Someone is happy. New gadgets arrived to Ahmed from Microsoft

[kpete]

https://twitter.com/YL_Ninja/status/645387401662042112

[Wilms]

1. Call the cops!

Look! He's making a gang symbol. And where did he get all that bling? Prolly stole it. Right?

[csziggy]

2. Uh-Oh - he's going to be too busy with new toys to invent new things!

I know Microsoft wouldn't do it, but someone should send him a box of computer components so he can build his own machine - and install Linux on it!

Ahmed would learn more with random old computer parts than he will with all that shiny new stuff, in my opinion.

I taught myself how to build my own computers with old computers from family members. I made working computers from a TRS-80, 286s, 486s, up to the first Pentium computers - found operating systems, programs, and how to advice all online or from helpful computer geeks. (The only old computers that were completely useless and I was unable to get working were a batch of Apple ][e boxes. Apple guards their software far too well, even for the old systems and Apple users are an unhelpful bunch who refuse to share their old crap. The computers still worked but had no OS or programs.) My husband and I gave away over 30 functional computers in five years during this learning period.

[ret5hd]

4. Oh, don't be so sure!!! I see the potential makings of an ICBM on that desk!

I think SWAT should take him down just to be sure!

[hunter]

9. Or horrors (to Microsoft!) he gets Linux running on the Microsoft bling.

The Apple II and Mac hacker scene was very active but a little further underground than the people messing with Atari, Commodore, and PC stuff. A major hurdle on the Apple II machines, and early Macs, was the unique disk drive hardware and file formats.

Plenty of Apple II and later Mac stuff was available on BBS's, Fidonet, and the pre-WWW internet, even cracked games and other sketchy stuff, but you had to have the Apple hardware or be able to hack together your own to make it work.

I was simply uninterested. My inexpensive junkyard Atari and PC stuff could be made to work together without much fuss. A PC could read Atari stuff, an Atari could read PC stuff without much trouble. My first disk drive, an Atari 1050 5¼", was very hackable. Later I modded an Atari XF551 with a 3½" 720k drive.

These days I emulate in Linux all the computers I've ever used at work or at home.

[csziggy]

11. Oh - I like that idea - someone send Ahmed to a Linux site!

In the late 1990s when I was messing with the old computers very little of the early Apple][ stuff survived online that I could find. And not one Apple person was willing to help me at all even though I was working with the computers just to learn and giving them away to people who could not otherwise get a computer.

Even though my first computer was an Apple][ (not + or e, just ][) when I needed to replace it I went over to PC clones. To do what I needed for my business a Packard Bell XT and shareware software cost me a third of what a Mac of that era cost. I simply could not justify the cost of an Apple product at that point. Sure, the Mac had better graphics but they were not required for my business at that point (about 1988).

By the time I next upgraded in 1993 Windows 3.1 was out and I moved to it with a 486 custom ordered from Micron. After that it was all Windows for me - by the time Linux in a consumer friendly version was out I had too much invested in Windows programs to change over. Sure there are Windows emulators but at a cost of efficiency.

These days I don't have time or energy to spend learning a new OS and new software. I still have thousands of antique family photos to scan, categorize and get online as well as researching the genealogy that goes with them. I understand that Linux is much easier to use than it was when I tried it in the late 1990s but that came too late for me. I've moved on.

[hunter]

13. The first "real" operating system I knew was BSD.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berkeley_Software_Distribution

After brief detours through DRDOS and then Windows 3.1 up to 98SE, Linux was like coming home again.

[csziggy]

14. Never even hear of that one!

While running my business I simply didn't have the time to get into operating systems or building computers. I just needed basic software for accounting and billing. Email and internet surfing were bonuses.

Once my injuries added up and I could no longer run my farm full time, I got into re-building old computers for a few years. Then when scanners got affordable and I could afford a Windows computer with decent graphics, I got into scanning the old photos.

Now, even though it's a hobby, that is my all consuming passion. I've been designated the archivist for both my family and my husband's family records - and those go back a long, long way.

