I disagree strongly

Post #226,213 by ben_tilly 9/23/05 3:53:52 PM Reply	I disagree strongly Good IT people have a sensitive nose for management BS, and a tendancy to see it where it might not be. "Team building" activities have a familiar whiff that triggers negative reactions. My experience suggests that official team building activities range from unnecessary to harmful for a good team. The best case is that the team is working well together anyways, and the team building activity is superflous. The worst case is that the team gets the message that management thinks that this little trip (taken out of lives that have other things - like families - in them) is a replacement for actually addressing whatever problems may exist. In which case it cements communication barriers. In a good team she should be getting plenty of offers to be part of the team. Good teams don't get and stay that way by accident. But it is up to her to take advantage of them. A not entirely random book recommend on this topic: Peopleware. I've heard more than once that Microsoft made it their policy in the late 80s and early 90s to give every new manager a copy, and then to quiz them in the hallways enough that people were sure that the copy had been read. And this was one of the secrets to Microsoft's success. I believe it. Cheers, Ben I have come to believe that idealism without discipline is a quick road to disaster, while discipline without idealism is pointless. -- Aaron Ward (my brother)
Post #226,218 by jb4 9/23/05 6:03:00 PM Reply	Gee! I didn't know Peopleware expoused monopolistic, predatory practices. I thought it was a management tome, not a blueprint for neocon/~~canabal~~capitalistic marketsturm! But what do I know.... jb4 shrub●bish (Am., from shrub* + rubbish, after the derisive name for America's 43 president; 2003) n. 1. a form of nonsensical political doubletalk wherein the speaker attempts to defend the indefensible by lying, obfuscation, or otherwise misstating the facts; GIBBERISH. 2. any of a collection of utterances from America's putative 43rd president. cf.* BULLSHIT
Post #226,226 by ben_tilly 9/23/05 7:22:16 PM Reply	It doesn't What people lose sight of, though, is that Microsoft not only does the whole predatory monopoly, but they also did a lot of good programming. Their development goals do not match mine, but anyone who denies that they have a lot of smart, competent people has a severe case of head-up-ass syndrome. Cheers, Ben I have come to believe that idealism without discipline is a quick road to disaster, while discipline without idealism is pointless. -- Aaron Ward (my brother)
Post #226,242 by Ashton 9/23/05 9:25:16 PM Reply	Expand? Really, I see I have little idea how 'smart' actually, Are the acolytes there ?? We hear about smart folk Hired-away, of course - and then assimilated (or not). But is there much indication that The Campus, in fact trains people who could do World-class work - elsewhere? (Not a rhetorical question, BTW.) The SS was pretty efficient too, though I'm not sure which way an idea of, smart, competent people would fit within a comparison of those particular Germans of the '30s. (The Maya were efficient at heart surgery, etc. No an\ufffdsthesia, either! - it was said to be over ~before you noticed.) But you re-raise here a certain wonderment about the birth-process of a new Softie: how, when? is the Koolaid spiked, such that all those internal machinations for breaking others' apps (and similar Dirty-tricks) are seamlessly incorporated into the Plan for a new piece of s/ware: AND made to appear to be routine Bizness. Is some of this work "great coding generally", or Great coding-to-a M$ recipe? Are these qualities the same, also interchangeable? And while appreciating 'efficiency', I wonder then, how many millions M$ spent (on a patently M$-only 'Final Solution') - anticipating that W2K + AD would next take over the network world. Hmm maybe they did.. is AD now Popular? (I recall W2K sales as having been 'disappointing', but - HTF would I know what that meant.) Was that then, efficient planning? And (way over My head, of course): what was it like re-engineering Kerberos for umm incompatibility: Nasty? Neutral? (hard.. or easy..) Not rabid, just skeptical - insufficient knowledge, I expect. Still, in the end.. maybe Efficiency isn't quite enough, to earn Admiration? Now with new leadership - - I can still recall the thread by one daleross, an M$ protege - "if it's legal it's ethical". But that's not about coding. Is it? Unless the code cripples the 'Partner's new OS/2 Offering or the DRDOS and then ... well, it does Do what you wanted it to do. (I get so confused when trying to actually relate Can I? to Should I? - but I see that I don't really know how that relates to Great Coding, do I?)
