Free Linux and OpenOffice - even if your email address doesn't

[Tony Duell]

> 
> 
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Tony Duell" <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk>
> To: <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
> Sent: Saturday, August 30, 2008 5:11 PM
> Subject: Re: Free Linux and OpenOffice - even if your email address doesn't
> 
> 
> >
> >
> >> Second, I work for a multi-billion dollar company, and there is NO WAY on
> >> this earth any minutely-responsible IT
> >> department is going to run ANYTHING unsupported in a production
> >> environment,
> >> especially with SOX and other
> >> requirements.
> >
> > And there is no way I am going to use anything I can't support myself.
> > Which means I won't depend on any hardware I don't have full schematics
> > for, I won't depend on any software I don't have the source code for. I
> > don;t require it to be 'open', I don't mind if the schematics and source
> > are not freely copyable and that I have to pay to get, say, a technical
> > manaual containing said schematics.
> >
> > -tony
> >
> 
> You're joking, right? Who the heck in THIS day and age is giving you
> schematics?We run HP, IBM, Sun, Cisco, and Dell hardware, and I hardly see
> ANY of them giving out schematics.

No I am not joking. I stand by what I dead. I do not depend on any piece 
of hardware I don't have full schematics for.

Now, unless I am mistaken, this is the 'Classic Computers' mailing list. 
What a 'classic computer' is I don't know precisely, but it's normally 
taken to be something 10 years old or moee. By that definition I don't 
own a single non-classic computer. I actually own (and use) very few 
machines that are less than 20 years old).

I certainly don't own any hardware from either Dell or Cisco. I am typing 
this on an IBM machine. An IBM machine for which I have full, official, 
schematics and BIOS source code. It's a much hacked PC/AT. I bought the 
full set of 'classic' Technical Reference manuals from IBM. Yes, they 
were expensive. And yest they  were (and still are) well worth it.

Now, HP is an interesting one. ASFAI with the exception of their MS-DOS
'incompatibles' (110, 110+, 150, 150-II), HP never publisehd official
schematics for any of their desktop machines. Well, maybe the HP85 series
too, I think the service manual for that one was avaialble had had a
schematic.. They did for their HP871B handheld (I have the full IDS), they
did for the HP75. And there are thecnical reference manuals for the 
MS-DOS stuff -- I have them. But equally, there are 'unofficial' 
scheamtics of most classic HPs around.

> 
> Maybe in a 7-person company, but let's be realistic. Company I work for has

Think again. I am on my own...

> well over 15,000 employees, 5000+ workstations and laptops, over 600
> servers, all spread across 6 worldwide offices + 5 call centers, and you're
> talking about schematics?

Are all those 5000 workstations/laptops different? Or is it, as I 
suspect, many instances of relatively few mahcines. You don't need <n> 
copies of the same schematic...

> 
> That's just nuts - we'd need a full-time person just to manage the
> schematics, much less actually repairing stuff...
> 
> In this day in age, it's "call the vendor," because everything we have comes
> with 3-5 year on-site warranties, and/or maintenance and support contracts.

Oh get real... I am not going to call up some company to get some 
board-swapping idiot turn up who knows less about the machine than I 
do. Many, many, times I've managed to repair something -- really repair a 
logic fault, not just plug the cable back in, or whatever -- in the time 
between some misguided person called the supplier and the so-called 
engineer turning up. 

FWIW, I don't want a support contract. Period. I am very happy to support 
my own machines myself, and choose to use machines where I can do this.

-tony