@kabel42 @OpenComputeDesign

16-bit/early-32-bit was my favorite era. (Basically, the #68k era ;)

Computers were just becoming capable, but not too big for their britches.

@rl_dane @kabel42

Yeah, tbh, we really should have stopped at 32-bit

@kabel42 @OpenComputeDesign

I think computers were honestly better when they were limited to absolutely no more than 1GB RAM, no more than 256 colors, and no more than 1024x768 screen resolution.

1GB RAM: no LLMs
256 colors: no horrid low-contrast soupy interfaces
XGA Resolution: no horrid empty spaces and bloated interfaces

I keep wanting to make that as an OS 😄

(If only I had the skillz)

@rl_dane @kabel42

Yeah, older GUIs were _so much better_ it's actually impressive just how fast and how hard GUI design has fallen off a cliff

@OpenComputeDesign @kabel42

Yeah, and the pushback I get from statements like that is insane to me.

"But we don't want to go back to Windows 95."

I don't either, it was a crap OS, but the interface was better than the crap interfaces they're shipping today, so ?!?!????!?

@rl_dane

I'd rather w95 with its software suite and interface than w11 with its.

W11 is a worse OS than w95 was.

@OpenComputeDesign @kabel42

@pixx @OpenComputeDesign @kabel42

It does have memory protection, though. That was Windows 95's most glaring weakness.

Edit: I meant to say that it doesn't. derp.
Edit2: No, I was saying that W11 has memory protection. lol

@rl_dane @pixx @kabel42

Modern software still absolutely _sucks_ with anything to do with memory. Any claims modern OS's make are, at best, just giving people a false sense of security.

@OpenComputeDesign @pixx @kabel42

Brofam, Windows 95 used to crash on me daily.

Linux? Basically never.

FreeBSD? Maaaaybe once a week.

@rl_dane @pixx @kabel42

Linux and NetBSD both crash on me daily :P

@OpenComputeDesign @rl_dane @pixx @kabel42 Is it the OS that crashes, or applications running on the OS?

Are the crashes related to video output?

The OS should never crash. If it does, you most likely have defective hardware, or you’re finding issues with your video hardware support.

@AnachronistJohn @pixx @kabel42 @rl_dane

If a program crashes, 95% chance the OS crashes with it. Preemptetive/memory protected is a flat out lie.

@OpenComputeDesign @AnachronistJohn @kabel42 @rl_dane uhhhhh no. just, no.

I have programs crash semifrequently and have had maaaaaybe two OS crashes on linux in the last five years

one of which was due to the hard drive failing

@pixx @AnachronistJohn @kabel42 @rl_dane

Admittedly most crashes are from come from running out of RAM/modern computers sucking at handling Swap latency. But even when programs properly crash without running out of RAM, even if the system doesn't _technically_ go out with it (which it often still does), there's still rarely any chance of recovering the system without (if you're lucky) a reboot or (more likely) a hard reset. Even xkill doesn't help all that much a lot of the time

@OpenComputeDesign @pixx @kabel42 @rl_dane You might have hardware problems, then.

I’m compiling perl on a system with 24 megs of memory, so the system is basically entirely in swap. If that can run like that for a week or two and be fully fine afterwards, then the VM system is doing what it should.

I can’t speak for Linux - it’s becoming the Windows of the open source world - but I also thrash the heck out of memory and swap on modern high memory systems, too, without issues.