Author: Kai Henningsen Date: To: exim-users Subject: Re: FW: Re: [Exim] Exim on a single-user system
ph10@??? (Philip Hazel) wrote on 02.01.02 in <Pine.SOL.4.33.0201022013310.8338-100000@???>:
> On Wed, 2 Jan 2002, dman wrote:
>
> > | no. ideally noone should use software s/he doesn't (and is not
> > | willing to) know a damn about.
> >
> > Well, do you know everything about all the software you use?
>
> Every new technology goes through this phase. "Ideally, everybody who
> drives a car should understand what goes on under the bonnet (= hood for
> N. Americans)." "Ideally everybody who uses an electric light should
> understand how to change a fuse." Etc. There are plenty of examples.
Actually, I agree with every example you mentioned: people should in fact
actually know these things. (Well ok, change "change a fuse" to "reset a
breaker", I haven't ever seen a real fuse for an electric light in all my
life, all of them were on electronic gadgets ... and a lightbulb is
practically a fuse that nearly everyone knows how to change anyway.)
My personal variant is "every programmer should have learned at least one
assembly or machine language".
> I remember back in the mid-1970s it was "How can you possibly let people
> use the time-sharing online system when they haven't understood how the
> computer works by learning to use the offline batch system?"
Well, that's not the only way to learn it, but learn it they certainly
should.
> The problem is always how to make the new technology fail-safe and
> idiot-proof. It takes time (think: early automotive technology). But
> inevitably, it happens in the end because that's what people demand.
There *is no* idiot-proof technology. Today's automotive technology
certainly isn't - just look at how many people it kills every day. (A
significant percentage because drivers don't understand, or forget, how
that car works - such as how it reacts to braking.)
People may demand idiot-proof technology, but I know of not a single case
where they actually got it.
> Just my GBP 0.02.
