4 ms·

In mid 2000s when my father bought us a PC, we opened paint, I impressed him by drawing my country's flag in paint (cuz I saw a teacher in school do it). Then,

In mid 2000s when my father bought us a PC, we opened paint, I impressed him by drawing my country's flag in paint (cuz I saw a teacher in school do it). Then, it comes the moment to leave the paint program (gonna use the old terminology), and as you know it ask you if you wanna leave without saving: Yes, No, Cancel? and it does with a warning sign. My father and me were so sussed out with that warning sign, so we did not click yes, I didn't have much of an idea what the message was about because it was in a language I did not understand. I kept clicking no and cancel repeatedly. The store where my father bought the PC told him to not turn the PC using the turn off button either, so we kept trying with that message without clicking yes. In the end we just unplugged it. That was my first interaction with a PC, and it was a bit scary.

sdflhasjd 4y ago
I recall some programs used to crash on Windows 95 and earlier with a big red "ILLEGAL OPERATION" error. As a child, I was frightened to death. I didn't tell anyone otherwise the authorities would whisk me away.
- bitwize 4y ago
  This is probably what led to today's glut of vague "Oops, there was a problem :(" error messages. The next round will probably have an Alegria person slouching in despair, shrugging, etc.
ipython 4y ago
It’s hard to remember back now but when I was probably about 8 or 9 years old my first family computer, a Commodore 64, had this program where it would “simulate” all sorts of catastrophic errors. Formatting disks, exploding, etc. As a child I was totally convinced and man that was scary. Funny to think back how silly that was now.
- LocalH 4y ago
  That almost sounds like the "Sillycrisis" portion of a thing called "Silly 64", by "Silly Software". I can find almost no information about this program other than the actual program itself. Pretty sure the whole thing was written in BASIC.
- dylan604 4y ago
  The realization that it is very hard to do something on a computer that could not be repaired via software was what allowed me to just try anything. I wasn't afraid to click on things, visit "scary" folders, or view hidden files. Even after doing something that forced a reboot into some sort of recovery mode to replace things showed that things were recoverable and not permanent. There are so many people with the notion that they will break their computer that are absolutely unwilling to experiment and try things. Fear is the mind killer!
  - danamit 4y ago
    We just didn't know better, the moment I learned to format my PC it was like the singularity. Still today, there is parents and siblings who don't know better and will not allow their kids to experiment.
  - Szpadel 4y ago
    With new products of today it might actually be such thing, there is many products, that do not have any official software recovery, eg many Android phones or consoles, so nowadays causing bug that would bootloop or crash your software means basically that you need to service it or throw it away if it's not supported or out of warranty
  - ipython 4y ago
    I think that ultimately it was that program that taught me this lesson. I was scared to death the first time but later it kind of became a rush, then just comedy - I came to realize that it really couldn’t have those effects. Of course afterward I learned the hard way how you really could make mistakes - repartitioning my dads disk incorrectly to install Linux for example. Whoops.
gala8y 4y ago
Mid 90s, my father and I went to buy a computer. It was late afternoon and the company (some B2B in some huge conference center) was almost closing for the day. We decided on what must go into the thing (along lines "no, 16Hz is unnecessary, 12Hz will do) and were so truly disappointed to find out it would take two business days. Despite almost closing, they told us to wait and assembled the computer on spot. We returned home where I learned that computer without software is nothing (I was able to play with some DOS commands this evening). I remember a strong 'aha' moment... "ok, that's computer PLUS software."
t0suj4 4y ago
"Who is this General Protection Fault and why is he reading from my hard disk?"

sdflhasjd 4y ago

I recall some programs used to crash on Windows 95 and earlier with a big red "ILLEGAL OPERATION" error. As a child, I was frightened to death. I didn't tell anyone otherwise the authorities would whisk me away.

bitwize 4y ago
This is probably what led to today's glut of vague "Oops, there was a problem :(" error messages. The next round will probably have an Alegria person slouching in despair, shrugging, etc.

ipython 4y ago

It’s hard to remember back now but when I was probably about 8 or 9 years old my first family computer, a Commodore 64, had this program where it would “simulate” all sorts of catastrophic errors. Formatting disks, exploding, etc. As a child I was totally convinced and man that was scary. Funny to think back how silly that was now.

LocalH 4y ago
That almost sounds like the "Sillycrisis" portion of a thing called "Silly 64", by "Silly Software". I can find almost no information about this program other than the actual program itself. Pretty sure the whole thing was written in BASIC.
dylan604 4y ago
The realization that it is very hard to do something on a computer that could not be repaired via software was what allowed me to just try anything. I wasn't afraid to click on things, visit "scary" folders, or view hidden files. Even after doing something that forced a reboot into some sort of recovery mode to replace things showed that things were recoverable and not permanent. There are so many people with the notion that they will break their computer that are absolutely unwilling to experiment and try things. Fear is the mind killer!
- danamit 4y ago
  We just didn't know better, the moment I learned to format my PC it was like the singularity. Still today, there is parents and siblings who don't know better and will not allow their kids to experiment.
- Szpadel 4y ago
  With new products of today it might actually be such thing, there is many products, that do not have any official software recovery, eg many Android phones or consoles, so nowadays causing bug that would bootloop or crash your software means basically that you need to service it or throw it away if it's not supported or out of warranty
- ipython 4y ago
  I think that ultimately it was that program that taught me this lesson. I was scared to death the first time but later it kind of became a rush, then just comedy - I came to realize that it really couldn’t have those effects. Of course afterward I learned the hard way how you really could make mistakes - repartitioning my dads disk incorrectly to install Linux for example. Whoops.

gala8y 4y ago

Mid 90s, my father and I went to buy a computer. It was late afternoon and the company (some B2B in some huge conference center) was almost closing for the day. We decided on what must go into the thing (along lines "no, 16Hz is unnecessary, 12Hz will do) and were so truly disappointed to find out it would take two business days. Despite almost closing, they told us to wait and assembled the computer on spot. We returned home where I learned that computer without software is nothing (I was able to play with some DOS commands this evening). I remember a strong 'aha' moment... "ok, that's computer PLUS software."

t0suj4 4y ago

"Who is this General Protection Fault and why is he reading from my hard disk?"