Nobody Cares: Technology-only Edition

[Free]

My first webserver was a 486 with 10M of RAM and it was fine.

I once ran a web server on a Pentium III with 128Mb RAM. It had BeOS on it (!), and it sat in my apartment serving over a DSL line. We used to be true masters of our own domain...

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

Set your TERMCAP/TERMINFO/TERM variables to one that's pre-colortty.

 

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

Set your TERMCAP/TERMINFO/TERM variables to one that's pre-colortty.

Oooh! Thanks! I was going to ask in #nethack on Freenode, but this did the trick.
Exporting $TERM to xterm-color from xterm-256color fixed it.

 

[Khamon]

Stupid default dark blue terminal color is stupid.

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

Terminals should be black with amber or green phosphors.

 

[Casey Pelous]

Terminals should be black with amber or green phosphors.

Fancy schmancy modernist, eh?

How about we bring back Teletype terminals?

Heh. What memories that brought back! I literally came of age with a UPI and/or AP teletype chunk-a-chunk-a-chunking in the background and lived with that sound as a sort of audio background wash for years. When something important happened, it rang a bell several times. They used typewriter-style ribbons that were super-saturated in purple (UPI) or black (AP) ink -- you just about needed to don a hazmat suit if you were going to change the ribbon and remain unsullied by ink.

It was SO weird when they switched them out for early dot matrix printers! No more chunk-a-chunk --- now, it was just zizzzzzz----zizzzzz ---zizzzzz ..... with no bells. Then, even that went away, and all the news came in silently on one of those newfangled green phosphor CRT's.

 

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

Stupid default dark blue terminal color is stupid.

Yes, yes it is. Due to how we perceive color it doesn't work well, not even on CRT's.

Terminals should be black with amber or green phosphors.

Ha ha ha, old school. While I'm old enough to remember monochrome green screens on various computers (Apple II's, CBM8032's, IBM PC's) I actually LIKE having colors in the terminal. I even preferred CGA color monitors to Monochrome for PC's back in 85/86.

Fancy schmancy modernist, eh?

How about we bring back Teletype terminals?

If you have one, you can still connect it to a Linux box and it will work.

It was SO weird when they switched them out for early dot matrix printers! No more chunk-a-chunk --- now, it was just zizzzzzz----zizzzzz ---zizzzzz ..... with no bells.

No bells? Sacrilege! My computer has a built in speaker that chirps whenever the terminal outputs a "bel".

All of these will make my computer itself chirp

printf '\a'
echo -e '\a'
echo $'\a'
tput bel

Then, even that went away, and all the news came in silently on one of those newfangled green phosphor CRT's.

I wonder how it works now.

 

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

Sadly, Stewart Cheifet, former host of the old Computer Chronicles show passed away in late december. Damn good host and damn informative show. Apparently he was the one who made it available to be archived on the Internet Archive.

Stewart Cheifet Obituary December 28, 2025 - Goldsteins Funeral

View Stewart Cheifet's obituary, find service dates, and sign the guestbook.

obits.goldsteinsfuneral.com

 

[Casey Pelous]

I wonder how it works now.

Setting aside my powerful urge to snarkily ask, "It works?" .....

UPI, as far as I know, is no longer a commercial subscription news service. They seem to be a free website now.

AP, on the other hand, has all sorts of services for radio stations, including audio clips as well as AP stories, now all delivered digitally into a software suite that does all kinds of correlating and searching. It's all happening on a screen, of course -- lots of screens in a big newsroom like 1010 WINS in NYC or KNX in LA -- but I'd presume they're still making some sort of hard copy for the people who eventually read the stuff on the air -- at least, until they're replaced by AI.

I have no idea what they provide for TV. Presumably, video as well as all the rest.

 

[Essence Lumin]

UPI, as far as I know, is no longer a commercial subscription news service. They seem to be a free website now.

Since its sale in 1982, UPI has changed ownership several times and was twice in Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization.[9] With each change in ownership came deeper service and staff cutbacks and changes of focus and a corresponding shrinkage of its traditional media customer base. Since the 1999 sale of its broadcast client list to its one-time major rival, the AP, UPI has concentrated on smaller information market niches. It no longer services media organizations in a major way.[10]

In 2000, UPI was purchased by News World Communications, an international news media company founded in 1976 by Unification Church leader Sun Myung Moon.[11][12]