One time, years ago, there was someone who asked me, "You're a software engineer? Do you know how to create letter head in Microsoft Word?"
Being a software engineer doesn't mean I know how to do such-and-such
in any given program..

Working in IT in small companies, people tried to get me to fix lots of

>things that weren't IT related by adding the word "server" to it.

I did general computer work for a few years, upgrades and repairs
and software issues and a number of times I got a call to do a
certain job, but when that was done, they always hit you with,
"Oh there was one other problem you could maybe help me with.."

Could be anything from virus infected software to adding blocks
to keep their kids from going to porn sites.. B)

I recall one time I was working on a system that was in a home
for family use but also had business software on it for the
construction and trucking company they ran. While cleaning up
the business stuff I ran across some porn and I hesitated to
mention it since they were a Very religious family, but I figured
it had to go so I tried to lighten the impact by saying that
sometimes you go to a site and they send you stuff like that
without you even knowing about it.. But the funny part was that
the only one who could have been downloading the porn was the
12 or 13 year old *Daughter*.. (Enter - Nanny Software..)

It's not just for boys anymore.. B)

---
þ SLMR Rob þ ... "Once I thought I was wrong, but I was mistaken."
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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Rob Mccart to POINDEXTER FORTRAN on Sat Nov 29 2025 08:58 am

I recall one time I was working on a system that was in a home for family us but also had business software on it for the construction and trucking company they ran. While cleaning up the business stuff I ran across some por and I hesitated to mention it since they were a Very religious family, but I

Oh, I hated that! It always seemed to be database administrators at one job that would let their kids onto their work laptops - see them with all sorts of game shortcuts on the desktop, game apps set to auto-start, and kids cartoon stickers on the laptop. A couple of them tried to play off obvious physical damage. One told me his spare bar stopped working. He didn't mention the crack in the case that ran right through the spacebar.

"A crack occurred..."

---
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Man, so many people were all about xtree gold.. I was like, what's the big deal? It's just another shell you arrow-key around in. I didn't
mind typing in paths to files. Imagine how stoked I was when I found
tab completion, though ;)

To me, it was a Window manager before we had window managers. For a
time, the last line of my autoexec was to run Xtree.

Norton Commander was nice along the same lines, if memory serves.

IIRC, isn't Midnight Commander a clone of Norton Commander?


* SLMR 2.1a * alnal nathrak uth vaas bethud dothiel dienve
---
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And of course the classic "LIST". Fantastic piece of software.

Just used that a few minutes ago in a dosemu window. LIST was always on my list of extra programs to add to any new DOS install. Now it is on the
list for dos emulator installs. ;)


* SLMR 2.1a * Ensign Walnut approaches Dr. Crusher with caution....
---
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Dude, you beat me to it, I was going to chime in on "LIST". I still use it today, that and QEdit (file editor) and a LIST clone called LOOK.COM

Using QEdit to respond to this message. That one is another essential DOS program.


* SLMR 2.1a * Beware Romulans baring GIFs.
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Dumas Walker wrote to GAMGEE <=-

And of course the classic "LIST". Fantastic piece of software.

Just used that a few minutes ago in a dosemu window. LIST was always
on my list of extra programs to add to any new DOS install. Now it is
on the list for dos emulator installs. ;)

I still use it occassionally when playing in DOSBox. It truly amazes me
as to what it can do, and so easily.

I have often thought that that "era" (let's call it '85 to '97 or so) of computing was my favorite time with computers. Sure, we now have so
much more capability, and Linux, and graphics galore and all.... but....
that period of time was when I feel like I "peaked" in many abilities.
All the stuff you had to know to maximize MSDOS, and batch files, and
putting *so* many pieces of software together to run a complete
BBS/Mailer setup. I think of it as the "Golden Years". ;-)




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Dumas Walker wrote to POINDEXTER FORTRAN <=-

Man, so many people were all about xtree gold.. I was like, what's the big deal? It's just another shell you arrow-key around in. I didn't mind typing in paths to files. Imagine how stoked I was when I found tab completion, though ;)

To me, it was a Window manager before we had window managers. For a
time, the last line of my autoexec was to run Xtree.

Norton Commander was nice along the same lines, if memory serves.

IIRC, isn't Midnight Commander a clone of Norton Commander?

Yes it is, and it's probably better.




