Keeping Up With Computer Stuff

[Lucky]

Long gone are the days when I couldn't figure out what www meant. But all the time I read stuff in the papers that I have no idea what it is. Cloud computing? Um, is that's using God's computer? Or just computing in an airplane?

Now I learn that RSA Security's SecurID Device has been compromised. But I have no idea what that is. (On the other hand, it seems all things computer can be hacked.)

Truthfully, I have no idea why someone with a laptop would also need an Ipad. And don't even get me started on computer games that millions of people play online. Why? Do you play them?

And Twitter. I know no one who tweets. I know no one who would want to keep up hourly with my random thoughts tweeted onto their computers. Do you tweet? Who reads your tweets?

And what am I to make of Nintendo's new hand-held screen with HI-Def when I have never even played a Nintendo game?

It's easier than ever to feel like a dinosaur.

[Guest StevenDraker]

For some "cloud computing" is everything and the kitchen sink ...

for others ...

or just ...

[KYTOP]

I'm just glad I got 2 kids to call that know how to fix my computer screw-ups in between their hysterical laughs at their Dad.

[TampaYankee]

Long gone are the days when I couldn't figure out what www meant. But all the time I read stuff in the papers that I have no idea what it is. Cloud computing? Um, is that's using God's computer? Or just computing in an airplane?

Now I learn that RSA Security's SecurID Device has been compromised. But I have no idea what that is. (On the other hand, it seems all things computer can be hacked.)

Truthfully, I have no idea why someone with a laptop would also need an Ipad. And don't even get me started on computer games that millions of people play online. Why? Do you play them?

And Twitter. I know no one who tweets. I know no one who would want to keep up hourly with my random thoughts tweeted onto their computers. Do you tweet? Who reads your tweets?

And what am I to make of Nintendo's new hand-held screen with HI-Def when I have never even played a Nintendo game?

It's easier than ever to feel like a dinosaur.

Ditto

[lookin]

I think all new technology is daunting at first. If we're happy without it, why clutter our pretty little heads with mumbo jumbo? When there's a good reason, we'll learn how to use it, and most likely it will be simpler by then.

Let's tweet . . . Let's meet

In my opinion, the burden belongs on the technology companies to make their wares easy to buy and easy to use. No one should feel inadequate when it's really the vendors who need to do the heavy lifting. They'll figure it out eventually, and we will all head happily into the cloud.

[Guest StevenDraker]

Ahh ... TO TWEET OR NOT TO TWEET ...

[Guest CharliePS]

I can't even figure out how to access the unread text messages that my regular 7 year old cell phone tells me are on there; it doesn't matter, since I don't know anyone who would send me a text message anyhow. I have never played a computer game, except solitaire, and can't imagine why I would want them on my cell phone (to play while I am driving on an empty Interstate?).

I don't own any other portable electronic device, although it might be convenient to have one when I am travelling to check things like flight info, but I am embarrassed to admit I don't understand how they could work if they are not plugged into my home cable connection. I didn't hook up to the Internet until the day I gave my card with a phone number to an attractive young man I picked up on an Amtrak ride, and he gave me a puzzled look and said, "Don't you have an email address?" (Duh..what is that?) I didn't change from dial-up to cable until my employer told me I couldn't keep working online without it.

The most important point, however, is that I hate to spend money to purchase and maintain anything that I don't really need.

[Guest BeachBoy]

Isn't cloud computing like Google docs? it's just Internet-based stuff, right? RIGHT??

[Guest BeachBoy]

I'm just glad I got 2 kids to call that know how to fix my computer screw-ups in between their hysterical laughs at their Dad.

That's me for my mom. She calls me in a panic and I go over and she's got the number lock button on. There's a place in heaven for kids who help their parents with computer stuff.

[lookin]

it's just Internet-based stuff, right? RIGHT??

Right.

It's even better than Google docs. Taken to its extreme, everything that used to be on your computer (docs, software applications, music, photos, videos, emails, you-name-it) can now be moved to a giant hard drive in the sky (the 'cloud'). You get access to it through the internet, and the only thing you really need in your possession is a device with some kind of browser that can connect to the internet and interact with all the stuff that's in the cloud.

The device you use can be a computer, a smart phone, even a TV, as long as it has a browser and can connect to the internet. All your stuff is available any time, anywhere in the world with internet access. And it's available on a device you can slip in your pocket.

The good news is, somebody else is responsible for storing all your stuff and making it available to you. The bad news is somebody else is responsible for storing all your stuff and making it available to you.

The idea of Google or Apple or Microsoft having all my stuff on their hard drives leaves me cold. I just know they're busy thinking up new schemes to charge me for getting at it.

