proprietary unix Archives - The Silicon Underground

Why did IBM fail at PCs?

Dave Farquhar — Mon, 03 Jul 2017 11:00:33 +0000

If you ask why did IBM fail, I assume you mean why did IBM ultimately fail in the personal computer market. IBM is still in business, after all. But its exit from the PC market after 24 years, including a

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Advantages and disadvantages of Windows NT 3.1

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 18 May 2017 11:00:38 +0000

I’ve talked a lot about the advantages and disadvantages of old milestone operating systems. But what were the advantages and disadvantages of Windows NT 3.1? That’s a fair question. Advantages of Windows NT 3.1 Windows NT 3.1 was a landmark

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Why we can’t have nice things: The reaction to IBM’s big black and blue quarter

Dave Farquhar — Tue, 21 Oct 2014 11:00:06 +0000

IBM announced yesterday that it had a terrible quarter. They missed earnings, the stock plunged, and Warren Buffett lost a billion dollars. Everyone assumes Warren Buffett is worried, or livid, and selling off the stock like it’s on fire. Here’s

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Bash is worse than heartbleed! Oh noes!

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 25 Sep 2014 11:00:35 +0000

A really bad remote code execution bug surfaced yesterday, in Bash–the GNU replacement for the Unix shell. If you have a webserver running, or possibly just SSH, it can be used to execute arbitrary code. It affects anything Unixy–Linux, BSD, Mac

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Balancing safety and versatility

Dave Farquhar — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 11:02:07 +0000

John C Dvorak has a very simple solution to the HP printing problem. Lock down the firmware so it’s not upgradeable. And while we’re at it, do the same thing to routers and other equipment. This solves the problem of

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Microsoft sold 400 million Windows 7 licenses; what does it mean?

Dave Farquhar — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 11:00:32 +0000

Steve Ballmer announced today that Microsoft has sold 400 million Windows 7 licenses, but anywhere from half to two-thirds of PCs are still running Windows XP and need to get with the program. He also continues to insist Windows 8

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Dinosaur hunting

Dave Farquhar — Sun, 23 May 2010 01:06:01 +0000

Today I slipped over to Laclede Computer Trading Company for the first time in many years. I was in search of an ISA parallel card. They're not easy to find these days, mostly because they aren't particularly useful to most people these days, but I figured if anyone would have one, it would be them.

No dice. But man, what memories.

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