CompuServe Archive

This is an archive of CompuServe forum messages from 1985 to 1995, as saved in transcripts by John Foust.

Search Results (128 messages)

#90451 #AmiExpo Report Message #91048
From: John Freeman The Amiga Forum · Hot News & Rumors October 25, 1987 11:50 PM
That's disturbing. The local Amiga dealer here had exactly the same thing happen to them (I don't know what percentage is involved.) E.g., a busted power supply of poor construction. The A500 is bound to be the "consumer" Amiga for a while due to its cost; I'd had to see…
#90448- #Cops, Courts, Crooks Message #90604
From: John Freeman The Amiga Forum · Off the Cuff October 22, 1987 1:21 AM
I think you may be in a for a pleasant surprise. Ayn Rand is like no other philosopher you have ever read. You may find her critical analysis of modern philosophy very enlightening. Let me know what you think.
#90227 Cops, Courts, Crooks Message #90307
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:34 AM
Note that "It never works … None of it" is a generalized statement which purports to say that generalized statements are useless. I disagree completely that philosophy is just a game. Read "Philosophy: Who Needs It" by Ayn Rand, if you dare…
#90227 Cops, Courts, Crooks Message #90307
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:34 AM
Note that "It never works … None of it" is a generalized statement which purports to say that generalized statements are useless. I disagree completely that philosophy is just a game. Read "Philosophy: Who Needs It" by Ayn Rand, if you dare…
#90209 Cops, Courts, Crooks Message #90306
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:30 AM
Plato … you mean, like the Republic, the original totalitarian blueprint?
#90209 Cops, Courts, Crooks Message #90306
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:30 AM
Plato … you mean, like the Republic, the original totalitarian blueprint?
#90197 Time-Dilation Prove Message #90305
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:29 AM
'Cities in Flight'?
#90197 Time-Dilation Prove Message #90305
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:29 AM
'Cities in Flight'?
#90196 Time-Dilation Prove Message #90304
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:29 AM
The question is whether macroscopic bodies exhibit the same relativistic effects as subatomic and atomic particles. If so, then it will be quite some time before anybody exceeds the sort of speeds achieved in modern accelerators, with say a 1000 ton ship. Relativistic particles behave precisely according to Einstein.
#90196 Time-Dilation Prove Message #90304
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:29 AM
The question is whether macroscopic bodies exhibit the same relativistic effects as subatomic and atomic particles. If so, then it will be quite some time before anybody exceeds the sort of speeds achieved in modern accelerators, with say a 1000 ton ship. Relativistic particles behave precisely according to Einstein.
#90217 Cops, Courts, Crooks Message #90303
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:26 AM
Statistics isn't proof of anything. Suppose the drunken dummy has already made plans to be taken home? You're saying he should be arrested in the bar? Ridiculous. Should the barkeep? No. If someone chooses to drink themselves into a stupor, of their own accord, that's their business. It only becomes…
#90217 Cops, Courts, Crooks Message #90303
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:26 AM
Statistics isn't proof of anything. Suppose the drunken dummy has already made plans to be taken home? You're saying he should be arrested in the bar? Ridiculous. Should the barkeep? No. If someone chooses to drink themselves into a stupor, of their own accord, that's their business. It only becomes…
#90212 Cops, Courts, Crooks Message #90302
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:22 AM
You don't understand very much about Objectivism if you don't understand the basis of morality (the objective need by humans to have a code of ethics, and the means by which such a system can be found and validated). Galt's speech in Atlas Shrugged covers the issue thoroughly. Additionally, 'Introduction…
#90212 Cops, Courts, Crooks Message #90302
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 20, 1987 2:22 AM
You don't understand very much about Objectivism if you don't understand the basis of morality (the objective need by humans to have a code of ethics, and the means by which such a system can be found and validated). Galt's speech in Atlas Shrugged covers the issue thoroughly. Additionally, 'Introduction…
#89990 #Time-Dilation Prove Message #90012
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 18, 1987 9:14 PM
Aha … one of the famous questions of relativity. The answer is that there is no such thing as a perfectly rigid anything. (I don't want to hear any bad puns!) In fact, energy is transmitted through a material in the form of a sub-light speed wave. Otherwise, you could…
#89990 #Time-Dilation Prove Message #90012
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 18, 1987 9:14 PM
Aha … one of the famous questions of relativity. The answer is that there is no such thing as a perfectly rigid anything. (I don't want to hear any bad puns!) In fact, energy is transmitted through a material in the form of a sub-light speed wave. Otherwise, you could…
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 18, 1987 9:07 PM
The basic problem with "pre-emptive legal action" is it presumes guilt (that hasn't even occured yet!!) It is a major, and common, philosophy error to equate a potential with an actual. Everyone has the physical potential to commit wanton violence. Only a relative handful every actually do. There is a…
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 18, 1987 9:07 PM
The basic problem with "pre-emptive legal action" is it presumes guilt (that hasn't even occured yet!!) It is a major, and common, philosophy error to equate a potential with an actual. Everyone has the physical potential to commit wanton violence. Only a relative handful every actually do. There is a…
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 18, 1987 9:07 PM
The basic problem with "pre-emptive legal action" is it presumes guilt (that hasn't even occured yet!!) It is a major, and common, philosophy error to equate a potential with an actual. Everyone has the physical potential to commit wanton violence. Only a relative handful every actually do. There is a…
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 18, 1987 9:07 PM