Post #226,251 by drewk 9/23/05 10:02:23 PM Reply	Kerberos was easy There was a field whose use was defined in the original specification as being optional. MS defined a non-optional use, then patented their implementation. === Purveyor of Doc Hope's [link\|http://DocHope.com\|fresh-baked dog biscuits and pet treats]. [link\|http://DocHope.com\|http://DocHope.com]
Post #226,266 by ben_tilly 9/24/05 1:10:59 AM Reply	Put it this way Many Microsoft applications were clearly best of breed. Yes, nasty, underhanded tricks were used to make those products dominant. But many Microsoft products from Excel to Internet Explorer really were superior to their direct competition at the time. Particularly when measured by the criteria that Microsoft was trying to win by - ease of development for third parties and ease of use. That didn't happen by accident. It didn't always happen either. For instance their operating systems often were not as good as the competition, but they weren't trying to be either. They already had a monopoly and their goal was to extend it, which gets in the way of a quality product. But whatever their goals were, for a long time Microsoft hit them very reliably. That requires talent, discipline, and a solid organization. Never let your dislike blind you to their strengths. Cheers, Ben I have come to believe that idealism without discipline is a quick road to disaster, while discipline without idealism is pointless. -- Aaron Ward (my brother)
Post #226,276 by Ashton 9/24/05 6:55:57 AM Reply	OK I can appreciate certain aspects; always with reservation Imagine though, if Billy&Bally/They'd possessed the integrity of say, a Tektronix (Once - Standard of the World for, simply unarguably - the Best State/Art electronic equipment ever produced anywhere. Also started, run by an engineer. Successfully. Also pioneering in the s/ware as digital became both possible and then more refined; ie correlation applies. Just not mass-market - or that aim, either.) Imagine! ..instead of a Me-Me-Me obsessed spoiled-brat-pair, whose largest talent was and remains: Marketing. Now that IS 'Something', even I concede - but is it ever a Something that isn't inherently tawdry, crass - and Mainly about hornswoggling the marks? 'Excellence' never rising beyond YAN lying-slogan, etc. Power/Wealth like 'ol Chainsaw and the others - but tinhorns all the way. (Digital Research, flawed by the usual Ego-problems as plague all 'quests'- at least never lost technical integrity.. however one picks a version.. of the means of their losing the IBM entr\ufffde to Billy's mom's lobbying of the IBM droids -- just after that Missed opportunity.) Heh, all those opportunities .. when people Didn't assassinate Hitler, too - Cosmic Humor; it's Everywhere.
Post #226,533 by JayMehaffey 9/26/05 12:34:34 PM Reply	Better because of dirty tricks Many Microsoft applications were clearly best of breed. Yes, nasty, underhanded tricks were used to make those products dominant. But many Microsoft products from Excel to Internet Explorer really were superior to their direct competition at the time. Particularly when measured by the criteria that Microsoft was trying to win by - ease of development for third parties and ease of use. It should also be kept in mind that Microsoft applications where better in part exactly becasue of underhanded tricks. Remember that the Microsoft anti-trust suits had as much to do with undocumented APIs as anything. When Excel first came out it was the fastest Windows spreadsheet because it used undocumented memory APIs to give it better memory access. Word made us of file access APIs that nobody else knew about so it could load files faster and easier. In the late Win 3.1 and early Win95 eras there was a whole genre of programming books that did nothing but cover undocumented and secret APIs. Microsoft abandoned that method only because the lawsuits made it too risky and better Windows programming tools made it too easy for outside developers to find the APIs. Jay
Post #226,569 by tuberculosis 9/26/05 3:17:56 PM Reply	You need to remember Excel and Word shipped first on the Mac and they were a couple of the best apps on the Mac at the time. Windows was born of Gates' frustration with Apple's low marketshare and refusal to license the OS externally. He wanted a more widely available platform on which to sell his warez. It was never about building a great OS, it is about providing a compatibility layer for Word and Excel. The original Word and Excel apps on the Mac really were great apps in a lot of ways (although they had an annoying habit of bypassing the Mac Toolbox to do things which resulted in compatibility problems for lots of people). "Whenever you find you are on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect" --Mark Twain "The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them." --Albert Einstein "This is still a dangerous world. It's a world of madmen and uncertainty and potential mental losses." --George W. Bush
Post #226,523 by jb4 9/26/05 11:20:58 AM Reply	Not since 1986 they havent! What people lose sight of, though, is that Microsoft not only does the whole predatory monopoly, but they also did a lot of good programming. Oh, yeah? Really? You mean like, for example, QuickC? Or Microsoft C V6.0? Or Dos 4 (either version)? Or whatever they called their "Procomm Killer"? Or NT (which had to be rewritten from scratch twice, and not even Dave Cutler could rescue; can you say graphics engine in Ring 0? I knew you could)? Or Clippy? Or (I'm sorry, I just can't resist...) BOB?!? Puh-leeze! The last decent piece of work Microsoft ever did was Microsoft C V4.0. And that was in 1986! [...] but anyone who denies that they have a lot of smart, competent people has a severe case of head-up-ass syndrome. They may well have some smart people there (after, it takes quite a bit of brain-bending to keep their current warm, steaming heaps something resembling running). I'm still waiting for empirical evidence of same. But assuming you are, indeed, correct, it's just too bad those alleged smart competent people are not allowed to show themselves. jb4 shrub●bish (Am., from shrub* + rubbish, after the derisive name for America's 43 president; 2003) n. 1. a form of nonsensical political doubletalk wherein the speaker attempts to defend the indefensible by lying, obfuscation, or otherwise misstating the facts; GIBBERISH. 2. any of a collection of utterances from America's putative 43rd president. cf.* BULLSHIT
Post #226,525 by drewk 9/26/05 11:30:10 AM Reply	You're judging them wrong Their products are very good at doing what they want them to do. Whether they do what you want them to do is entirely incidental. === Purveyor of Doc Hope's [link\|http://DocHope.com\|fresh-baked dog biscuits and pet treats]. [link\|http://DocHope.com\|http://DocHope.com]
Post #226,542 by inthane-chan 9/26/05 1:01:58 PM Reply	Amen. There's a guy I knew there named [link\|http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/\|Raymond Chen]. Total and complete asshole. If he found a bug in your department's product, he'd check out the source, write up a fix, then send the fix, diffs, and an all staff e-mail indicating what a bunch of idiots everybody in your department was for missing something as simple as what he had fixed. I actually worked IN his department for 4 months - not something I'd want to do again. OTOH, I watched this guy read a debug stream from Wordperfect in RAW HEX and figure out exactly where a nasty compatability issue with a prebuild of Win2k was cropping up. He was most definitely NOT stupid, and he definitely had some skills. (He was also a completely amoral antisocial git, but that goes without saying at Microsoft.) When somebody asks you to trade your security for freedom, it isn't your freedom they're talking about.
Post #226,544 by ben_tilly 9/26/05 1:09:54 PM Reply	ICLRPD (new thread) Created as new thread #226543 titled [link\|/forums/render/content/show?contentid=226543\|ICLRPD] I have come to believe that idealism without discipline is a quick road to disaster, while discipline without idealism is pointless. -- Aaron Ward (my brother)
Post #227,262 by pwhysall 9/30/05 7:25:38 AM Reply	Re: Amen. (He was also a completely amoral antisocial git, but that goes without saying at Microsoft.) Hey, you worked there. Oh, wait... Peter [link\|http://www.no2id.net/\|Don't Let The Terrorists Win] [link\|http://www.kuro5hin.org\|There is no K5 Cabal] [link\|http://guildenstern.dyndns.org\|Home] Use P2P for legitimate purposes!