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Dumas Walker wrote to LONEWOLF <=-

Dude, you beat me to it, I was going to chime in on "LIST". I still use it today, that and QEdit (file editor) and a LIST clone called LOOK.COM

Using QEdit to respond to this message. That one is another essential
DOS program.

Absolutely, it is.




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Dumas Walker wrote to POINDEXTER FORTRAN <=-

IIRC, isn't Midnight Commander a clone of Norton Commander?

Yes, it was part of the Norton Utilities, probably one of the most
pirated titles back then.

I remember Norton Desktop, it was an alternative window manager for
Windows 3.x, looked pretty nice.



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Dumas Walker wrote to LONEWOLF <=-

Using QEdit to respond to this message. That one is another essential
DOS program.

I tried lots of different editors during the DOS era, but ended up
coming back to Qedit - still used it under DOSBOX for my offline reader
setup as of last year. I found TSEPro, the 32-bit version of Qedit, and
am using that now!



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Gamgee wrote to Dumas Walker <=-

I have often thought that that "era" (let's call it '85 to '97 or so)
of computing was my favorite time with computers. Sure, we now have so much more capability, and Linux, and graphics galore and all....
but.... that period of time was when I feel like I "peaked" in many abilities. All the stuff you had to know to maximize MSDOS, and batch files, and putting *so* many pieces of software together to run a
complete BBS/Mailer setup. I think of it as the "Golden Years". ;-)

Getting a batch file, BBS, utilities and a mailer all working together
was a high point of BBSing in the DOS era. Scheduling mail runs, echo maintenance, defragging, log rotation and online games was pretty fly.

Did I just type that?



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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Gamgee to Dumas Walker on Sun Nov 30 2025 08:11 pm

I have often thought that that "era" (let's call it '85 to '97 or so) of computing was my favorite time with computers. Sure, we now have so much more capability, and Linux, and graphics galore and all.... but.... that period of time was when I feel like I "peaked" in many abilities. All the stuff you had to know to maximize MSDOS, and batch files, and putting *so* many pieces of software together to run a complete BBS/Mailer setup. I think of it as the "Golden Years". ;-)

What I liked about that time (and I was also fairly young and didn't get my own PC until 1992) was that upgrades were a lot more significant, so it was a much more noticeable difference. For instance, going from a 12mhz 286 to a 40mhz 386 or from monochrome graphics to color, or adding a sound card to a PC, were exciting upgrades. After making those kinds of upgrades, I was excited to use my computer. Also, home computers were still a relatively new thing in those times, so there was the novelty of it too. And things like being able to run a BBS from your home computer was pretty cool.

Although I like today's computers too, I feel like technology has reached a bit of a plateau, and computer upgrades these days often don't seem quite as significant or noticeable.

Nightfox

---
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To me, it was a Window manager before we had window managers. For a

>time, the last line of my autoexec was to run Xtree.

Norton Commander was nice along the same lines, if memory serves.

Yes, I ran both of those as well. As mentioned elsewhere, when
Win 3.x came out I avoided using it as much as possible, although
I had to know it pretty well because I was working on computers
for other people.

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I recall one time I was working on a system that was in a home for family

> > but also had business software on it for the construction and trucking
> > company they ran. While cleaning up the business stuff I ran across some p
> > and I hesitated to mention it since they were a Very religious family, but

Oh, I hated that! It always seemed to be database administrators at one job t

> would let their kids onto their work laptops - see them with all sorts of ga
>shortcuts on the desktop, game apps set to auto-start, and kids cartoon stick
> on the laptop. A couple of them tried to play off obvious physical damage. O
>told me his spare bar stopped working. He didn't mention the crack in the cas
>hat ran right through the spacebar.

"A crack occurred..."

Yes, these days it seem every kid over 5 has their own computer and
we forget about the 'good olde days' when it took about 2 months
income to buy a computer so having multiple systems was a lot more
difficult so, do you keep your kids from getting used to them or
do you take a chance and hope for the best?

Obviously this is a bigger problem/question when you run your
business out of your home..

---
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And of course the classic "LIST". Fantastic piece of software.

Dude, you beat me to it, I was going to chime in on "LIST". I still use it to

>, that and QEdit (file editor) and a LIST clone called LOOK.COM

I am using QEdit to answer this message.. B)

I'm sure I must have used LIST for a while, the name is familiar,
but it's been so long I don't recall all that it did off hand.
But pretty much any program that made DOS work better I found a copy of..

