Re^2: Visualizing bugs

[hv]

I've always wanted a sound-based firewall that plays a tone each time a packet is rejected, with a different tone for each port. I think with a bit of fine-tuning this could give you a kind of wide-spectrum Geiger counter that would make it very easy to recognise a change in the normal patterns that might represent a problem.

Hugo

[BrowserUk]

In my first ever multi-threaded program, written to run under OS/2 pre-1.0, the only reentrant IO function available was Beep( freq, duration ). So

1. thread_1 did "beeeb....beeep...beeep";
2. thread_2 did "beep beep....beep beep";
3. thread_3 did "bip bip bip....bip bip bip" etc.

You could suspend/resume each of the threads by typing it's thread number on the keyboard.

It wasn't much of a program, but you'd be amazed how many grown men (and women) spent an inordinate amount of time being amused by it:)

[gaal]

OS/2! Now that was a system.

Where I'm at, lots of ATMs still run it. (Version 2.1 I think.)

[BrowserUk]

Yes. Many, many ATM's were built around 2.1, which was the first properly complete and tuned version. It was also the last major version that had MS involvement if memory serves.

Warp was pretty cool, with the emphasis mainly on "pretty". There was little really new underneath, but the new interface had some nice features.

After that, the "PCs are just terminals to mainframes" crowd kinda took over and the rest is history.

A friend of mine involved in developing the replacement for OS/2 in ATM's was kind of nervous about the prospects--but that was some time ago.