Hi Mike,      ...In a msg of , Mad Moose Mike wrote:

 SM>> Still, the one thing that might worry me is that Win98 regularly
 SM>> has trouble managing the apparently difficult "shut down"
 SM>> process.  Go figure, eh?

 MM> Could be related to USB. Win 98 has trouble with that.

Hey, for all I know, it could be related to the phase of the moon.  My
desktop does have a couple of USB ports that I'm not using, but surely
that wouldn't?    ...No wait, we won't "go there."  :-)

What has been really wild is my resuscitating the usefulness of a
Hitachi laptop, by putting in a larger hard drive and switching from
OS/2 to Win98.  In all fairness, I think half of the problems have
come from the Hitachi's slightly weird BIOS, but a fair bit of blame
should go to things like the Windows driver for the video chipset.
I'll spare you any more details, partly because I'm saving them for a
"rant" when the kingston.bbs.fido.users249 newsgroup slows down again.

Anyway...   For whatever reason an improper shutdown, and then the
subsequent disk scan during the next boot, has become a regular
feature of using the laptop.  It's probably what I deserve for trying
to keep using antique computers.  After all, this laptop is around six
or seven years old which makes it quite ancient.


By the way, wasn't it really subtle how I worked in a disguised advert
for the kingston.bbs.fido.users249 newsgroup?  Mentioning it is sorta
part of my long-term "virtual moose migration" policy.  While that
newsgroup was originally started to "gate" a Net249 BBS Users echo, in
the longterm I can see it morphing into a place where current and
former BBS sysops and users can indulge in nostalgia and occasional
technical discussion.  Or. whatever comes to mind, including
Moose-like satire or silliness.     ...After all, having a widely
distributed newsgroup is nothing to "sniff at."  :-)

 SM>> I'm happy for you.  Learning to coexist with your computer's inner
 SM>> daemons can sometimes take the patience of a Zen master.  Congrats!

 MM> Although those "daemons" (or is it "demons"?)
Have been mucking about the

That depends on a few different factors.  Aside from the actual class
of program that's running, and whether it is "good" or whether it has
been seduced by "the dark side," there is also the question of
spelling.  I think that the Unix and Linux gurus like "daemons"
because it's has a sort of archaic "coolness" about it.  Or, is that
"kewlness" I'm referring to?  Anyway, you've definitely asked a very
deep question.

 MM> bottom of the bog lately, stirring up trouble, and making me blue too
 MM> often lately. I don't think it's NT, but likely a third party program
 MM> that's to blame. Don't know which, though, and that's the frustrating
 MM> part. Snort!

It's a shame when various pieces of hardware and software "will not
play well with others."


 SM>> sexy HPFS file system.  ...Or, was Win95 descended OS/2 v2 ?  (Not
 SM>> only are all these "cousin" operating systems
starting to seem almost
 SM>> incestuous, but it's also getting very hard to keep the various
 SM>> lineages straight.

 MM> Nope. Win 9x is pure, 100% Micro$haft manure. It was excreted out of the
 MM> Windoze 3.1 Win 32S project, and is more closely related to Xerox's old
 MM> GUI operating system, developed in 1981 for it's STAR systems, than
 MM> anything else. It was this OS that Micro$haft ripped off for it's original
 MM> Windows v1.0 OS, since Xerox, as part of a business partnership, allowed

I need to try and remember some of that early history.  Somehow I
always blame the M$ success on their deadly ninja marketing teams.

 MM> The high foreheads in Redmond have finally realized that they can't make a
 MM> stable kernal (or even a cob, for that matter) all by themselves; so
 MM> they've fallen back to what they've always found success with: stealing
 MM> someone else's ideas.

Well, that _is_ one of the keys to success, according to all those
self-help books.  ...And no, I don't mean "help yourself to other
people's stuff" but rather the old "go with what you're good at"
adage...:-)  How wonderful that M$ has realized what their strengths
are, and are comfortable enough with their self-image to use those
strengths.  It seems the M$ is a true new-millennium group.  In fact,
if they pull-off the whole "convert users to the NT-style kernel
without telling them what XP really is," I foresee a whole new crop of
books extolling their genius.  Naturally though, they won't mention
the true reason for their success.  At least, not until the statute of
limitations runs out.


 SM>> Right you are.  The question I don't want to answer is whether that
 SM>> laughter is from honest amusement or the result of hysteria resulting
 SM>> from the trauma of using these "user friendly" computers.

 MM>           -+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+---
 MM>          |   Windows Error # 666    |
 MM>          |                          |
 MM>          | Your computer is a P.O.S.|
 MM>          |          ______          |
 MM>          |         |  OK  |         |
 MM>          |         `-+--+-'         |
 MM>           -+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+---

:-)  Win98 didn't come right out and give that type of error message
on my laptop, but it came pretty close.  Meanwhile, there's the
wording of the dread "exception thirteen" error, more commonly known
as "the M$ blue screen of death."  What confused me for a while was
that the same wording and error message is used whether it is only the
one application that has screwed-up or whether the complete OS is
hosed and needs a re-boot.  Regular Windows users have since told me
that you know when the computer needs a re-boot by noticing the subtle
fact that your computer has totally "frozen,"
"crashed," or "died" of
embarrassment...

In defense of my confusion, I'll point out that I've mainly been using
Linux and OS/2 for the last few years and I was therefore not used to
interpreting system error messages.  They were just so rare, eh?


YitWotM,           ...Steve

-
It was the name of the Beast and its number was 10100011010

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