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Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

scifiinterfaces.com

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Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#51
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because its unlikely that the girl would have had access to an IRIX box She's related to Hammond, who owns an island. I'm sure he could get her an old box and some manuals to play with, if not outright a state of the art system. > As a filesystem browser it was not useful. Someone with Unix system experience would prefer a 2D browser, which IRIX also had. But isn't that exactly the sort of thing a clever kid with a…

Using the 3D browser would be akin to saying "That's Linux" upong seeing a Compiz cube a few years ago. I mean, yes, it would be technically correct, but not a defining term for deeply knowing Linux and its intrinsics.

It's not weird or wrong in any way though. Plenty of people were running compiz for a while, and a kid into Linux would recognize it.

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#52
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because its unlikely that the girl would have had access to an IRIX box She's related to Hammond, who owns an island. I'm sure he could get her an old box and some manuals to play with, if not outright a state of the art system. > As a filesystem browser it was not useful. Someone with Unix system experience would prefer a 2D browser, which IRIX also had. But isn't that exactly the sort of thing a clever kid with a…

Using the 3D browser would be akin to saying "That's Linux" upong seeing a Compiz cube a few years ago. I mean, yes, it would be technically correct, but not a defining term for deeply knowing Linux and its intrinsics.

Yeah, so? She's a bright 12 year old, not a burnt out and jaded Unix sysadmin with 20 years of experience.

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#53

This is a nice website, with an interesting purpose. Though i suppose reviewing sci-Fi movies notions of interfaces will soon clash with the dryness of reality. The 90's were wild in that sense, you could imagine that the internet superhighway would be a superhighway you could literally drive on with your Avatar, and countless movies and tv-series presented things thus. The noughties were way more grounded in reality…

Minority Report came out in 2002, and I can tell you, actually using a computer interface like that for an extended period of time would be pretty exhausting.

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#54
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because its unlikely that the girl would have had access to an IRIX box, and while it was real software, it was dog-slow on low-end SGI without a graphics card, so she had to be using some pretty expensive hardware. As a filesystem browser it was not useful. Someone with Unix system experience would prefer a 2D browser, which IRIX also had. We only used the 3D browser for our demo setup for visitors.

> Because its unlikely that the girl would have had access to an IRIX box She's related to Hammond, who owns an island. I'm sure he could get her an old box and some manuals to play with, if not outright a state of the art system. > As a filesystem browser it was not useful. Someone with Unix system experience would prefer a 2D browser, which IRIX also had. But isn't that exactly the sort of thing a clever kid with a…

"would mess around with", certainly. And quickly find it wasn't useful for actual file system navigation.

The 2D file browser for IRIX was pretty nice, with vector icons. https://sgi.neocities.org/1.png shows an example from https://sgi.neocities.org/ .

I made a mistake when I said we used it for demos. We did not use fsv for that. I was thinking of buttonfly - see example to the left of http://www.sgistuff.net/software/irixintro/images/irix-4.0.1... .

I did try out fsv, but again, it was slow on the desktop machine I had, and not useful.

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#55

Not exactly related, but I'm shocked by the amount of people, older people even working in IT who mock the girl in Jurassic Park saying "it's a Unix system, I know this", when in fact what they showed was a Unix system and the 3D interface they showed was real software SGI shipped with IRIX.

Well, the fix was probably around the lines of: sudo systemctl restart gates But, whatever, I mean, there are literal dinosaurs going around, I guess that's the more plausible plotline.

Ah but this was pre-systemd so you would have been screwing around trying to find whatever script was being used to lock the doors after close of business.

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#56
post #41

If you're a fan of the movie, this youtube channel has amazing interviews with cast and crew. So many great anecdotes buried within... https://www.youtube.com/@HackersCurator/videos

I never thought such a hyperfocused channel would be this fascinating!

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#58
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because its unlikely that the girl would have had access to an IRIX box, and while it was real software, it was dog-slow on low-end SGI without a graphics card, so she had to be using some pretty expensive hardware. As a filesystem browser it was not useful. Someone with Unix system experience would prefer a 2D browser, which IRIX also had. We only used the 3D browser for our demo setup for visitors.

When I was a kid I had access to all sorts of exotic operating systems. SunOS, VMS, all sorts of Unixes. I was a very naughty boy.

SunOS and VMS were two of the most common workstation/minicomputer-class OSes out there, and rather less exotic than IRIX.

I'm old enough that my college-freshman "intro to computers" and Fortran classes were taught on a CDC Cyber running NOS.

Re: Sci-Fi Interfaces: Hackers

#59

Oh man. Legendary film. Young Angelina Jolie in her hacker outfit with her Spock haircut … am I right?

You made it weird by mentioning a Spock haircut.

How about young Persis Khambatta in her Star Trek outfit with her Mr. Clean haircut … am I right?
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