On Friday, June 24, 2022 at 1:30:24 PM UTC-7, dick...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Monday, June 20, 2022 at 3:23:09 PM UTC-5, plateshutoverlock wrote:
> <snip>
> > I can say for sure that when I boot up Windows 3.11 in Dosbox to relive
> > some old memories, it feels like a giant weight has been lifted off my
> > shoulders. Even with it's stability issues and rather awkward UI design,.I
> > feel like I am once again back in control of everything, that nothing
> > I don't know about is happening behind my back, and that I won't
> > be blitzed with notifications or "Your experience will be better..." or
> > all of the second guessing and unwanted overrides of modern operating
> > systems.
> >
> > The industry needs to do a full course reversal into that direction.
> AMEN!
>
> I started feeling "amiss" when they (the industry at large) began over-blowing the BASIC computer language into "visual BASIC" and other formats.
>
> Keeping the computer at a "computational tool" level was *LIBERATING* yet turning it into a demographics data mining operation feels "depleting."
>
> Just last month, gmail made changes to their system which *deliberately* rendered Outlook Express as "obsolete" / non-functional.
>
> Very upsetting. I may have to switch to a different email provider after all these years....

With MS-DOS/Windows 3.11, I had a very good idea about
what was going on, even though I didn't have the source code,
nor did I run those OS's under a machine language monitor.

Nowadays, OSes in general are more and more like black boxes,
overly complex to the point even the developers don't know
exactly what's going on with the very OS they are adding and
changing code for. Most Linux distributions which you have
access all of the source code to are impossible for one
person to fully understand the internal workings.

Yes, we need to go back to simpler OSes, that does not have
all of the bloat and eye candy that is really there for marketing
purposes, stuff that is also plaguing the %100 free and open
source Linux distros. If this is something for a Smart TV,
then fine, the OS can be a noisy seizure inducing circus.
But I expect my work computer to be a tool, and look like
one too.

On Saturday, June 25, 2022 at 5:59:20 PM UTC-5, plateshutoverlock wrote:
> On Friday, June 24, 2022 at 1:30:24 PM UTC-7, dicksilk wrote:
> > On Monday, June 20, 2022 at 3:23:09 PM UTC-5, plateshutoverlock wrote:
> > <snip>
DS:>
> > Very upsetting. I may have to switch to a different email provider after all these years....
PS:>
> With MS-DOS/Windows 3.11, I had a very good idea about
> what was going on, even though I didn't have the source code,
> nor did I run those OS's under a machine language monitor.
>
> Nowadays, OSes in general are more and more like black boxes,
> overly complex to the point even the developers don't know
> exactly what's going on with the very OS they are adding and
> changing code for. Most Linux distributions which you have
> access all of the source code to are impossible for one
> person to fully understand the internal workings.
>
> Yes, we need to go back to simpler OSes, that does not have
> all of the bloat and eye candy that is really there for marketing
> purposes, stuff that is also plaguing the %100 free and open
> source Linux distros. If this is something for a Smart TV,
> then fine, the OS can be a noisy seizure inducing circus.
> But I expect my work computer to be a tool, and look like
> one too.

Agreed!
Consider: 1) a CORE OS, then with 2) selective add-ons ("apps") for individual purposes.

At least, that's the way things *started* back in the day....