---
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I have often thought that that "era" (let's call it '85 to '97 or so) of computing was my favorite time with computers. Sure, we now have so
much more capability, and Linux, and graphics galore and all.... but....
that period of time was when I feel like I "peaked" in many abilities.
All the stuff you had to know to maximize MSDOS, and batch files, and
putting *so* many pieces of software together to run a complete
BBS/Mailer setup. I think of it as the "Golden Years". ;-)

Same. It seems like I do learn things now, but a lot of it is "use once" knowledge that I either never need again, or it is so long between needs
that I forget it. ;)

It somehow also isn't as much fun as it was when I learned something I
could do back then.


* SLMR 2.1a * If you believe in telekinesis, please raise my hand.
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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Rob Mccart to POINDEXTER FORTRAN on Mon Dec 01 2025 08:17 am

Yes, these days it seem every kid over 5 has their own computer and we forget about the 'good olde days' when it took about 2 months income to buy a computer so having multiple systems was a lot more difficult so, do you keep your kids from getting used to them or do you take a chance and hope for the best?

These days, maybe a cheap tablet or smartphone would be okay for a young child. And I think they tend to have parental controls on them too, so you can lock down what they can access. And I was also thinking an iPod Touch would be good, since it doesn't have the phone part, but I don't think Apple makes that anymore.. Maybe you could find a used one for not too much money.

Obviously this is a bigger problem/question when you run your business out of your home..

In that situation, if possible, I think it could be good to have a dedicated office room, maybe with a locking door, so a yound child couldn't get in and make a mess.

Nightfox

---
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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Dumas Walker on Mon Dec 01 2025 07:01 am

I remember Norton Desktop, it was an alternative window manager
for Windows 3.x, looked pretty nice.

it was pretty much the same thing as the default shell.
the file manager was better.

i just liked ndos.
you could do tons of cool stuff with it.
---
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Nightfox wrote to Gamgee <=-

I have often thought that that "era" (let's call it '85 to '97 or so) of computing was my favorite time with computers. Sure, we now have so much more capability, and Linux, and graphics galore and all.... but.... that period of time was when I feel like I "peaked" in many abilities. All the stuff you had to know to maximize MSDOS, and batch files, and putting *so* many pieces of software together to run a complete BBS/Mailer setup. I think of it as the "Golden Years". ;-)

What I liked about that time (and I was also fairly young and didn't
get my own PC until 1992) was that upgrades were a lot more
significant, so it was a much more noticeable difference. For
instance, going from a 12mhz 286 to a 40mhz 386 or from monochrome graphics to color, or adding a sound card to a PC, were exciting
upgrades. After making those kinds of upgrades, I was excited to use
my computer. Also, home computers were still a relatively new thing in those times, so there was the novelty of it too. And things like being able to run a BBS from your home computer was pretty cool.

100% agree on every word of this!

Although I like today's computers too, I feel like technology has
reached a bit of a plateau, and computer upgrades these days often
don't seem quite as significant or noticeable.

No doubt about that, either.

I think we have peaked, and are now on the downhill slippery slope,
headed to AI taking over the world. :-(



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Dumas Walker wrote to GAMGEE <=-

I have often thought that that "era" (let's call it '85 to '97 or so) of computing was my favorite time with computers. Sure, we now have so
much more capability, and Linux, and graphics galore and all.... but.... that period of time was when I feel like I "peaked" in many abilities.
All the stuff you had to know to maximize MSDOS, and batch files, and putting *so* many pieces of software together to run a complete
BBS/Mailer setup. I think of it as the "Golden Years". ;-)

Same. It seems like I do learn things now, but a lot of it is "use
once" knowledge that I either never need again, or it is so long
between needs that I forget it. ;)

Yep, for sure. Still learning also, but at a slower pace, and smaller
leaps. We can now learn anything instantly with a Google search, which
is much different than trying to find a (printed) manual for something,
or ask questions on echomail and wait a day or two to hopefully get an
answer. Got to tell ya, I miss those days.

It somehow also isn't as much fun as it was when I learned something I could do back then.

Not *nearly* as much fun.



