changed subject for experiement on threading orders
in [Laptops]
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From: BillW50 on 28 May 2010 19:25 On 5/28/2010 12:43 PM, John Rumm wrote: > On 28/05/2010 14:03, BillW50 wrote: > >>> No, I was thinking of its incomplete decoding of mime headers that would >>> cause it to think that there was a broken attachment on a post when a >>> line began: >>> >>> begin something... >>> >>> it took the "begin" as a mime header. >> >> Oh okay. Well TB pops up a box every time I type attachment. As it >> thinks I want to add one into this post. So what other keywords can you >> type to cause other boxes to pop up? > > Don't know what the canonical list is, but "enclosed" triggers it as > well. The attachment thing was new in TB3 IIRC - presumably in response > to the number of times you end up getting a second email entitled "This > time with attachment!". Well okay, it seems something pretty strange to do. But I could get used to it I guess. >>> That was actually a powerfully dumb default that it inherited from >>> windows (and I can't believe they have still not fixed it!), where a >>> double file extension such as picture.jpg.exe would be truncated for >>> display to "picture", and given the default .jpg handler's icon. However >>> when opened it would be treated as the .exe it really was. >> >> Well I don't know why Microsoft doesn't fix some stuff? Well I kind of >> do. As I had a beef with them say around '84 about some bug in their >> MS-DOS that would show up if you were a software developer. >> >> Well it turns out that MS knew about it and they were not going to fix >> it. And the reason was that other software developers already found what >> I found. And they coded their programs around the bug. And MS claimed if >> they fixed the bug, it would break thousands and thousands of programs >> already written. > > Yup, I still have a copy of "undocumented DOS" sat on the shelf - full > of all the little hacks that they would not dare change because all > their software used them, but at the same time they would not make an > official part of the API. Yes well what can I say. >> Well I can see their point. But at least some stuff really does need to >> be really fixed right. I dunno, maybe the CIA and FBI uses this as a >> backdoor to break into dumb criminals computers. > > Perhaps - I suspect they have better ways for the not so dumb criminals > though! Perhaps! I always have this feeling that Microsoft knows a lot of things that they can use to get inside of your computer. And I also have a feeling that Microsoft used this and disclosed some of them to the Justice Department to get them to back off. I dunno! Just a gut feeling. >> I always save attachments anyway. And open them up with a hex editor to >> see what it really is anyway. Thus the whole problem is avoided. > >>>> I believe this has been fixed too. But the work around is and is >>>> probably still a very good idea anyway is to save the attachment. And >>>> the name better end up as a txt type for example. If it isn't, >>>> something >>>> is wrong. ;-) >>> >>> The whole reliance on file extensions for identifying file content and >>> associated apps is very 1970's anyway! >> >> Well I started with computers in the 70's and I still kind of like it. >> So what do you think works better? Having a header included with all >> files that tells what kind of file it is? Works except when you want to >> view a directory of files and the mass storage device has to look up >> every single file in the list to find out what type of file it is. > > The two options that seemed to work reasonably were the system used on > the Amiga where for files intended to be launched by clicking etc there > was an additional .info file. This contained the icon, a link to the > application needed to open it, and toolypes (parameters or environment > variables effectively), plus a few other capabilities. The downside was > an extra file to shift about but it gave good flexibility, freedom from > things fighting over extension associations etc. You could also then > look at a folder at several levels - say choosing to not see all the > minor files without info files. > > The Mac approach was/is similar - but the extra information is encoded > within a separate fork of the file (multiple forks being a concept > supported but under used on NTFS as well interestingly) > > IIRC BEos also had quite a sophisticated system, but that relied on the > clever relational file system it was based on (like the one MS were > building for Vistam or not as it turned out!) And GEOS had used headers in front of the files, programs. >> CBM-DOS used a different method. Somewhat like the extension idea, but >> rather stored the type just after the file name in the directory. And if >> the file type ever ended up being wrong, it was not as easy as changing >> the file extension. > > If you go back to their intelligent GCR encoded floppies etc then there > were only really 4 files types (prg, seq, usr, rel) - and that was more > a statement of architecture than an indication of the app that would > handle them. Actually there was 5 in CBM-DOS v10. DOS was in each floppy drive (in ROM) and not in the computer itself. So depending on the floppy drives, you could have many CBM-DOS running at the same time. I am going by failing memory, but I believe the popular ones were CBM v2.6 (single sided 5 1/4 drive), CBM-DOS v3.x (double sided 5 1/4 drives) and CBM-DOS v10 (3 1/2 drives). That 5th one on v10 was really odd. I believe it was called CBM type. I think Commodore called it a partition, but it acted like both a partition and a subdirectory. As it was listed in the directory as a folder. And you could open it like a folder. But creating it you had to state the size of it. Not by sector, but by whole tracks I believe. >> Another thing about file extensions that I like is that they are easy to >> change. For example, some drivers, games, programs, etc. install autorun >> stuff that you may not need or want. At least running all of the time. >> >> And for these, I add my own second extension. Say like Manager.exe to >> Manager.exe.disabled. Now it is dead in the water and can't start and it >> is out of the way. ;-) > > Disabling autorun altogether works for me! ;-) Yes you can go that route too if you would like. ;-) >> For DOS machines I did the same, except it was also used as a RecycleBin >> too. Instead of deleting files that I wasn't sure I would need again. I >> would change the extension to .DEL. Say a file called data.txt I renamed >> to data_txt.del. And when space started to run low, I would delete all >> or some DEL file types. ;-) > > VMS used to be quite nice to work with in that respect. Files had names, > and versions. So every time you overwrote a file it was actually > recorded as a new version. So main.c;1 would get edited, and you would > then have main.c;2 etc. You can then go back to any previous version at > any time by deleting the most recent or fully specifying the version in > the file name etc. When you were happy to wipe the older versions you > just did a "purge" command to erase all but the last (or specified > number of) generations. Yes all very nice. -- Bill Thunderbird Portable 3.0 (20091130)
From: BillW50 on 28 May 2010 19:27 On 5/28/2010 6:09 PM, dennis(a)home wrote: > > > "BillW50" <BillW50(a)aol.kom> wrote in message > news:htpg34$91k$1(a)news.eternal-september.org... >> On 5/28/2010 7:01 AM, dennis(a)home wrote: >>> >>> >>> "BillW50" <BillW50(a)aol.kom> wrote in message >>> news:hto8hj$oq5$1(a)news.eternal-september.org... >>>> On 5/28/2010 1:58 AM, dennis(a)home wrote: >>> >>> 8< >>> >>>>> I don't know why people use OE at all. >>>> >>>> I do. ;-) >>>> >>>>> It hasn't been maintained for years and was replaced by windows live >>>>> mail. >>>> >>>> WLM hasn't been updated in years either. As it seems like the updates >>>> between OE6 and WLM stopped just months apart from one another. >>> >>> My WLM was updated late last year. >> >> Well I say this from what I have been reading in the Microsoft >> newsgroups since over a year ago. That Microsoft got out of the email >> and newsgroup business and they don't support either one anymore. They >> still offer WLM though if you want to download it. >> >>>>> WLM has the same looks but has most of the OE bugs fixed. >>>> >>>> Actually it has a new interface which is somewhat nice. Although they >>>> separated email from newsgroups. Now instead of glancing at one window >>>> if anything new came in, You have to toggle between email and >>>> newsgroups. Which is more work. >>> >>> Not here. >>> I have email and two news servers that all appear in the same pane on >>> the left. >> >> Really? I must have done something wrong. Can you get the RSS in the >> same window too? > > I don't know as I don't use it for RSS. > I would imagine you can add them to the quick views pane if nothing else. Well I didn't know. Something else to check out. ;-) -- Bill Thunderbird Portable 3.0 (20091130)
From: Tony Bryer on 28 May 2010 20:16 On Fri, 28 May 2010 08:03:54 -0500 BillW50 wrote : > Well I don't know why Microsoft doesn't fix some stuff? Well I kind of > do. As I had a beef with them say around '84 about some bug in their > MS-DOS that would show up if you were a software developer. > > Well it turns out that MS knew about it and they were not going to fix > it. And the reason was that other software developers already found > what I found. And they coded their programs around the bug. And MS > claimed if they fixed the bug, it would break thousands and thousands > of programs already written. Have you read Raymond Chen's 'The Old New Thing' - some of the stories he recounts about things done at MS to keep badly behaved programs working on newer versions of DOS/Windows are amazing. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2006/12/07/1233002.aspx -- Tony Bryer, Greentram: 'Software to build on' Melbourne, Australia www.superbeam.co.uk www.eurobeam.co.uk www.greentram.com
From: Tony Bryer on 28 May 2010 20:16 On Fri, 28 May 2010 08:03:54 -0500 BillW50 wrote : > Which is also funny, since I like MS Office 2000 the best out of all of > the Office versions. I probably would like MS Office 98 a lot too, but > it crashed and burned a lot. Instead of fixing it, MS had you to get MS > Office 2000 instead which is stable IMHO. Having been a Lotus WordPro user since it first came out, I struggle with Word every time I am forced to use it. But I think I may yet have to: WordPro runs on Windows 7 but every time an warning dialog appears first. If MS spent millions on usability studies for Word, I have failed to notice their effect. -- Tony Bryer, Greentram: 'Software to build on' Melbourne, Australia www.superbeam.co.uk www.eurobeam.co.uk www.greentram.com
From: The Natural Philosopher on 29 May 2010 03:40
Tony Bryer wrote: > On Fri, 28 May 2010 08:03:54 -0500 BillW50 wrote : >> Which is also funny, since I like MS Office 2000 the best out of all of >> the Office versions. I probably would like MS Office 98 a lot too, but >> it crashed and burned a lot. Instead of fixing it, MS had you to get MS >> Office 2000 instead which is stable IMHO. > > Having been a Lotus WordPro user since it first came out, I struggle with > Word every time I am forced to use it. But I think I may yet have to: > WordPro runs on Windows 7 but every time an warning dialog appears first. > If MS spent millions on usability studies for Word, I have failed to > notice their effect. > that's because although they did the studies, they followed the results of the second study 'What features make this software look complicated, expensive, impressive and impenetrable, and therefore worth what we want to charge' instead. |