[Lucky]

Thanks, Lookin and Steven for explaining, or trying to, cloud computing. Some companies that had used Amazon's cloud computing came to regret it when their data was not available to them when they wanted it.

I also learned what the RSA token is. It's a device that generates a number that allows you to enter a computer network. The number is different each time you enter, thus more secure. Citibank, for example, has 50,000 of the devices for their employees to use to access the in-house system. So you can see why they want it to be secure, but apparently RSA waited some time before revealing the insecurity of its devices, thus pissing off the companies that thought they were secure.

Now on to E-books. I dread the day when the inevitable will come and I can no longer pick up a traditional book to read. Yet the trend is clear. Current E-books leave a lot to be desired, especially if you take NY Times tech columnist David Pogue's word for it. Today he reviews 2 new readers, each an advance over what is currently available. He begins his column thus:

"We think we’re so modern. We think we’re hot stuff, with our touch-screen tablets, video cellphones and Internet movie downloads. But mark my words: we’re in the Paleozoic era of consumer technology. Our grandchildren will listen to our technology tales — spotty cellphone coverage, 24-hour movie viewing windows, three-hour battery life — and burst out laughing the minute they’re out of earshot. Take e-book readers, like the Kindle and its rivals. “Come on, Grandma. You really couldn’t read Kindle books on a Nook, or vice versa? What a dumb system!” “Tell us again why you couldn’t read Harry Potter books on e-readers?” “Grandpa, what do you mean ‘monochrome?’ ”

This week, though, e-book readers just took their first slimy steps out of the primordial soup."

He then goes on to review the new Kobo and "All-New NOOK." In is review, he mentions that there is a cheaper reader available, but you have to allow ads to appear on it. I cannot imagine buying that. Here is his review if you are interested:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/09/technology/personaltech/09pogue.html?ref=personaltech

[Guest BeachBoy]

The good news is, somebody else is responsible for storing all your stuff and making it available to you. The bad news is somebody else is responsible for storing all your stuff and making it available to you.

The idea of Google or Apple or Microsoft having all my stuff on their hard drives leaves me cold. I just know they're busy thinking up new schemes to charge me for getting at it.

That creeps me out too. It helped me when I planned a road trip with a buddy who was coming from LA - we were able to make an itinerary together on a Google Doc that made it a LOT easier and then we just printed it out and we had all the info. But I wouldn't keep any REAL info on there. I have USB keys for that.

[Guest BeachBoy]

"We think we’re so modern. We think we’re hot stuff, with our touch-screen tablets, video cellphones and Internet movie downloads. But mark my words: we’re in the Paleozoic era of consumer technology. Our grandchildren will listen to our technology tales — spotty cellphone coverage, 24-hour movie viewing windows, three-hour battery life — and burst out laughing the minute they’re out of earshot. Take e-book readers, like the Kindle and its rivals. “Come on, Grandma. You really couldn’t read Kindle books on a Nook, or vice versa? What a dumb system!” “Tell us again why you couldn’t read Harry Potter books on e-readers?” “Grandpa, what do you mean ‘monochrome?’ ”

This week, though, e-book readers just took their first slimy steps out of the primordial soup."

He then goes on to review the new Kobo and "All-New NOOK." In is review, he mentions that there is a cheaper reader available, but you have to allow ads to appear on it. I cannot imagine buying that. Here is his review if you are interested:

http://www.nytimes.c...ef=personaltech

I don't think regular books will disappear in our lifetimes, or even in the lifetime of anyone who's currently living. There would have to be something REALLY spectacular - more so than the All-New NOOK, or anything else that's around.

[Lucky]

That creeps me out too. It helped me when I planned a road trip with a buddy who was coming from LA - we were able to make an itinerary together on a Google Doc that made it a LOT easier and then we just printed it out and we had all the info. But I wouldn't keep any REAL info on there. I have USB keys for that.

Some ten years ago a young computer repair guy told me that the wave of the future was to store stuff elsewhere besides your computer, and that we would soon only need small, portable computers. I thought he was nuts. Cute, though.

[Guest BeachBoy]

Some ten years ago a young computer repair guy told me that the wave of the future was to store stuff elsewhere besides your computer, and that we would soon only need small, portable computers. I thought he was nuts. Cute, though.

I love nerds.

[lookin]

Much as I'd love to be sitting on the night train to Bucharest listening to Spanish Eyes and taking pictures with my iPhone, I'd just as soon not have it all up in Apple's cloud.

They'd probably track my GPS back to the caboose and cause my gentleman friend and me all kinds of tsuris.

[Lucky]

Much as I'd love to be sitting on the night train to Bucharest listening to Spanish Eyes and taking pictures with my iPhone, I'd just as soon not have it all up in Apple's cloud.