... I didn't know it was impossible when I did it.
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poindexter FORTRAN wrote to Gamgee <=-

Gamgee wrote to Dumas Walker <=-

I have often thought that that "era" (let's call it '85 to '97 or so)
of computing was my favorite time with computers. Sure, we now have so much more capability, and Linux, and graphics galore and all....
but.... that period of time was when I feel like I "peaked" in many abilities. All the stuff you had to know to maximize MSDOS, and batch files, and putting *so* many pieces of software together to run a
complete BBS/Mailer setup. I think of it as the "Golden Years". ;-)

Getting a batch file, BBS, utilities and a mailer all working together
was a high point of BBSing in the DOS era. Scheduling mail runs, echo maintenance, defragging, log rotation and online games was pretty fly.

Did I just type that?

Ummm, yes, although it was pretty much a summary/repeat of what I said
right above it... Except for the 90's reference right at the end. :-)



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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Rob Mccart to POINDEXTER FORTRAN on Sat Nov 29 2025 08:58 am

the only one who could have been downloading the porn was the
12 or 13 year old *Daughter*.. (Enter - Nanny Software..)

"Research".

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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Dumas Walker to GAMGEE on Sun Nov 30 2025 11:23 am

list of extra programs to add to any new DOS install. Now it is on the
list for dos emulator installs. ;)

Care to share your lists for DOS (bare metal and emulator) installs?

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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Nightfox to Gamgee on Mon Dec 01 2025 09:06 am

Although I like today's computers too, I feel like technology has reached a

The only thing I differentiate in today's computers is aesthetics. I too miss the major upgrades and significant add-ons. Heck, it was a big deal for me just getting a serial mouse... and before that the serial port that would take it ;)

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phigan wrote to Nightfox <=-

The only thing I differentiate in today's computers is aesthetics. I
too miss the major upgrades and significant add-ons. Heck, it was a big deal for me just getting a serial mouse... and before that the serial
port that would take it ;)

It's odd, since the percentage of people who owned computers was so
low, but in big cities, there were computer stores every half-mile or
so. Most of my computers were work cast-offs, but when I switched jobs
and cashed out my PTO, I splurged on a local shop PC - they custom
built everything to your specs, so I could get a video card that Linux
supported (not so easy back then) and even specify a soft or clicky
keyboard with my build.

Now, everyone has something at their house, but the stores are gone.
Shame.




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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: poindexter FORTRAN to phigan on Tue Dec 02 2025 07:13 am

It's odd, since the percentage of people who owned computers was so low,

Now, everyone has something at their house, but the stores are gone. Shame.

Lately I've realized that a good number of people these days don't have a desktop or laptop PC anymore and just use a tablet or smartphone.. I find that hard to believe though, because even some fairly simple things like sending an email and applying for jobs online (really, anything where you'd need to write up a document of some kind) is a lot easier with a real keyboard and bigger screen.

Nightfox

---
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I have often thought that that "era" (let's call it '85 to '97 or so) of

>computing was my favorite time with computers. Sure, we now have so
>much more capability, and Linux, and graphics galore and all.... but....
>that period of time was when I feel like I "peaked" in many abilities.
>All the stuff you had to know to maximize MSDOS, and batch files, and
>putting *so* many pieces of software together to run a complete
>BBS/Mailer setup. I think of it as the "Golden Years". ;-)

Back around that time there were several BBS systems in town and
I was creating the menu screens for a couple of them.
I was writing the code from scratch at the time, and I totally
lost interest when programs like The Draw came out and any idiot
could do it.. I prefer being a Special idiot.. B)

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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Dumas Walker on Mon Dec 01 2025 07:01:51

I remember Norton Desktop, it was an alternative window manager for
Windows 3.x, looked pretty nice.

We used that on a couple of machines in an office I was working at in 1994. It made Win 3.x look somewhat like what Win95 would look like a couple of years later. I cannot remember if it had a "start" bar, but it did have onscreen icons and, IIRC, was the first time I remember seeing a "trash can" on a desktop. ;)
---
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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Dumas Walker on Mon Dec 01 2025 07:01:51

I tried lots of different editors during the DOS era, but ended up
coming back to Qedit - still used it under DOSBOX for my offline reader setup as of last year. I found TSEPro, the 32-bit version of Qedit, and
am using that now!

I assume TSEPro only works under Windows, or will it also run under DOS on 32-bit machines?
---
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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Dumas Walker to poindexter FORTRAN on Tue Dec 02 2025 08:09 am

I remember Norton Desktop, it was an alternative window manager for Windows
3.x, looked pretty nice.

