware of what it stands for. To this day I much prefer the

(Me neither, actually.)

use of cc as a unit of measurement most probably because that's what I
learned at school as a teenager. I am perfectly happy using metres or
cc's as units of length but I just have to convert them in my mind to

Another oops (-:

inches etc to visualize them. Old habits die hard and it's not easy
teaching old dogs new tricks.

But hey, this is a W7 group and I for one will stick with W7 for as
long as possible. Metrication did bring in benefits but I can see no
benefits in upgrading to W8. For one thing my huge monitor screen is
some 30+ inches (that's some 75+ cm) from where I sit and I can't even
reach it unless I get off my bum. This distance is necessitated not
only by the size of the screen but also by eyesight problems as one
gets older.

That's another thing: when are we going to ditch this convention of
measuring screens by a method that dates from when CRTs were
round-bottomed flasks! Probably never, since it gives the biggest
number, so manufacturers like it. I think there is some evidence that
metric expression of screen sizes coincided with the use of vertical or
horizontal size (possibly with the addition of a V to make the position
clearer).

--
choro
*****
[]
Do you know _why_ I keep telling you to put a space after the two
dashes?
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

`And a constant sound of flushing runneth from Windows...' (from a poem by John
Betjeman, quoted by Paul Bray in `Computing' 27 February 1997.)

On 06/11/2012 07:45, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , choro
writes:
[]
Indeed. This was what was on my mind when I keyed in my original
response. I meant to key in..
ml = cc

I guessed as much (-:

For some strange reason ml doesn't come easy to me even though I am
perfectly aware of what it stands for. To this day I much prefer the

(Me neither, actually.)

use of cc as a unit of measurement most probably because that's what I
learned at school as a teenager. I am perfectly happy using metres or
cc's as units of length but I just have to convert them in my mind to

Another oops (-:

inches etc to visualize them. Old habits die hard and it's not easy
teaching old dogs new tricks.

But hey, this is a W7 group and I for one will stick with W7 for as
long as possible. Metrication did bring in benefits but I can see no
benefits in upgrading to W8. For one thing my huge monitor screen is
some 30+ inches (that's some 75+ cm) from where I sit and I can't even
reach it unless I get off my bum. This distance is necessitated not
only by the size of the screen but also by eyesight problems as one
gets older.

That's another thing: when are we going to ditch this convention of
measuring screens by a method that dates from when CRTs were
round-bottomed flasks! Probably never, since it gives the biggest
number, so manufacturers like it. I think there is some evidence that
metric expression of screen sizes coincided with the use of vertical or
horizontal size (possibly with the addition of a V to make the position
clearer).

--
choro
*****
[]
Do you know _why_ I keep telling you to put a space after the two dashes?

No. Why should I insert a space after the two dashes?

Those 2 dashes by the way are inserted automatically as part of my
signature as you can see below. I usually delete the space at the end of
my posting so that the 2 dashes end up on the last line of my message
which saves a line on the screen which I haven't done this time so you
can see the result IF I don't BACKSPACE DELETE before the 2 dashes.
--
choro
*****

On Tue, 6 Nov 2012 07:38:47 +0000, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:

But I'm not saying you have to wear a clock; I'm just rather resenting
the implication that I am (and others here who do are) strange for doing
so.

That surprises me. I thought you were going to resent the fact that I
pretty much suggested that no one under about 60 years of age wears a
watch anymore, implying that only old people still do. :-)

Kidding aside, I don't think it's strange if you wear a watch, (well,
maybe a little), but I do think you'd be in a dwindling subset of the
(civilized) world's population by doing so. It's completely up to you
to decide when it's time to go naked, as it were.

--

Char Jackson

On Mon, 05 Nov 2012 18:36:06 -0800, Gene Wirchenko
wrote:

On Mon, 05 Nov 2012 14:32:11 -0700, Ken Blake
wrote:

On Mon, 05 Nov 2012 10:59:51 -0800, Gene Wirchenko
wrote:

[snip]

That is exactly what I do. I check it against my computer's
clock just after I have resynced it with an Internet time server.

As I suspected. But that very small error wouldn't bother me at all.

Well, I figure that if I am going to use a watch, that it should
have the correct time to within about one minute.


Same here, but I can go a lot of weeks before I need to set it.

Ken

On Mon, 05 Nov 2012 21:34:31 -0600, Char Jackson
wrote:

On Tue, 6 Nov 2012 00:20:21 +0000, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:


(By "bathroom" I presume you mean the US use of the word, one that
doesn't necessarily have a bath in it.)

I use the language of the country in which I reside. I admit, it can
be clumsy at times, but in this case not any more so than calling it a
water closet.


I try to use the language of the country I'm *in* at the time. g

Even if I don't know the language, the one thing I learn how to say
before I go is "where is the bathroom?"

I'm soon going to Italy for a couple of weeks. I know how to say "Dovè
il gabinetto?" "Gabinetto" literally mean "closet," and it's used in
the sense of "water closet."

Ed Cryer wrote:
Ed Cryer wrote:
Ken Blake wrote:
On Mon, 05 Nov 2012 10:18:15 +0000, Ed Cryer
wrote:

"Load" a program comes from when a program was held on punched cards,
and they had to be literally loaded into the card hopper.


