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Steve Jobs Ponders His Legacy In Never-Before-Seen 1994 Video

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Re: Steve Jobs Ponders His Legacy In Never-Before-Seen 1994 Video

#61

Post by jdpage »

dman wrote: post #14
hello_newman wrote: post #4

Steve Jobs had such a way with words. I personally love this quote: "This is not a field where one paints a painting which will be looked at for centuries...This is a field where one does his work and in ten years it is obsolete." I loved the metaphor: "It's sort of like a sentiment of rocks. You're building up a mountain and you get to contribute your little layer of sedimentary rock to make the mountain that much h…

This is why Ritchie and McCarthy deserve a special place in computing heaven.

Okay, I appreciate that Ritchie was a genius and that C was revolutionary and is foundational to modern computing.

But seriously, C arrays not having bounds checks has probably caused more security disasters than anything else in the history of computing, with the possible exception of end-users. Was there a good reason for this, and if so, what was it?

Re: Steve Jobs Ponders His Legacy In Never-Before-Seen 1994 Video

#62

Post by r0s »

jasonjei wrote: post #25
snowwrestler wrote: post #10

Steve Jobs might not be right about this. Apple's latest and greatest operating systems still implement quite a bit of functionality from Unix, which is much more than 10 years old. They still implement and use ASCII, JPG, TCP/IP, etc. Most mathematical papers, paintings, and churches don't inspire awe 200 years later. The vast majority are lost to time. Only the most original, revolutionary, or useful cultural artif…

In a way, his work supports the work of UNIX and Ritchie. He states that tech work on a large scale is often like setting pavement. UNIX APIs are a progression of that. The fact that many can use a computer without understanding the underpinnings of an OS is a testament to Jobs.

> The fact that many can use a computer without understanding the underpinnings of an OS is a testament to Jobs.

Isn't that a quirk Windows users are usually derided for? And that OS is far more pervasive, even now...

Re: Steve Jobs Ponders His Legacy In Never-Before-Seen 1994 Video

#63

Post by georgemcbay »

jdpage wrote: post #61
dman wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why Ritchie and McCarthy deserve a special place in computing heaven.

Okay, I appreciate that Ritchie was a genius and that C was revolutionary and is foundational to modern computing. But seriously, C arrays not having bounds checks has probably caused more security disasters than anything else in the history of computing, with the possible exception of end-users. Was there a good reason for this, and if so, what was it?

C was introduced in 1972, that's a year before I was born (and it had been in development for a couple years prior).

The first computer I programmed on ran at 1 mhz and had 64 kilobytes of RAM.

Is it really so hard to see why C didn't historically have bounds checking? Bounds checking was pretty controversial in languages even as late as the early 2000s because of the runtime cost.

Re: Steve Jobs Ponders His Legacy In Never-Before-Seen 1994 Video

#64

Post by emiliobumachar »

jdpage wrote: post #61
dman wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why Ritchie and McCarthy deserve a special place in computing heaven.

Okay, I appreciate that Ritchie was a genius and that C was revolutionary and is foundational to modern computing. But seriously, C arrays not having bounds checks has probably caused more security disasters than anything else in the history of computing, with the possible exception of end-users. Was there a good reason for this, and if so, what was it?

I'm going to guess performance. Sure it's tiny today, but what about back then?

Re: Steve Jobs Ponders His Legacy In Never-Before-Seen 1994 Video

#65

Post by dman »

jdpage wrote: post #61
dman wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why Ritchie and McCarthy deserve a special place in computing heaven.

Okay, I appreciate that Ritchie was a genius and that C was revolutionary and is foundational to modern computing. But seriously, C arrays not having bounds checks has probably caused more security disasters than anything else in the history of computing, with the possible exception of end-users. Was there a good reason for this, and if so, what was it?

C is to sytems computing what democracy is to governance.

Re: Steve Jobs Ponders His Legacy In Never-Before-Seen 1994 Video

#66

Post by dmoney »

acqq wrote: post #38
joelrunyon wrote: post #3

This is old. You can pick up the full video here - http://www.siliconvalleyhistorical.org/#!steve-jobs-film/c1x... I did a couple years back. It's like $5 & well worth it

But here's Amazon review: "I was threatened with legal action and personal attacks via email from the president of the Silicon Valley Historical Association over the above review (which is against not only the 1st Amendment, but also Amazon's policies), and then my review was removed. Therefore I am posting this review again (...) In my opinion, if you are looking for a film about Steve Jobs, this is NOT it. In this…

I bought the audio version a while ago and agree with most of this. I bought it through some other site (probably whatever the SV Historical Society site linked to) and found it virtually impossible to post a review, due to errors about illegal characters in the text. I did find the 15 or so minutes to be worthwhile, but I wished it had been clear that it wasn't an hour-long interview. The person who answered my e-mail was apologetic and comped me another interview.

Re: Steve Jobs Ponders His Legacy In Never-Before-Seen 1994 Video

#69

Post by dorfsmay »

Nobody would try to fly one of the original Wright brothers' kites or planes, yet, this does not diminish our ability to admire their contribution to the aviation industry.

I find it ironic that a buddhist laments the lack of permanence of the product of his work!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impermanence

Re: Steve Jobs Ponders His Legacy In Never-Before-Seen 1994 Video

#70

Post by dorfsmay »

acqq wrote: post #38
joelrunyon wrote: post #3

This is old. You can pick up the full video here - http://www.siliconvalleyhistorical.org/#!steve-jobs-film/c1x... I did a couple years back. It's like $5 & well worth it

But here's Amazon review: "I was threatened with legal action and personal attacks via email from the president of the Silicon Valley Historical Association over the above review (which is against not only the 1st Amendment, but also Amazon's policies), and then my review was removed. Therefore I am posting this review again (...) In my opinion, if you are looking for a film about Steve Jobs, this is NOT it. In this…

Thanks very much, this gives context to the video.

Interesting, I always compare the internet, and more specifically instant access to a huge area of knowledge to the invention of the press.

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