We used that on a couple of machines in an office I was working at in 1994. It made Win 3.x look somewhat like what Win95 would look like a couple of years later. I cannot remember if it had a "start" bar, but it did have onscreen icons and, IIRC, was the first time I remember seeing a "trash can" on a desktop. ;)

I don't remember seeing that, but Norton had some pretty cool stuff back then. I had seen some trash can add-ons for Windows 3.x, but it would have been cool to have that as part of an overall software package like Norton Desktop.

From what I remember, Norton's undelete was the first program I had seen for DOS that would let you undelete a file.

I remember finding some trash can add-ons for Windows 3.x, some which looked like the trash can from Mac OS (System 7 etc.), and at the time I thought it was cool to see add-ons that made Windows look like a Mac (I felt like I could sort of make my Windows setup at home look a bit like the Mac computers that my school had).

I also remember using a Windows 3.1 utility back then that added some stuff to the UI, such as a clock in the titlebar of all apps. I don't remember what add-on that was though..

Nightfox

---
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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Dumas Walker to poindexter FORTRAN on Tue Dec 02 2025 08:20 am

I assume TSEPro only works under Windows, or will it also run under
DOS on 32-bit machines?

if you want an editor checkout yedit or kinestics editor.
those are both good 32bit console editors. yedit is an edit.com clone.
---
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Rob Mccart wrote to GAMGEE <=-

I have often thought that that "era" (let's call it '85 to '97 or so) of

>computing was my favorite time with computers. Sure, we now have so
>much more capability, and Linux, and graphics galore and all.... but....
>that period of time was when I feel like I "peaked" in many abilities.
>All the stuff you had to know to maximize MSDOS, and batch files, and
>putting *so* many pieces of software together to run a complete
>BBS/Mailer setup. I think of it as the "Golden Years". ;-)

Back around that time there were several BBS systems in town and
I was creating the menu screens for a couple of them.
I was writing the code from scratch at the time, and I totally
lost interest when programs like The Draw came out and any idiot
could do it.. I prefer being a Special idiot.. B)

Wow, I bet that was fairly tedious work, doing ANSI screens that way.

Haha, not all idiots can even master TheDraw... Well done.




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Dumas Walker wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

I tried lots of different editors during the DOS era, but ended up
coming back to Qedit - still used it under DOSBOX for my offline reader setup as of last year. I found TSEPro, the 32-bit version of Qedit, and
am using that now!

I assume TSEPro only works under Windows, or will it also run under DOS
on 32-bit machines?

Modern TSE runs on Windows or Linux.

Those and the (1997) version of Qedit are all available here:

https://www.semware.com/

Good stuff! :-)



... Windows 3.1 - From the people who brought you EDLIN.
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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Gamgee to Rob Mccart on Tue Dec 02 2025 04:53 pm

Back around that time there were several BBS systems in town and I was
creating the menu screens for a couple of them. I was writing the code
from scratch at the time, and I totally lost interest when programs like
The Draw came out and any idiot could do it.. I prefer being a Special
idiot.. B)

Wow, I bet that was fairly tedious work, doing ANSI screens that way.

Recently, as RIP support has been added to the latest SyncTerm, I've been more seriously been thinking of making RIP menus for my BBS. There are RIP drawing tools, but for things like adding buttons, colored borders & areas & such, I'm not sure the RIP drawing tools I've used so far support those (oddly); for those things, it seems like a similar situation where I may have to write them by hand with a text editor.

Nightfox

---
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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Nightfox to Gamgee on Mon Dec 01 2025 09:06 am

Although I like today's computers too, I feel like technology has reached a bit of a plateau, and computer upgrades these days often don't seem quite as significant or noticeable.

The way I overcome that was... I built my previous PC in 2012 with an intel mb and a gen 3 core i5 cpu with HDD rotators... used it for 10 years.

Then in 2022, I built a gen 12 core i9 on a gigabyte mb with 8tb of NMVMe ssd's..

This felt like an AMAZING improvement to me...

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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Dumas Walker to poindexter FORTRAN on Tue Dec 02 2025 08:20 am

I assume TSEPro only works under Windows, or will it also run under DOS on 32-bit machines?

There is a TSE (older version) for DOS.

---
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Nightfox wrote to Gamgee <=-

Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Gamgee to Rob Mccart on Tue Dec 02 2025 04:53 pm

Back around that time there were several BBS systems in town and I was
creating the menu screens for a couple of them. I was writing the code
from scratch at the time, and I totally lost interest when programs like
The Draw came out and any idiot could do it.. I prefer being a Special
idiot.. B)

Wow, I bet that was fairly tedious work, doing ANSI screens that way.