Yes.


What happened in actuality was that an operator would carry them across
the room, trip over one of the wires, scatter the cards all over the
floor, pick them up and put them in the hopper.


LOL! Sometimes true.

But bear in mind that there were normally no wires on the floor.
Computer rooms normally had (presumably still have) raised floors with
all the cables, and air-conditioning, under the floor.



Next day the programmer would arrive at work and be told that his
program run had produced strange results!


But that's never true. It might depend on the machine, but in most
case as long as the first few cards remained at the beginning and the
last ones at the end, all would be well.

And if those few cards were not at the beginning and end, it would not
load at all. So the question was whether the program would run at all,
not whether it would run properly.

But if the order of the cards in a *source* program was screwed up,
yes, compiling the program, no running it, could have all sorts of
strange results.


Computers of a generation before us had even object programs held on
punched cards; and written in machine code too. If you just interchanged
two middle cards (say a shift-left-logical command and a subsequent XOR)
then the thing would run but produce wrong results.

Two more actualities in the cause of computing history.

1. One major machine kept dying. It took ages to find the cause.
Eventually they discovered that when a certain door was thrown fully
open it hit the emergency power-off button.

2. We were getting random strange run results for ages until we
discovered the cause. A batch of memory boards had been replaced by
incompetent staff who'd simply slid them out; but that dropped iron
filings all around the place, and these were moving around with the
current fluxes and shorting things out.

Ed



Apropos which, I've just found this picture.
LOL.
http://tinyurl.com/brpjvee

Ed


I've thought of a nice title for the picture; better than the one given
as Programmer standing beside punched cards.

Ada Lovelace, programmer to Charles Babbage, putting the Differential
Engine to a severe test.

Ed

On Tue, 6 Nov 2012 07:45:15 +0000, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:


That's another thing: when are we going to ditch this convention of
measuring screens by a method that dates from when CRTs were
round-bottomed flasks!


Yes, we certainly should!


Probably never, since it gives the biggest number, so manufacturers like it.


Unfortunately, you are likely to be right.


I think there is some evidence that
metric expression of screen sizes coincided with the use of vertical or
horizontal size (possibly with the addition of a V to make the position
clearer).


Rather than horizontal *or* vertical, I'd like to see both. So, for
example, instead of calling it a 55" screen, call it 47.9" x 27" (or
better, round it to 48" x 27"). Or even better, call it 121.7 cm x
68.6 cm (or rounded, 122 cm x 69 cm).

On 06/11/2012 15:37, Ken Blake wrote:
On Tue, 6 Nov 2012 07:45:15 +0000, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:


That's another thing: when are we going to ditch this convention of
measuring screens by a method that dates from when CRTs were
round-bottomed flasks!


Yes, we certainly should!


Probably never, since it gives the biggest number, so manufacturers like it.


Unfortunately, you are likely to be right.


I think there is some evidence that
metric expression of screen sizes coincided with the use of vertical or
horizontal size (possibly with the addition of a V to make the position
clearer).


Rather than horizontal *or* vertical, I'd like to see both. So, for
example, instead of calling it a 55" screen, call it 47.9" x 27" (or
better, round it to 48" x 27"). Or even better, call it 121.7 cm x
68.6 cm (or rounded, 122 cm x 69 cm).

69?

What an interesting number!--
choro
*****

On Tue, 06 Nov 2012 08:13:02 -0700, Ken Blake
wrote:

On Mon, 05 Nov 2012 18:36:06 -0800, Gene Wirchenko
wrote:

On Mon, 05 Nov 2012 14:32:11 -0700, Ken Blake
wrote:

On Mon, 05 Nov 2012 10:59:51 -0800, Gene Wirchenko
wrote:

[snip]

That is exactly what I do. I check it against my computer's
clock just after I have resynced it with an Internet time server.

As I suspected. But that very small error wouldn't bother me at all.

Well, I figure that if I am going to use a watch, that it should
have the correct time to within about one minute.

Same here, but I can go a lot of weeks before I need to set it.

6-8 weeks for me.

Casio also has a trick for changing the battery. Simply changing
the battery does not work. There is some little trick to doing it.
This is not user-friendly.

Casio! spit

My next watch is very unlikely to be a Casio.

Sincerely,

Gene Wirchenko

On Tue, 06 Nov 2012 03:05:12 -0600, Char Jackson
wrote:

On Tue, 6 Nov 2012 07:38:47 +0000, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:

But I'm not saying you have to wear a clock; I'm just rather resenting
the implication that I am (and others here who do are) strange for doing
so.

That surprises me. I thought you were going to resent the fact that I
pretty much suggested that no one under about 60 years of age wears a
watch anymore, implying that only old people still do. :-)

I just think that that is silly. Different people have different
needs.

Kidding aside, I don't think it's strange if you wear a watch, (well,
maybe a little), but I do think you'd be in a dwindling subset of the
(civilized) world's population by doing so. It's completely up to you
to decide when it's time to go naked, as it were.

The elite are always a minority. polishes knuckles against
chest

Sincerely,

Gene Wirchenko