Notices by Ken McLeod (_the_cloud@mastodon.social)

@europlus @thomasfuchs At least they didn't call it a "diskette".

@pluralistic Long ago, I read a Bill Stickers poem, probably in some anthology, and could not find any reference to it in a search just now. From memory, the poem went something like this:

"Bill Stickers Will Be Prosecuted"
The evening papers run
But the thing I want to know
Is what's Bill Stickers done?

Anyone recognize this or know the source?

@aebrockwell @pluralistic I took this photo in Scotland. Apparently elderly people had become such a road hazard that the council felt that they needed to put up a sign.

@thomasfuchs What makes these particular cassettes "for CD"? Do they mean "less noise to clean up when doing analog-to-digital conversion for making a CD"? Or do they mean "you can totally make high-fidelity cassette copies of your CDs!" I think it's the second one.

@paulrickards Now that ImageWriter and LQ support are looking reasonable, I went back to looking at what to do about LaserWriter emulation. The LW8 driver wants me to execute a PostScript query before it will send anything else. Fortunately this query is documented in the ASIP Security Protocol publication found here: https://leopard-adc.pepas.com/documentation/macos8/pdf/ASIPPrintServer.pdf

Time to gather more traces and see how my Brother printer responds.

@thomasfuchs That is some sweet matching audio gear. Analog VU meters and backlit dials and heavy metal knobs and switches everywhere! I used to pore over the Pacific Stereo and Federated ads in the Sunday papers, wishing I could afford a decent system. By the time I could, everything had switched to plastic buttons and LEDs.

As for recording levels, I just rely on the VU meters to tell me that the input signal level isn't too low or too high.

@kims I once referred to someone else with the same initials as "JK" in the presence of a mutual colleague. I was immediately corrected: "there is only one JK, and we all know who that is."

@thomasfuchs Shouldn't that be "Magic Beans Subscription" and "Snake Oil Rental"?

@whitequark
[Chorus]
Is that what you want?
(Is it what you want?)
Is it what you really want?
(Is it what you really want?)
Is that what you want?
(Is it what you want?)
Is it what you really want?
-- Yours Truly, 2095 (from "Time" by Electric Light Orchestra)

@WarnerCrocker If you order clothing from ChatGPT, I feel like you would need to be very specific on details like how many arm holes and leg holes to provide.

@mac84tv What is in that MacWrite file named "BigMac.let", I wonder.

@thomasfuchs Yes. See alt text in the image for links.

Here's another case of a single pixel conveying information. In System 3.2/Finder 5.3, you could distinguish a Mac which had been upgraded with the new 128K Mac Plus ROM by looking at the amount of memory displayed in "About the Finder". If the machine has the newer ROM, then a dot is displayed at the end, e.g. "4096K."

#macintosh #retrocomputing

The 12 Disks of Christmas

#macintosh #retrocomputing

@amszmidt More choices:
- subroutine
- procedure
- function
- method
- closure