Post #227,306 by inthane-chan 9/30/05 10:54:08 AM Reply	He was an employee. I never was.
Post #226,563 by jb4 9/26/05 3:00:01 PM 9/26/05 3:00:49 PM Reply	Point taken! ;-) Still, what did they want BOB to do?!? Enquiring minds want to know... jb4 shrub●bish (Am., from shrub* + rubbish, after the derisive name for America's 43 president; 2003) n. 1. a form of nonsensical political doubletalk wherein the speaker attempts to defend the indefensible by lying, obfuscation, or otherwise misstating the facts; GIBBERISH. 2. any of a collection of utterances from America's putative 43rd president. cf.* BULLSHIT Edited by jb4 Sept. 26, 2005, 03:00:49 PM EDT Expand All History
Post #226,567 by inthane-chan 9/26/05 3:09:45 PM Reply	Get BillG laid, that's what.
Post #226,568 by tuberculosis 9/26/05 3:14:09 PM Reply	Maybe they should have written Microsoft Babe give him something to practice on. "Whenever you find you are on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect" --Mark Twain "The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them." --Albert Einstein "This is still a dangerous world. It's a world of madmen and uncertainty and potential mental losses." --George W. Bush
Post #226,588 by ben_tilly 9/26/05 5:27:13 PM Reply	Um, Inthane is right. And it worked. If you don't have a clue what we're talking about, who was in charge of Microsoft Bob? Cheers, Ben I have come to believe that idealism without discipline is a quick road to disaster, while discipline without idealism is pointless. -- Aaron Ward (my brother)
Post #226,589 by tuberculosis 9/26/05 5:31:45 PM Reply	Ohhhhhhhhhh. I didn't realize that was the angle. "Whenever you find you are on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect" --Mark Twain "The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them." --Albert Einstein "This is still a dangerous world. It's a world of madmen and uncertainty and potential mental losses." --George W. Bush
Post #226,797 by jb4 9/27/05 6:10:41 PM Reply	So lemme get this straight... ..BOB was the software equivalent of a blow-up doll?!? Suh-weeet! Why am I not surprised? Screwed all of us, dinit? jb4 shrub●bish (Am., from shrub* + rubbish, after the derisive name for America's 43 president; 2003) n. 1. a form of nonsensical political doubletalk wherein the speaker attempts to defend the indefensible by lying, obfuscation, or otherwise misstating the facts; GIBBERISH. 2. any of a collection of utterances from America's putative 43rd president. cf.* BULLSHIT
Post #226,601 by boxley 9/26/05 7:03:20 PM Reply	nt 3.5.1 dam fine OS, NT4 is where they screwed the pooch and gave application access to ring 0. thanx, bill "the reason people don't buy conspiracy theories is that they think conspiracy means everyone is on the same program. Thats not how it works. Everybody has a different program. They just all want the same guy dead. Socrates was a gadfly, but I bet he took time out to screw somebodies wife" Gus Vitelli Any opinions expressed by me are mine alone, posted from my home computer, on my own time as a free american and do not reflect the opinions of any person or company that I have had professional relations with in the past 49 years. meep questions, help? [link\|mailto:pappas@catholic.org\|email pappas at catholic.org]
Post #226,798 by jb4 9/27/05 6:15:31 PM Reply	Beg to differ! NT 3.anything was the equivalent of my ex-girlfriend's Peugeot: It's ugly, but it sure is slow! And what was the "new technology" that gave NT its "name"? Protected memory spaces...Something they had on 16-bit PDP-11's 20 years before, ferchrissakes! Big fuckin innovation there, all right! Finally using the feature (and poorly at that) that Intel had been puting into their processor chips for the preceeding 8 fuckin years! Right fine piece of "innovation", that...yeppir! Who you crappin, box?!? jb4 shrub●bish (Am., from shrub* + rubbish, after the derisive name for America's 43 president; 2003) n. 1. a form of nonsensical political doubletalk wherein the speaker attempts to defend the indefensible by lying, obfuscation, or otherwise misstating the facts; GIBBERISH. 2. any of a collection of utterances from America's putative 43rd president. cf.* BULLSHIT