Recently, as RIP support has been added to the latest SyncTerm, I've
been more seriously been thinking of making RIP menus for my BBS.
There are RIP drawing tools, but for things like adding buttons,
colored borders & areas & such, I'm not sure the RIP drawing tools I've used so far support those (oddly); for those things, it seems like a similar situation where I may have to write them by hand with a text editor.

That would be pretty cool, to see RIP on a modern system. Sounds like a challenging task... Let us know if you get any progress on it!




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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Bf2k+ to Nightfox on Tue Dec 02 2025 06:29 pm

Although I like today's computers too, I feel like technology has reached a
bit of a plateau, and computer upgrades these days often don't seem quite
as significant or noticeable.

The way I overcome that was... I built my previous PC in 2012 with an intel mb and a gen 3 core i5 cpu with HDD rotators... used it for 10 years.

Then in 2022, I built a gen 12 core i9 on a gigabyte mb with 8tb of NMVMe ssd's..

This felt like an AMAZING improvement to me...

I've been somewhat similar lately. I built a new PC in 2011 and used it until 2019, when I built a new PC. It felt fresh & fast, though still I don't think it was quite as significant as older PC upgrades. I did put an RTX graphics card in it, which was cool though. I'm still using my 2019 PC, but I've upgraded a few components. One game I've been able to run on it is Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 (and then 2024), which I've really enjoyed, and I'm sure I probably wouldn't have been able to play that with my 2011 PC.

Nightfox

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Yes, these days it seem every kid over 5 has their own computer and we forget about the 'good olde days' when it took about 2 months income to
buy a computer so having multiple systems was a lot more difficult so, do you keep your kids from getting used to them or do you take a chance and hope for the best?

These days, maybe a cheap tablet or smartphone would be okay for a young chil

>And I think they tend to have parental controls on them too, so you can lock
>n what they can access. And I was also thinking an iPod Touch would be good,
>nce it doesn't have the phone part, but I don't think Apple makes that anymor
> Maybe you could find a used one for not too much money.

Yes, it's a lot different these days. My sister's grandkids (age 7 & 9)
have Tablets and their parents also give them their cell phones when
they upgrade, without a phone plan at this stage.

Obviously this is a bigger problem/question when you run your business
out of your home..

In that situation, if possible, I think it could be good to have a dedicated

>ice room, maybe with a locking door, so a young child couldn't get in and mak
> mess.

The idea at that time was the kids could use the computer if it wasn't
being used for business at the moment. But unless you sit there and
watch them every minute, kids tend to get into things and are often
more clever at it than their parents..

My niece's kids got into trouble a while back because they'd figured
out how to buy time on games online that were not free. I assume
their parents had done that for them at times and they somehow
got the info required to do it, or (more possibly), the purchase
info was on that site and they were able to just put through
another order..

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Same. It seems like I do learn things now, but a lot of it is "use
once" knowledge that I either never need again, or it is so long
between needs that I forget it. ;)

Yep, for sure. Still learning also, but at a slower pace, and smaller

>leaps. We can now learn anything instantly with a Google search, which
>is much different than trying to find a (printed) manual for something,
>or ask questions on echomail and wait a day or two to hopefully get an
>answer. Got to tell ya, I miss those days.

It somehow also isn't as much fun as it was when I learned something I could do back then.

Not *nearly* as much fun.

The other thing that's changed over the years is it's a lot harder to
get into the OS to change things. We used to have pretty much full
control over that if you knew what you were doing but it's a lot
harder to access things these days.

Probably some of the OS's other than Windows are still more open..

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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Rob Mccart to NIGHTFOX on Wed Dec 03 2025 09:19 am

The idea at that time was the kids could use the computer if it wasn't being used for business at the moment. But unless you sit there and watch them every minute, kids tend to get into things and are often more clever at it than their parents..

Yeah, it's probably best not to leave kids alone with things that are important like that. Kids will do things and not really think about it.

Nightfox

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Rob Mccart wrote to GAMGEE <=-

Same. It seems like I do learn things now, but a lot of it is "use
once" knowledge that I either never need again, or it is so long
between needs that I forget it. ;)

Yep, for sure. Still learning also, but at a slower pace, and smaller

>leaps. We can now learn anything instantly with a Google search, which
>is much different than trying to find a (printed) manual for something,
>or ask questions on echomail and wait a day or two to hopefully get an
>answer. Got to tell ya, I miss those days.

It somehow also isn't as much fun as it was when I learned something I could do back then.

Not *nearly* as much fun.

The other thing that's changed over the years is it's a lot harder to
get into the OS to change things. We used to have pretty much full
control over that if you knew what you were doing but it's a lot
harder to access things these days.

Probably some of the OS's other than Windows are still more open..

Hmmmm, yeah, that hasn't changed for me; perhaps even gone the other direction. I did use Win95 and maybe Win98 for a while, but mostly it's
been from DOS to Linux for me, and Linux is *very* controllable. In
fact that's a highlighted point for Linux. ;-)



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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Lordwoodoo to Nightfox on Wed Dec 03 2025 06:46 pm

Lately I've realized that a good number of people these days don't have a
desktop or laptop PC anymore and just use a tablet or smartphone.. I
find that hard to believe though, because even some fairly simple things
like sending an email and applying for jobs online (really, anything
where you'd need to write up a document of some kind) is a lot easier
with a real keyboard and bigger screen.

I cant imagine myself doing all this stuff on a smartphone. What a pain!! I have a phone to phone, and F2A by obligation.

Yeah, I don't know how some people are patient enough to do that kind of thing on a smartphone if they have any lengthy thing to type up or process to complete.

The only social media
thing I installed on my smartphone is Snapchat to chat with my childrens and some friends.

Off subject, but look at the people in life, in the street, in restaurants, well.. everywhere: they cant live without this thing.

I mainly use Facebook to see what my family & friends are sharing. Sometimes I wonder what I'd be missing out on if I stopped using social media, but I know there's a lot more that goes on besides what people post on social media.. When I'm doing things with other people, I try not to spend a whole lot of time looking at my phone, as I want to be in the moment.

Semi-related - Sometimes it seems to me that some people expect people to quickly answer all their texts & things. Sometimes I'm doing other things which I'm focusing on, so I won't alawys reply right away. I think people sometimes forget what it was like before a lot of people had cell phones; also, there are people now who never even really lived without cell phones & such..

Nightfox

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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Lordwoodoo to Rob Mccart on Wed Dec 03 2025 07:21 pm

You can still access them with the real control panel on Windows. They want to hide all this by pushing the new ::I dont love it:: interface.

A while ago, I read that Microsoft was planning to eliminate the old Control Panel altogether.. I'm glad they haven't yet.

Reading this, I remember using Stardock Software to customize my desktop. Crazy themes you downloaded. And Windows Blinds, etc.. It was fun!

I still use Stardock Window Blinds. But these days, it can't skin all apps anymore, because there's new & alternate GUI drawing functionality in newer versions of Windows that some software is using now (starting with Windows 10, or maybe Windows 8), so those programs won't get skinned by WindowBlinds. And apparently it's something that 3rd-party apps like WindowBlinds can't hijack, or else Stardock probably would have already updated WindowBlinds to do so. I have a feeling one reason Microsoft has done that is that for some reason they don't want 3rd-party apps to be able to customize the GUI in Windows.

Probably due to that, there aren't a whole lot of WindowBlinds themes being developed, so there aren't a lot to choose from, unless you want to get into making your own WindowBlinds themes (which I imagine could be fairly tedious).

GUI themes & skinning works a lot better in Linux GUI environments, probably because they were made to support that, whereas Windows wasn't.

Recently I was seeing an issue with SyncTerm flickering while using SDL mode, and just in the last day or so, I realized it only seems to happen when I'm using WindowBlinds to skin SyncTerm.. I configured WindowBlinds to ignore SyncTerm (not to skin it), and now the flickering isn't there anymore.

Nightfox

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the only one who could have been downloading the porn was the

> > 12 or 13 year old *Daughter*.. (Enter - Nanny Software..)

"Research".

That's what I called mine... B)

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Back around that time there were several BBS systems in town and
I was creating the menu screens for a couple of them.
I was writing the code from scratch at the time, and I totally
lost interest when programs like The Draw came out and any idiot
could do it.. I prefer being a Special idiot.. B)

Wow, I bet that was fairly tedious work, doing ANSI screens that way.

Haha, not all idiots can even master TheDraw... Well done.