[NBachers]

31. I started with GeoWorks Ensemble from Berkeley Softworks

Last edited Mon Sep 21, 2015, 02:49 AM - Edit history (1)

I loved the GeoWorks and it's subsequent New Deal versions, but they kind of got left behind with hardware and software upgrades.

I had a 486 built by a computer store in Cupertino (maybe Lex Micro) just so I could load GeoWorks Ensemble on it. When the floppy disks failed to install, the geniuses at GeoWorks in Berkeley insisted that it couldn't be a problem with their product, sending me back down to Cupertino to accuse the store of selling me a lemon. After they proved their product was fine, I took it all up to GeoWorks in Berkeley and made them do their own installation. "I'm a disgruntled customer - and I'm capable of everything a disgruntled customer is capable of." They sent the security guard along with me for the installation.

After they verified that *well well* their floppies were defective, I got a good installation, and a good set of 3 1/2" disks. I've still got the disks and the manuals. But I'm still bugged by the arrogant jerks who couldn't just offer to send me a new set of disks when the originals failed.

[hunter]

36. Geoworks runs under DosBox, even on ARM hardware.

It's one of the old computers I emulate on my desktop.

I never upgrade to new computer without bringing all my old computers along in a kind of virtual reality.

There was some small tweak I had to do to get Geoworks running under DosBox but that was it, and it's lived on my machines ever since, just as it was in the 'nineties. I wrote a lot of stuff using Geoworks, and so did my kids.

The desktop version is still available here:

http://www.breadbox.com

I first saw it running on IBM hardware, where it was sold as alternative Operating System for home and school use, somewhat comparable to the Macintosh. Microsoft Windows was still primitive at the time.

Geoworks was originally developed for the Commodore 8-bits. I hadn't used it there. I was, and still am, an Atari 8-bit fan. (My favorite Atari computers are also emulated on my Linux desktop.)

Geoworks desktop got bulldozed under by Microsoft, and then Apple handing out hardware to schools like a crack dealer. Geoworks decided to go after the "mobile device" market, abandoning support of their IBM PC desktop system. It's possible this explains their crankiness with you.

During one of my time-outs from college I was hired at a big mainframe computer manufacturer that was in the process of collapsing. The atmosphere was unpleasant, in a huge mostly dark building with very small well-lit islands of chaos. The pay was pretty good, but the ship was clearly sinking. The only people left were those who hadn't yet fled, a few optimists and near-retirement age people, but a lot more grouchy people who hadn't found new jobs yet, or emergency hires like me, needed to keep the place running to service mostly government contracts, maintaining ancient (in computer years) hardware and software.

[NBachers]

37. If I could click over to Geoworks Ensemble easily, I'd probably still use it.

[hunter]

38. I've retired to a version of Markdown for all my non-DU internet rants.

Just Plain Old Text. Convertible to HTML or not, it doesn't matter. Looks fine, whatever.

http://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown

The DU text editor works almost as well. It's got what I need.

As Linux evolved there came a day when I could read all my old BSD writings with no hassles at all.

Recovering my writings in Microsoft Windows 3.1 thru 98SE was not always so easy.

My Geoworks stuff was usually plain text, but most all the rest worked well exported as .rtf files easily converted to html.

[jtuck004]

10. Blanket training

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Blanket training is a type of corporal punishment used to discipline infants and toddlers. Proponents believe that blanket training trains very young children to stay on a blanket.[1] Critics consider it a form of child abuse.[2]

Blanket training is a method adapted from the methods encouraged in To Train Up a Child, a controversial[3] parenting book. The book teaches parents several methods of corporal punishment with implements;[1] using implements to inflict pain as a form of discipline is explicitly denounced by the American Academy of Pediatrics.[4] To Train Up a Child has been linked to the deaths[5] of several children whose parents owned the book and used its methods.[2]
To blanket train a child, a caretaker places the infant or toddler on a blanket and inflicts pain on the child when he or she attempts to leave the blanket. Proponents of blanket training[6] believe that eventually the child will stay on the blanket without adult intervention or enforcement because the child has come to associate leaving the blanket with pain.[1]

-Michelle Duggar talks about how she raises people using this method. I don't think she mentions that they sometimes later become predators.
......................