The basic problem with "pre-emptive legal action" is it presumes guilt (that hasn't even occured yet!!) It is a major, and common, philosophy error to equate a potential with an actual. Everyone has the physical potential to commit wanton violence. Only a relative handful every actually do. There is a…
#89928 SDP Data Message #90007
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware October 18, 1987 9:01 PM
I thought about this last night and realized it wasn't as tough as I originally thought. I came up with a (untested) 20 instruction routine which does an arbitrary non-overlapping block move, using 32 bytes (8 long word registers) at a time. 32 bytes is a nice number because if…
#89928 SDP Data Message #90007
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware October 18, 1987 9:01 PM
I thought about this last night and realized it wasn't as tough as I originally thought. I came up with a (untested) 20 instruction routine which does an arbitrary non-overlapping block move, using 32 bytes (8 long word registers) at a time. 32 bytes is a nice number because if…
#89721 #SDP Data Message #89782
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware October 17, 1987 1:02 PM
How about on the 68010/68020 with the following sequence: LOOP: MOVE.B (A0)+,(A1)+ DBF D0,LOOP (where D0 has been appropriately set up as a counter) According to Motorola, this will be placed in a small internal cache (don't know about the relation of it to the 68020 which has a 256…
#89721 #SDP Data Message #89782
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware October 17, 1987 1:02 PM
How about on the 68010/68020 with the following sequence: LOOP: MOVE.B (A0)+,(A1)+ DBF D0,LOOP (where D0 has been appropriately set up as a counter) According to Motorola, this will be placed in a small internal cache (don't know about the relation of it to the 68020 which has a 256…
#89677 #SDP Data Message #89706
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware October 17, 1987 2:22 AM
So what is? DMA? Or another instruction?
#89677 #SDP Data Message #89706
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware October 17, 1987 2:22 AM
So what is? DMA? Or another instruction?
#89392- #Cops, Courts, Crooks Message #89419
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 16, 1987 1:25 AM
Looking at the broader perspective, people who want to deaden their consciousness with the use of drugs (who have that right if they so choose, laws or not) are never common in a society where freedom of action is possible, i.e., where one can work to achieve values in a…
#89392- #Cops, Courts, Crooks Message #89419
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Off the Cuff October 16, 1987 1:25 AM
Looking at the broader perspective, people who want to deaden their consciousness with the use of drugs (who have that right if they so choose, laws or not) are never common in a society where freedom of action is possible, i.e., where one can work to achieve values in a…
#73889 #MS-Dos Evasion Message #74254
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Forum Business June 29, 1987 9:13 PM
You must truly be grasping at straws if that's all you can come up with. Actually, there are utility programs available which can do this; I think even some version of the Norton Utilities can do across-directory rename. As far as "extensions" to MSDOS go, every single utility, even down…
#73889 #MS-Dos Evasion Message #74254
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Forum Business June 29, 1987 9:13 PM
You must truly be grasping at straws if that's all you can come up with. Actually, there are utility programs available which can do this; I think even some version of the Norton Utilities can do across-directory rename. As far as "extensions" to MSDOS go, every single utility, even down…
#73721 #Amiga 2000 Message #73798
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Forum Business June 25, 1987 11:56 PM
I am still puzzled at the huge price discrepancy between the Amiga 500 and the 2000; $1300 if my information is correct. Incidentally the local Amiga dealer had a non-functional AMiga 500 on display here. I asked why it wasn't turned on. Evidently the power supply was utterly smashed up…
#73721 #Amiga 2000 Message #73798
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Forum Business June 25, 1987 11:56 PM
I am still puzzled at the huge price discrepancy between the Amiga 500 and the 2000; $1300 if my information is correct. Incidentally the local Amiga dealer had a non-functional AMiga 500 on display here. I asked why it wasn't turned on. Evidently the power supply was utterly smashed up…
#73421 Amiga 2000 Message #73589
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Forum Business June 23, 1987 11:30 PM
No, no connection to "Freefall Associates". (Hmmm, that sounds interesting. Who are they? Private space development?) My classification of an individual as an evader is certainly a considered one; I am well aware of what the term implies. An innocent person who isn't aware of the issue would be curious,…
#73421 Amiga 2000 Message #73589
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Forum Business June 23, 1987 11:30 PM
No, no connection to "Freefall Associates". (Hmmm, that sounds interesting. Who are they? Private space development?) My classification of an individual as an evader is certainly a considered one; I am well aware of what the term implies. An innocent person who isn't aware of the issue would be curious,…
#73123- Amiga 2000 Message #73240
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Forum Business June 21, 1987 3:56 PM
Fine. Don't read my messages. About AmigaDos, you may be one of a few select group of evaders who choose to believe AmigaDos is acceptably fast; everyone else knows that it is slow as molasses. John Foust has some interesting remarks and benchmarks in the latest issue of Amazing Computing…
#73123- Amiga 2000 Message #73240
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Forum Business June 21, 1987 3:56 PM
Fine. Don't read my messages. About AmigaDos, you may be one of a few select group of evaders who choose to believe AmigaDos is acceptably fast; everyone else knows that it is slow as molasses. John Foust has some interesting remarks and benchmarks in the latest issue of Amazing Computing…
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware June 19, 1987 9:56 PM
Think so. Thanks. Am I to infer that you intend to bypass AmigaDos in your future generations of software to gain additional speed, since you mention using the same hardware and you are currently running near the limitations of the existing drivers?
