From: gad@eclipse.its.rpi.edu (Garance A. Drosehn)
Subject: Re: A CPU on Every Desk?
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 00:46:20 GMT

henry@trilithon.mpk.ca.us (Henry McGilton) writes:
> As Steve Abell said, ``Oh, how short people's memories are!''.
> 
> Anybody who (like me) suffered through that computer industry mass
> psychosis of the 1970's called ``time sharing'' while trying to
> get software out the door would never want to go back to centralised
> anything.  The biggest liberating factor I had in my career was
> when I quit using a Control Data 7600 timeshared machine and got
> myself a Cromemco Z2 box with a Z80 in it -- mine, all mine!

The question you should ask is, "Were my problems the result of time-sharing  
per se, or were they particularly bad because of the OS that I happened to  
be stuck with to do that timesharing?"

> Unfortunately, I see the disquieting trend back to time sharing,
> except it's now called ``client server computing'', as if giving
> it a new name changes the result.  In these new bad old days, the
> resource being competed for (competition, you understand, NOT
> sharing) isn't so much CPU cycles as network bandwidth.  The end
> results are the same, though:

One of my biggest complaints with "the brave new world of computing" is the  
lies that are involved.  People tout the benefits of standalone systems, but  
what is really sold is "client-server" computing.  I agree with you that  
"client-server" computing isn't all *that* much different than mainframe  
computing, once you peel away the fancy marketting layers.

>   o   the decisions as to what's on your desk and how well (or
> 	mostly badly) it'll be ``served'' are made by somebody
> 	other than you.  The person making the decisions usually
> 	has no accountability and usually doesn't have to suffer
> 	the same lousy service you're getting.

Again, this shows a problem in your particular situation.  System developers  
need to be on the *exact* same system as the users, or the problem you note  
is unavoidable.  This is true whether we're talking mainframes or  
stand-alone PC's.

>   o   the administration of the central resource ends up being
> 	done by what rapidly becomes an elite priesthood of ``gurus''
> 	and their acolytes.  This elite priesthood rapidly develops
> 	into a defensive faction with their own agenda which has
> 	little or nothing to do with providing adequate service to
> 	the users of the resource.

That defensive mechanism comes from having too many people asking for too  
many things.  This is unavoidable with any centralized system.  Of course,  
with any completely distributed system, you end up with a similar problem.   
My stand-alone Mac has all kinds of gee-whiz, high brow, fancy productivity  
enhancements.  I'll be willing to bet that most the Macs on campus don't,  
because *I* know where to find these things and the average Mac user doesn't  
have a clue about them.

While I do believe there's a difference there, it's hard for me to put into  
words just what (or where) I think the overall advantage is.

I'm also all too painfully aware of users who *think* they know what they  
are doing, so they install some new piece of software --- and then call us  
up (us = a central computing service) to figure out why nothing on their  
machine works anymore.  I've lost many a day to such "productivity  
enhancements" as we have moved towards the distributed computing approach.

>   o   the decisions as to the level of utilisation of the central
> 	resource are made by bean counters, who usually don't have
> 	to suffer from their decisions.  The bean counter mentality
> 	indicates that the resource must be utilised to and beyond
> 	the limit, to the point where the resource becomes useless.

The influence of bean counters on all this can be a problem.  But again, it  
can also be a problem for standalone systems.  Why buy a Mac Quadra when you  
only use that Mac Plus 2 hours per day?  The real problem here is that you  
are using other people's money to get resources for your own work (work that  
they do not do).  You have to convince them to spend the bucks.

And since I work at a university, I am very familiar with this problem...

> One would think that the people in the industry had learned their
> lessons in the so called ``software crises'' of the 60's and 70's
> and would not want to repeat the nonsense.

It is not clear that everyone can really get what they need with any of the  
current models of computing, if that one model is followed slavishly.

--
Garance Alistair Drosehn     =     gad@eclipse.its.rpi.edu
ITS Systems Programmer            (handles NeXT-type mail)
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute;           Troy NY    USA
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy