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Bombay, 1999 - my first ever Internet connection was a VSNL shell account that could barely load Yahoo.com on Windows 98. PCQuest, the (paper) magazine which A

by ajju 13y ago

Bombay, 1999 - my first ever Internet connection was a VSNL shell account that could barely load Yahoo.com on Windows 98. PCQuest, the (paper) magazine which Atul edited, bundled a CD with a new distro of Linux (or KDE or GNOME) with each month's magazine and became my introduction to the world of Linux, and soon there after to programming for fun. Sad to learn that he is no more.

primelens 13y ago
PCQuest ensured that even though general net connectivity and speed in India lagged behind for a while (due to government restrictions and then for a long time because the state-monopoly ISP, VSNL, priced their substandard service exhorbitantly), the Linux revolution reached India almost as it happened. Without those monthly CDs Linux would have been impossible for many of us to download with slow modems and a Lynx browser. The first ever CD they included contained OS/2 warp, though - this was '94-ish.
- kamaal 13y ago
  I feel like a kid when I hear these stories. As an Indian, and not having any exposure(nor the means to afford to get some exposure) to computers. My first date with a computer was in school around 1999. Our school principal had bought a Desktop which could only run DOS. No one in the school knew what a computer even was. A kid ran back to his home to bring the game 'Lion King' from his home on a Floppy disk. He successfully booted the PC and ran the game on it. It was the most fascinating moment of my whole life to stand in a room full of 200 kids to watch the black magic happen. I have very interesting stories coming back from those days. I've done some ingenious and some super stupid things out of curiosity.
  - primelens 13y ago
    A decade earlier but it was almost the same situation for us. The school computers we PC/XT and they were teaching us Logo and GW-BASIC. When someone's home 286 PC could run Prince of Persia it was a jaw dropping experience. And the QuickBasic IDE seemed heavensent. Oh how I miss my pirated copy of Turbo C :-)

by ajju 13y ago

primelens 13y ago

PCQuest ensured that even though general net connectivity and speed in India lagged behind for a while (due to government restrictions and then for a long time because the state-monopoly ISP, VSNL, priced their substandard service exhorbitantly), the Linux revolution reached India almost as it happened. Without those monthly CDs Linux would have been impossible for many of us to download with slow modems and a Lynx browser. The first ever CD they included contained OS/2 warp, though - this was '94-ish.

kamaal 13y ago
I feel like a kid when I hear these stories. As an Indian, and not having any exposure(nor the means to afford to get some exposure) to computers. My first date with a computer was in school around 1999. Our school principal had bought a Desktop which could only run DOS. No one in the school knew what a computer even was. A kid ran back to his home to bring the game 'Lion King' from his home on a Floppy disk. He successfully booted the PC and ran the game on it. It was the most fascinating moment of my whole life to stand in a room full of 200 kids to watch the black magic happen. I have very interesting stories coming back from those days. I've done some ingenious and some super stupid things out of curiosity.
- primelens 13y ago
  A decade earlier but it was almost the same situation for us. The school computers we PC/XT and they were teaching us Logo and GW-BASIC. When someone's home 286 PC could run Prince of Persia it was a jaw dropping experience. And the QuickBasic IDE seemed heavensent. Oh how I miss my pirated copy of Turbo C :-)