Re: No Y2k Bug

["Joshua P. Hill" <XXjoshhill@mindspring.com>]

On Fri, 07 Jan 2000 17:19:56 GMT, /dev/null@.com (Justa Lurker) wrote:

>| >All you have to do is build good failsafes around the computer and
>| >even a TRS-80 could do mission critical work.
>| 
>| Yeah, but would you use one?
>
>Yes.  One uses what is available, usually until something better is
>avaiable.  My first computer was a 4k RAM whoknows clock speed box
>that WORKED.  The next was a glorious 286-10Mhz with a 30meg HD - wow
>that WAS fast.  Then the next one came.
>Each machine was state of the art when I used it.  And now I am on a
>different state of the art machine.  Mission critical - REAL TIME.

None of the machiens you refer to, TRS-80 or otherwise, was ever
state-of-the-art. They were all personal computers.

Look, we aren't talking pimply faced kids here. In the days of the
TRS-80, small scale control applications were either built around
dedicated boards with their own processors or microcontrollers, or, at
the next higher level, minis like the PDP-11. No one beyond
adolescence would have used a TRS-80 in an engineering project.

NT is far from the only operating system avaikable, and among the many
that are, it is not the appropriate one for mission critical
applications. At best its best, it works in apps that require
semi-reliability such as servers.

>| This has nothing to do wtih pro/anti NT
>| bias: since there are perfectly good OS's that are designed for
>| mission critical applications, it strikes me as--well, I'll be
>| blunt--professionally incompetent to use one that wasn't.
>
>As I said before, it depends on the mission.  A TRS-80 is fine IF you
>don't mind its failings AND you build what the box controls with
>appropriate failsafes so that if/when the box does die, it fails SAFE.

That's ridiculous. Why use something unreliable and put a kludge
around it when there are more reliable OS's that are designed for this
sort of application? There are no issues of economy or functionality
here; the architecture of NT just isn't good enough for sufficient
stablity or consistency.

I'm begining to understand why Tim Kynnerd has to reboot the ATC on
his train periodically (*choke*) . . .

>| And NT was *not* designed for real time control. Period.
>
>That is your opinion.  You are welcome to it.

Rubbish; it's a basic engineering fact. I've read several articles
that mention the architectural issues involved, and the possibility
that Microsoft might fix them some day.

>I'm sure you can name a few OS's that you believe are better for
>mission critical or real time applications.  Name ONE that has never
>failed.  Note the word NEVER.

You: "I send my clients across the Atlantic in rowboats."

Me: "That's ridiculous; a rowboat isn't the right kind of boat for
that."

You: "Name ONE kind of ship that has never sunk. Note the word NEVER."

-- 

Josh