They'd probably track my GPS back to the caboose and cause my gentleman friend and me all kinds of tsuris.

Fo shizzle!

[Guest Allessio77]

What is that picture with the two women? What are they doing?

[lookin]

What is that picture with the two women? What are they doing?

A million thanks! I used the picture without reading the entire caption. Very interesting description of an early advance in technolology.

Early telephone exchange, Paris

V410/0043 Rights Managed

Caption: Telephone exchange. Women working in a telephone exchange in Paris, 1890. Connections between early telephones were made manually by the operators. Technological improvements in this Parisian exchange meant that people, for the first time, provided a number rather than a name, and they were passed between fewer people before being connected. This system was known as Poste assis. Taken from Physique Populaire, 1891.

[RA1]

AT&T used operators, especially long distance operators at least into the 1960's according to my memory. My grandmother's sister aka my great aunt was a LD operator which was an elite position because they had to do so much "stuff" especially on international calls.

I am sure several posters herein recall how high LD calls were up until fairly recently. 45 cents per minute was a "cheaper" rate and then steadily less until today, many have a fixed fee for almost unlimited minutes and we think nothing of calling anywhere in the US or even the world, just for fun.

Best regards,

RA1

[TampaYankee]

The good news is, somebody else is responsible for storing all your stuff and making it available to you. The bad news is somebody else is responsible for storing all your stuff and making it available to you.

The idea of Google or Apple or Microsoft having all my stuff on their hard drives leaves me cold. I just know they're busy thinking up new schemes to charge me for getting at it.

Amen.

I get visions of Technology Big Brother having ultimate control over all of our lives through access and control of all information about us. I prefer to have my own data storage and my own software on my own computer. I know that even with this, privacy is a fiction. Nevertheless, I prefer to keep it as difficult as possible to let others access all of my information, especially for a central broadly scoped entity.

When ones gives away responsibility for maintaing one's own life, one cannot be surprised when he is no longer in control of it.

[Guest CharliePS]

AT&T used operators, especially long distance operators at least into the 1960's according to my memory. My grandmother's sister aka my great aunt was a LD operator which was an elite position because they had to do so much "stuff" especially on international calls.

I am sure several posters herein recall how high LD calls were up until fairly recently. 45 cents per minute was a "cheaper" rate and then steadily less until today, many have a fixed fee for almost unlimited minutes and we think nothing of calling anywhere in the US or even the world, just for fun.

Best regards,

RA1

I worked in Czechoslovakia right after the Iron Curtain fell down, and trying to call home was a nightmare. Very few people had private phones in their homes, so one had to go to the post office (which controlled the national phone system), pay in advance, and take a seat in an open phone booth where anyone could listen to your conversation, and wait for as much as a half hour while they tried to set up a connection, which usually wasn't very reliable.

When I lived in London in the 1970s, my partner in the US and I made cassette tapes and mailed them back and forth, because it was easier and cheaper than trying to phone one another, especially since one had to pay even if there was no one home at the other end. The other day I called a friend in London to wish him a happy birthday; I punched in several numbers on my home phone and was instantly connected, but had to leave a message on his answering machine; he called me back the next day on Skype. Neither of us had to give any thought to what it might cost.

[Guest BeachBoy]

Much as I'd love to be sitting on the night train to Bucharest listening to Spanish Eyes and taking pictures with my iPhone, I'd just as soon not have it all up in Apple's cloud.

They'd probably track my GPS back to the caboose and cause my gentleman friend and me all kinds of tsuris.

Oh, HELL yes.

I'm with you on that. Also, If they want everyone to use the cloud then Internet has to be always available to all devices all the time. And I don't see that happening anytime soon.

[Guest StevenDraker]

I punched in several numbers on my home phone and was instantly connected, but had to leave a message on his answering machine; he called me back the next day on Skype. Neither of us had to give any thought to what it might cost.

Charlie, Skype to Skype (video)calls are free of charge provided both parties have a Skype account (free to set up) and a reliable/broadband Internet connection. I use Skype all the time to connect with family and friends.

Also, If they want everyone to use the cloud then Internet has to be always available to all devices all the time. And I don't see that happening anytime soon.

It will. In about 10-20 years not only Internet will be available to all devices all the time but also all communications (phone calls, Internet ...) will be completely free of charge.

[Guest BeachBoy]

Charlie, Skype to Skype (video)calls are free of charge provided both parties have a Skype account (free to set up) and a reliable/broadband Internet connection. I use Skype all the time to connect with family and friends.

It will. In about 10-20 years not only Internet will be available to all devices all the time but also all communications (phone calls, Internet ...) will be completely free of charge.

Yeah, it will be free since huge conglomerations will be paying to have their pages loaded up faster.