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> Ship an entire physical PC to the user pre-loaded with the application? Ironically, that’s essentially what IBM did with mainframes. Another example of what
by MR4D 4y ago
> Ship an entire physical PC to the user pre-loaded with the application?
Ironically, that’s essentially what IBM did with mainframes.
Another example of what’s old is new again.
- arghwhat 4y agoEh? Mainframes are and always were general purpose computers, and run stufd like Linux just fine. Nowadays they are mainly meant as machines with extreme reliability guarantees, from things like running multiple processors in lockstep to detect spontaneous processor errors, but they're still just computers. While their cost makes them hugely impractical for .øst usecases, mainframes do have some really cool tech, including their new CPU designs with quite interesting cache layouts.
- MR4D 4y agoI never commented on the specificity, rather I pointed out this quote "Ship an entire physical PC to the user pre-loaded with the application." Replace "PC" with "Mainframe" and the sentence was true (at least back when mainframes were a thing. The software came pre-loaded with the hardware, and IBM shipped it to you and set it up for you. You couldn't buy an app without paying for the hardware. Technically, you rented everything from IBM, and paid one lease price.
- arghwhat 4y agoThat sounds more like a case of "you're buying an app for our mainframes, so you'll need something to run it on".