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware June 19, 1987 9:56 PM
Think so. Thanks. Am I to infer that you intend to bypass AmigaDos in your future generations of software to gain additional speed, since you mention using the same hardware and you are currently running near the limitations of the existing drivers?
#72770- hard disk installation Message #72816
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware June 18, 1987 11:45 PM
I have written a recursive copy command for myself, in Turbo Pascal, that traversed directories automatically to copy an entire hard disk to another, a file at a time. Don't know if anyone's ever published one, though.
#72770- hard disk installation Message #72816
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware June 18, 1987 11:45 PM
I have written a recursive copy command for myself, in Turbo Pascal, that traversed directories automatically to copy an entire hard disk to another, a file at a time. Don't know if anyone's ever published one, though.
#72763- hard disk installation Message #72815
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware June 18, 1987 11:40 PM
I would also be interested in such a comparison. Is that something your company is planning on doing? (I.e., compare equivalent hard disk access on a 10 mhz AT clone, heavily loaded with files, doing random record access, with an Amiga and the same hard disk and whatever interface.)
#72763- hard disk installation Message #72815
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware June 18, 1987 11:40 PM
I would also be interested in such a comparison. Is that something your company is planning on doing? (I.e., compare equivalent hard disk access on a 10 mhz AT clone, heavily loaded with files, doing random record access, with an Amiga and the same hard disk and whatever interface.)
#72721- #hard disk installation Message #72814
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware June 18, 1987 11:33 PM
Question: At what point does AmigaDos becoming the limiting speed factor in hard drives? I would be most interested to know.
#72721- #hard disk installation Message #72814
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Hardware June 18, 1987 11:33 PM
Question: At what point does AmigaDos becoming the limiting speed factor in hard drives? I would be most interested to know.
#71550- Amiga 2000 Message #72303
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Forum Business June 16, 1987 12:48 AM
$1995 for a basic Amiga 2000 is comparable in price to a '386 based IBM PC clone, or a 40 meg, 12 mhz AT clone. I can't see paying that much, myself.
#71550- Amiga 2000 Message #72303
From: John Freeman Forum unknown · Forum Business June 16, 1987 12:48 AM
$1995 for a basic Amiga 2000 is comparable in price to a '386 based IBM PC clone, or a 40 meg, 12 mhz AT clone. I can't see paying that much, myself.
From: John Freeman The Amiga Forum · Programming January 2, 1987 11:50 AM
Agreed that is an important proviso. I suppose the appropriate comparison is any person who knows assembly, wants to write the most compact program available (and fast), and whether the compiler can beat them. For a novice, "C" would be better, perhaps. For an expert programmer, and I consider myself…
From: John Freeman DDJ Forum · Hardware January 1, 1987 9:49 PM
I wouldn't buy an Intel Aboveboard myself; far too expensive. I paid, as I recall, about $150 for a 512K expansion board by a "clone" company whose name I forget. Works flawlessly so far (about six months or more.) One should recall that expanding a PC above 640K involves additional…
From: John Freeman The Amiga Forum · Hardware January 1, 1987 9:49 PM
I wouldn't buy an Intel Aboveboard myself; far too expensive. I paid, as I recall, about $150 for a 512K expansion board by a "clone" company whose name I forget. Works flawlessly so far (about six months or more.) One should recall that expanding a PC above 640K involves additional…
From: John Freeman The Amiga Forum · Programming January 1, 1987 9:38 PM
Not to be argumentative — but please name just ONE compiler, in any HLL, that runs on the Amiga, which will produce code that is "as good as or better than hand coded assembly."

Page 1 of 3