Re: stop the Carly-bashing Message #5 Posted by Vieira, Luiz C. (Brazil) on 10 Feb 2005, 3:07 a.m., in response to message #1 by Don Shepherd
Hi, Don;
I agree with you that we'll not see something like the HP15C or the HP16C again, neither from HP nor another company. They actualy do not fit todays needs, todays market. I remember programming the HP16C to test some digital implementations. I do that, today, by using some graphics software (Eagle, TKGate, and a few others), mosty for my own or a few, very few professional activities. I also remember using the HP15C for "crunching" AC circuits, like load flow: the complex stack, the integrate and SOLVER, matrices... All-in-one! Beautifull! Today we have softwares that do that all instantly.
I like using them all, I'd buy (if I can afford) any new implementation from our friends, reserches in this forum. If it is a kit, beter yet! A DIY RPN calculator!
I remember that when I started with Electronics (I was 8 YO, first half 1970) I was never known about copmputers as they are, I was not aware of what they were supposed to do. I was 13 YO when I saw an HP21 and I was not aware of what SIN, COS, TAN, P->R and R->P were for. But the calculator was as beauty!
Professional needs for these days are different, for those who want to survive and be active there's a need for keeping 'up to date', otherwise we're not gonna be inside the market.
While many guys use the topmost portables, PDA's and the like (even pagers already belong to the past), using a calculator may seem "antique". I barely use mine outside home and, most of the time, I use them to find a solution to a problem or develop programs to post here.
I don't complain, I simply accept that Don is right about many things. I'd also add that all new achievemnts had their followers at the same time those wanting to keep existing ones were against the new. I want to keep calculators running because they were the best I had in my time, and I cannot see better stuff now. I think of those using slide rules and against calculators. The advantages of calculators against slide rules are tremendous for those who like calculators, but the advantages of slide rules against calculators are also imperative for those using slide rules.
Who's right?
Carly left HP because her fights against the board were biger than herself. That's a fact. I wonder: would HP, as a company, do what it has been done if Carly were not there? How powerfull was she to define everything without any opposition? I guess all of the final decisons, the "big ones", were taken by the board with her, and I gues not all of the things she wanted to be done were effectively done (maybe for the best of HP they were not...)
I'll wait to see. Fast changes in big companies are like route changes in bigger ships: they cannot be done unless you use extreme power. And if so, you may spend a lot of energy for nothing because when you achieve the maximum changing hability, all extra energy is completlely lost. If current board starts to announce astonishing changes and decide to apply them fast, I guess HP will be in trouble. Again.
Cheers.
Luiz (Brazil)
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