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Yeah, but you're missing the point the parent is making. On a C64, you boot into bare basic and can immediately start playing with sprites and lines and stuff.

Yeah, but you're missing the point the parent is making. On a C64, you boot into bare basic and can immediately start playing with sprites and lines and stuff. With a modern computer you have BIOS, 80 bazillion lines of Windows or Linux, your Python installation and about 90 layers in between. It's simply not possible to fully understand a modern computer. Just take a look at all the lines of code in Windows and Python that lets you play with turtle graphics (forget about the other million lines of other code I don't even know about). Then, compare that sum with the amount of code in the C64. See the difference? Sure a modern computer does a lot more, but it's also a black-hole/ accretion disk of bad design glued together.

theamk 6y ago
Well, what is your goal? If you want to play with sprites and lines and stuff, use modern PC. It does the things that poor C64 never dreamed of, and if you want constraints, there are always things like "1k demos" which let one express their creativity while keeping the minimal amount of code around. if you want to understand stuff down to the metal, there is a whole embedded world out there. From the simple 8051 with a half-dozen registers to 32 bit ARMs where you can learn how to set up DMA transfers. (My favorite one is 8-bit AVR: the datasheet is small enough you can read it end to end, there are plenty of peripherals, but at the same time it is slow enough you have to occasionally solve "how to code this quickly" puzzle) I see no reason to mix those two, except because of nostalgia. Yes, in the past you had to be blacksmith and woodworker -- but those are gone. You can still mix those two, and the very first rasp you made still feels very special, but let's not pretend it was somehow better than the modern store-bought one.
- 7thaccount 6y ago
  I'm not sure if there is a goal here, just pointing out how times have changed. I shift between we should throw out the whole modern desktop and completely redesign it from the ground up to resigning myself to the understanding that the complexity is unavoidable in a fashion if you want networking, USB, web browser, GPU...etc.
  - zepto 6y ago
    The desktop itself doesn’t really seem very ‘modern’. It’s really not very different from what was available in the 80’s and 90’s, just with better graphics on some systems. Most of the complexity in those things you mention comes from asynchrony.
egsmi 6y ago
> On a C64, you boot into bare basic Come on. I think you're remembering the past with rose colored glasses. I loved my C64 in the 80s but it was not user friendly, compared to say an iPad running playgrounds. This is what is was like when things worked. https://dfarq.homeip.net/load-commodore-64-games/ https://dfarq.homeip.net/load-commodore-64-games/ When things didn't work...

theamk 6y ago

Well, what is your goal? If you want to play with sprites and lines and stuff, use modern PC. It does the things that poor C64 never dreamed of, and if you want constraints, there are always things like "1k demos" which let one express their creativity while keeping the minimal amount of code around. if you want to understand stuff down to the metal, there is a whole embedded world out there. From the simple 8051 with a half-dozen registers to 32 bit ARMs where you can learn how to set up DMA transfers. (My favorite one is 8-bit AVR: the datasheet is small enough you can read it end to end, there are plenty of peripherals, but at the same time it is slow enough you have to occasionally solve "how to code this quickly" puzzle) I see no reason to mix those two, except because of nostalgia. Yes, in the past you had to be blacksmith and woodworker -- but those are gone. You can still mix those two, and the very first rasp you made still feels very special, but let's not pretend it was somehow better than the modern store-bought one.

7thaccount 6y ago
I'm not sure if there is a goal here, just pointing out how times have changed. I shift between we should throw out the whole modern desktop and completely redesign it from the ground up to resigning myself to the understanding that the complexity is unavoidable in a fashion if you want networking, USB, web browser, GPU...etc.
- zepto 6y ago
  The desktop itself doesn’t really seem very ‘modern’. It’s really not very different from what was available in the 80’s and 90’s, just with better graphics on some systems. Most of the complexity in those things you mention comes from asynchrony.

egsmi 6y ago

> On a C64, you boot into bare basic Come on. I think you're remembering the past with rose colored glasses. I loved my C64 in the 80s but it was not user friendly, compared to say an iPad running playgrounds. This is what is was like when things worked. https://dfarq.homeip.net/load-commodore-64-games/ https://dfarq.homeip.net/load-commodore-64-games/ When things didn't work...