It took a bit of work but, like most programming, you get a collection
of commands you can insert where needed to save time. I also wrote a
lot of software and would create fully working programs that didn't
do anything.. You had menus with blank options that went gosub to
labels that were empty other than the Return.

When someone wanted a program for a specific task, you go in and add
the information necessary to make the program do that.
It saved a lot of time in the long run..

At that time the BBS that was carrying the Global message bases
shut down and the person who decided to take that over started
charging for access since his cost for special lines and such
were so high. I wasn't too happy about that but, before I had
much chance to think about it, he contacted me and said if I
would be the Monitor in the Tech Help areas on the BBS, he'd
give me access for free. This was a great bonus for me since
I was always giving people help handling computer problems for
free on the old BBS so it was a bit of a win-win for both of us.

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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Lordwoodoo to Nightfox on Wed Dec 03 2025 11:49 pm

Semi-related - Sometimes it seems to me that some people expect people to
quickly answer all their texts & things. Sometimes I'm doing other

On Facebook, and elsewhere too, I get the impression that everyone is only interested in themselves. I'm there for musical projects; otherwise, I'd leave immediately. :0)) I like fediverse. Mastodon.

I wasn't really thinking of Facebook with that, but mainly things like regular text messages & emails & such.

Nightfox

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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Lordwoodoo to Nightfox on Thu Dec 04 2025 12:07 am

Yes, the complete Stardock suite offered a theme editor to create your own themes and potentially share them with the community. They had a utility that scanned hard drives to see what was taking up space. Very useful for starting a good cleanup or organization.

Yeah, I've had a look at the theme editor for WindowBlinds. I've thought of making my own themes, but haven't really take the time to learn & delve into it.

And I think Stardock does make some other useful utilities, although they're not all unique. As far as the utility that scans hard drives to see what's taking up space, I hadn't seen Stardock's, but if that does what I think it does, I know if WinDirStat (which is free) and TreeSize, which has a free and a paid verison.

Stardock also has a Start Menu replacement for Windows 11, called Start11, which I'm using, and I like it. It's paid though, and there are equivalent free tools available. I was using Classic Shell (a Start Menu replacement) for a while; when Windows 11 was released, Classic Shell didn't work anymore, and that morphed into another project called Open Shell. I think that's a fairly decent Start Menu replacement, and it's free. There are others too.

Nightfox

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Re: Re: Thin client PC to run
By: Lordwoodoo to Nightfox on Thu Dec 04 2025 03:35 pm

Does Start11 also improve responsiveness? I don't remember testing it (Start8 was the first one?).

I don't think I've noticed an increase in responsiveness with it. However, I pretty much started using a start menu replacement immediately after I started using Windows 10.

Nightfox

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But unless you sit there and watch them every minute, kids tend to

> get into things and are often more clever at it than their parents..

Yeah, it's probably best not to leave kids alone with things that are

>important like that. Kids will do things and not really think about it.

Or think a lot about how to get away with it.. B)

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The other thing that's changed over the years is it's a lot harder to
get into the OS to change things. We used to have pretty much full
control over that if you knew what you were doing but it's a lot
harder to access things these days.
Probably some of the OS's other than Windows are still more open..

Hmmmm, yeah, that hasn't changed for me; perhaps even gone the other

>direction. I did use Win95 and maybe Win98 for a while, but mostly it's
>been from DOS to Linux for me, and Linux is *very* controllable. In
>fact that's a highlighted point for Linux. ;-)

Yes, I figured that.. I probably should have taken the time to learn
Linux but.. Old dogs - New tricks.. I've tried a few light versions
of it over the years, but ones that more or less look like Windows
and are designed for Windows users, but I only got into using it a
bit, not into controlling it better than it came..

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Does Start11 also improve responsiveness? I don't remember testing it (Start8 was the first one?).

I don't think I've noticed an increase in responsiveness with it. However, I

>etty much started using a start menu replacement immediately after I started
>ng Windows 10.

This may be simple enough that I'm wasting time mentioning it, and
I'm not sure if it works the same in Windows 10 and 11 which I don't
use, but for a long time now I've set up my own Start Menu, for lack
of a better name, in Windows 7 by creating a folder and filling it
with Sub Folders with shortcut links to start a program or show a
graphics file or other file, and then I just drag it to the exiting
Taskbar so that only the things I want to use frequently are there
and easy to get at. I very rarely use the main Start button anymore.

It creates its own Menu Bar that pulls up from the Taskbar link.

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