In article <6369k6F259eh4U1@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
Pete Dashwood <dashwood@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
[snip]
>We talked about the lack of low level training in young people and
whether
>they actually need it. I was of the opinion that they don't, but I think
I
>need to modify that a little bit, after a long and fruitless discussion
with
>a Seagate Helpdesk somewhere on the sub-continent yesterday.
[snip]
>Pretty soon, and really just for
>fun, I took my previous notebook (which did not have a wireless card) and
>connected that to the WLAN as well, using a small USB wireless link.
[snip]
>Then I got to thinking... It would be pretty cool to be able to
>print from these machines to a printer on the WLAN. Apart from anything
>else, it would enable me to move my printer into a back room with the
>router, rather than have it occupying space in the lounge...
[snip]
>If the WLAN had a high capacity storage
>device that was shared, and could be used for backups in the background,
it
>would be sweet...
[snip]
>But I don't want to lash out and buy a
>new notebook.
[snip]
>This brings me to the point about low level knowledge. We expect Wizards
to
>do stuff for us and most of the time they do, but there are times when it
is
>necessary to revert to an earlier world, where things were done manually.
A while back, Mr Dashwood, I was listening to a radio-program(me) and a
fellow called in and described the Anciente and Honorede Traditione of
'tinkering' ('tinker' in the sense of 'to repair, adjust or experiment
with'). The fellow had been raised on a farm and mentioned how if one
could *not* tinker successfully it could endanger one's ability to get the
crops in and otherwise Do One's Job as a Farmer.
(He also described going to the Air and Space Museum and looking at the
cut-away views on some of the early American spacecraft... he said it was
obvious that these things were the first of their kind, they were designed
and built by folks who had never seen a person-carrying spacecraft before
and, as a result, showed signs of... tinkering. There was stuff in there
that wasn't spacecraft-stuff, it was... like... farm-implements or
kitchen-appliances and the like.)
The circumstances your skills met, by your own description, were nothing
necessary or mission-critical... unless phrases like 'really just for
fun' or '(i)t would be pretty cool' or '(i)t would be sweet' have become
ways to describe necessary, mission-critical functions.
It was enjoyable, of course, and it allowed you resurrect hardware,
software and brain-ware you'd relegated to archive-status... but was there
'an actual need' (the phrase initially used to describe low-level
training) for it? Just for laffs - another way to describe necessary,
mission-critical critieria, of course - I will disagree on the basis of
the Franklin Equivalence.
Had you gone out and purchased modern equipment you would have spent
money, true... but you would have saved time. Given the aforementioned
Equivalence of 'Time is Money' and your bill-rate... dealing with Tech
Sup****t for a few hours costs a fair amount. Given the state of Modern
Technology... you go online, click a few links, do something else for a
day or three... and at your door are the packages that you open, assemble,
configure and run in less time than you spent on the telephone.
E'en (e'en?) moreso in a Cor****ate Environment, where a Team is being held
back from Doing Its Job or a Decision Involving Money is delayed because
rather than pay for someone who knows what they're doing and the equipment
they need to do it with... a false economy of 'it'll just take a bit...
no, wait, we need a left-handed thread there... whoops, I didn't know
these devices were *that* incompatible... it's gotta be out on the web
*somewhere*, just give me a moment to find it'' starts to cost Real Money.
Come to think of it... we've addressed this before, just recently...
well... maybe 'mainframe recently', almost exactly two years back. From
<http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.cobol/msg/dbed9ca432a9f091?dmode=source>
--begin quoted text:
>The one I'm proudest of is a system I built for a disabled lady who
wanted
>to do a remote study writing course. She has a fully functioning XP
system
>with XP Office (all legal) that connects over broadband, and the whole
>system cost $NZ104. So far it has performed flawlessly for about 3
months; I
>have my fingers crossed... :-) All of the hardware was begged borrowed or
>recycled from other old systems that were non-functional. It took me 30
>hours to get the bits and build it. :-)
This reminds me of a put-it-together-yourself file cabinet I helped a
physician I know assemble back in the early 1990s. This stuff has
improved since then and now it's more difficult to attach part B to part D
instead of hooking it to part C, where it belongs... and we'd knock a few
pieces together, realise we'd done the wrong ones, take it apart, set it
aright...
.... all in all it took us about three hours. Sipping our Pilsner Urquels
and gazing upon the finished product the doctor mused 'You know... between
the cost of your time and mine that is, per cubic inch, probably the most
expensive piece of furniture in this house.'
--end quoted text
DD
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