Post #226,800 by Ashton 9/27/05 6:39:57 PM Reply	Wasn't that the last NT to pass the Orange book (whatever) 'Certification' re security (the first they'd actually heard of that word..?) Or was that V3.50? -- providing it was in a locked room with no floppy; nothing connected to it. ie Ed Curry redux. And they Imported, did they not? == Hired-away some mega-Honcho (was he ex-DEC?) to do it all: for the little drop-out preppie guys to attribute to M$ Innovation. And: none of the above has occurred re Govmint 'Security' tests since? (Yet all the Govmint folks buy the add-ons at $Bs - I'm pretty sure that part is true.) (And.. I Loved the Ring-0 dissertations, first time around - why, even moi could grok what a lazy 'driver'-makin jockey might do.. right there in the hen house.) What a joke, them 'Standards'. And 'Security Proofs' cha cha cha
Post #226,803 by ben_tilly 9/27/05 6:57:58 PM Reply	Not by my recollection NT 3.50, service pack 3. Ed Curry claimed he could have had 3.51 certified fast. NT 4.0, no way. Eventually, many service packs later (6?), NT 4.0 managed to pass a UK test which Microsoft claimed was "equivalent" to the US test. I've not seen proof of that equivalence, nor have I heard of any later version of Windows passing such a security audit. Cheers, Ben I have come to believe that idealism without discipline is a quick road to disaster, while discipline without idealism is pointless. -- Aaron Ward (my brother)
Post #226,808 by Ashton 9/27/05 7:18:34 PM Reply	Ah so - it remains ephemeral er, 'inferential'.
Post #226,961 by folkert 9/28/05 2:57:48 PM Reply	On only certain hardware. With no Network Card, Modem, Floppy or CDROM. -- [link\|mailto:greg@gregfolkert.net\|greg], [link\|http://www.iwethey.org/ed_curry\|REMEMBER ED CURRY!] @ *i_wethey* [image\|http://www.danasoft.com/vipersig.jpg\|\|\|\|]
Post #226,982 by ben_tilly 9/28/05 5:00:44 PM Reply	Right I have come to believe that idealism without discipline is a quick road to disaster, while discipline without idealism is pointless. -- Aaron Ward (my brother)
Post #226,993 by jb4 9/28/05 6:15:14 PM Reply	Honcho == Dave Cutler (ex of DEC) But, you see, it's OK for Micros~1 to raid and ravage its "competitors" for talent, but should a "competitor return the favor, it's greeted by lawsuits and flying furniture. jb4 shrub●bish (Am., from shrub* + rubbish, after the derisive name for America's 43 president; 2003) n. 1. a form of nonsensical political doubletalk wherein the speaker attempts to defend the indefensible by lying, obfuscation, or otherwise misstating the facts; GIBBERISH. 2. any of a collection of utterances from America's putative 43rd president. cf.* BULLSHIT
Post #228,559 by static 10/7/05 12:10:25 AM Reply	Sounds like how Disney does business... d-_-b
Post #228,574 by Ashton 10/7/05 2:50:14 AM Reply	My theory, like the 'single electron' one is that there's One talented person left - who time-shares like that One electron; the rest are all MBAs or wannabes.
Post #229,875 by jb4 10/17/05 5:22:07 PM Reply	The Heisenberg Talented Engineer theory... jb4 shrub●bish (Am., from shrub* + rubbish, after the derisive name for America's 43 president; 2003) n. 1. a form of nonsensical political doubletalk wherein the speaker attempts to defend the indefensible by lying, obfuscation, or otherwise misstating the facts; GIBBERISH. 2. any of a collection of utterances from America's putative 43rd president. cf.* BULLSHIT

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