The other side of blanket training is to give them objects they associate with pleasure, further encouragement to stay on the blanket. (or in the party, but that's another post)

Very effective, can be done in the privacy of your own home, or in a school.

He already has linux - he is programming arduino controllers - so there is hope. <G> It will be a momentary distraction, but I bet he is back on a decent OS soon.

[jrandom421]

18. Why should he install linux on anything?

Here's what he got

• Raspberry Pi2 Windows Maker Kits
• 3D Systems 3D printer + scanner
• Surface Pro 3 + Surface Arc Mouse
• Microsoft Band
• MSDN subscription
• Microsoft Store gift card (he lives close to one of our stores)

Since he got the Windows Maker kits, why should he bother with Linux?

Go Ahmed! Make cooler stuff!!

[IDemo]

20. Not that he necessarily should install Linux, but

that is a very common thing to do in R&D labs on single-board computers such as Raspberry Pi, Arduino and Beagle boards for product development and testing purposes.

[pinboy3niner]

21. Don't ask me. I already know this is all above my head and Ahmed is much smarter than I am.

[DAMANgoldberg]

23. He may have also gotten Azure credits...

This way, he can run Linux in a Docker container or in a Virtual Machine (VirtualBox, or other VM software). The RPi2 NOOBS is various flavors of Linux, but can also run Win10.

[pinboy3niner]

24. Oh, darn. I was hoping for an explanation in English.

[jrandom421]

25. Yes he does get Azure credits

from the MSDN subscription. Since he's gotten the whole Windows 10 makers kits, it would be a lot easier to use that than the NOOBS distribution, especially since the kits support .NET 4.52 and he can use PowerShell.

As for Azure, he can certainly get a Linux VM on it, but since he has the MSDN subscription, why not Windows Server 2012 R2 Enterprise? A whole lot more easily scalable than Linux!

[DAMANgoldberg]

30. I forgot about the MSDN including Azure...

I am a Windows fan and user, but only know enough about Ubuntu's flavor of Linux to be dangerous. With Azure, he can do VMs in both somebody's distro of Linux and Win Server 2012. Plus he can use VS Code and Xamarin on his Linux. I suspect he will use Windows 10 maker kits, I sure would if I received a Pi2, Xbox, and Surface Pro.

[tblue37]

3. K&R. nt

[GummyBearz]

5. See, corporations are good

They are so generous, and not bigoted. This is why they shouldn't just be equal to people, they should have even more rights! Yay microsoft!

[marym625]

6. This kid will go far.

I'm so glad this is staying in the news. The more he's celebrated, the worse that school and police look.

[jtuck004]

7. Cute gesture. Note: He uses Linux for real work.<G>

But it will give him some cool trading stuff at his new school.

[MineralMan]

8. Score! Nice batch of fun devices for

that kid.

[Arkana]

12. It's a win-win for Microsoft.

It costs them next to nothing and they get good press out of it.

[madokie]

15. awesome

[yuiyoshida]

16. THIS PHOTO MUST BE DRIVING

Sarah Palin Nuts.... good. let HER STEW!!!

[dickthegrouch]

17. I hope his dad understands the tax implications

Otherwise they might come to arrest a second member of the same family... for an equally trumped-up reason.

[jrandom421]

19. It comes to less than $10,000

the max allowable for gifts. Nothing to worry about.

[Nye Bevan]

29. Gift tax (if any) is owed by the giver of the gift, not the recipient (nt)

[Initech]

22. How can I get a free Surface Pro 3?

[ScreamingMeemie]

33. Get arrested for doing absolutely nothing wrong at the tender

age of 14 for starters.

[romanic]

26. Look at all dat swag!

[RandySF]

27. Good Lord. The Palins would have no idea what to do with any of it.

[IDemo]

34. EBay, or trade it for snowmobile repairs

[pa28]

28. Nice to see a smile on that kid's face!

[Jeroen]

32. OMG Now he's only 24 days away from his first nuke n/t

[greytdemocrat]

35. FREE STUFF!!!!!