kokopelli wrote:
I have thought about doing one thing really strange with computers. It would be interesting to take everything out of the box and mount them on my walls and ceilings. Make it hard to see where one computer ended and the next ended. And, of course, they would all be networked together through switches taken out of the boxes and mounted on the walls. It would be almost like being inside a computer.
Yes! Do it! Include lots of screens and a cool looking chair!
And lots of blinken lights. Preferably ones that serve some useful diagnostic purpose rather than just blinking in an arbitrary pattern. Just for fun you could run the sound output to an oscilloscope.
Technology is always more interesting when you can see it working. That's why people like to look at steam locomotives more than Diesel Electric locomotives. The Diesel Electric locomotives have a decent degree of mechanical complexity but it's all in a box. It looks like a box on wheels. In Steam locomotives many of the moving parts are mounted to the outside. You can see them working.
It would be fascinating to see computers get the same treatment. I hate how many companies (especially Apple) want computers to be these opaque boxes that seamingly run on magic (every time Apple describes one of their products as "magical" a kitten dies). I think these consumer tech companies want their customers to be far removed from the inner workings of their products. They don't want the customer to tinker with the device, they only want the customer to buy more media from the app store.
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The days are long, but the years are short
27 Jun 2018, 8:29 pm
