Cards are mailed

On Fri, 13 Jan 2006 21:10:35 GMT, Aaron <kemtek.1 DeleteThis @gmail.com> wrote:

>> I, errrr, may have stretched my bookstore ethics by hiding in the
>> fantasy books aisle long enough to read ML's essay. :> But I *did* buy
>> a nice, fat, expensive book that day -- just not the Potter book.
>> (Computer reference book. Darn things get fatter every year.)
>
>The inverse complement to Moore's Law: As computers get smaller and more
>powerful, computer books get thicker and heavier.

Soo true. I have the second edition "Java in a Nutshell" book, which
covers ALL of Java 1.0 circa 1996- it's 1" thick. I also have the
fifth edition I bought last week. It explicitly doesn't cover a lot
of the libraries (I think it skips the GUI ones, for example - too
lazy to go pick it up)- and it's 3" thick. The corresponding "full"
manuals would be about 6 feet thick (I know, Java & thick are
redundant...). *shudder*

Thankfully our favorite author doesn't expand each book quite like
that... although with the output over the last few months, it's about
equivalent

Bedlams Edge, Music to My Sorrow, Crossroads & Wizard of London in
what, 3 months? Oh yea - the latest elves & Henry VIII I am one as
well.... I'll get caught up shortly.

.... Bruce (diving back into the books)
--

Bruce the elder, the constantly de-lurking hemi-demi-semi deity of sanity, split personalities, reality and knitter of feeted PJs. Deposit
your sanity here, please. (there's another one tagged)
 >> Stay informed about: Cards are mailed 

m_thomas[movies_in_LoTR] wrote:
> Aaron wrote:
>
>>> I, errrr, may have stretched my bookstore ethics by hiding in the
>>> fantasy books aisle long enough to read ML's essay. :> But I *did*
>>> buy a nice, fat, expensive book that day -- just not the Potter book.
>>> (Computer reference book. Darn things get fatter every year.)
>>
>>
>>
>> The inverse complement to Moore's Law: As computers get smaller and
>> more powerful, computer books get thicker and heavier.
>
>
> Oh, dear. There is, or used to be, a project at UCBerkeley called
> "Smart Dust" -- trying to make wee little devices with computer power,
> ambitiously aiming for dust particle size.
>
> How big are the textbooks for those devices going to be?!
>
> [Note: the name is just an attention-getter. Until batteries get much
> smaller, the "dust"-sized sensors will remain quite visible to the human
> eye. And nowhere near as powerful as a laptop -- to get small size,
> they sacrifice lots and lots and lots of CPU power.]

Can't they link together to increase their overall processing power?

--
Point Keeper starting 1-4-2005

I'm glad my Mom named me Aaron,
That's what everybody calls me.

Hemidemisemideity of Anonymous Eponymity
Patron Saint of Hair Color Changing
Currently: Very short, colored hair,
Color = Deep Golden Blonde
Nice N Easy # 105
Holder of a provisional pedant licens/ce
(limited to the area of physical sciens/ce)
Member of ABMLNCSC - Base singer, very base
"Mommy, make daddy stop singing".

I dye my hair so much my driver's license
has a color wheel. Nancy Mura
 >> Stay informed about: Cards are mailed 

>>>I, errrr, may have stretched my bookstore ethics by hiding in the
>>>fantasy books aisle long enough to read ML's essay. :> But I *did* buy
>>>a nice, fat, expensive book that day -- just not the Potter book.
>>>(Computer reference book. Darn things get fatter every year.)
>>
>>The inverse complement to Moore's Law: As computers get smaller and more
>>powerful, computer books get thicker and heavier.
>
> Soo true. I have the second edition "Java in a Nutshell" book, which
> covers ALL of Java 1.0 circa 1996- it's 1" thick. I also have the
> fifth edition I bought last week. It explicitly doesn't cover a lot
> of the libraries (I think it skips the GUI ones, for example - too
> lazy to go pick it up)- and it's 3" thick. The corresponding "full"
> manuals would be about 6 feet thick (I know, Java & thick are
> redundant...). *shudder*
>
> Thankfully our favorite author doesn't expand each book quite like
> that... although with the output over the last few months, it's about
> equivalent
>
> Bedlams Edge, Music to My Sorrow, Crossroads & Wizard of London in
> what, 3 months? Oh yea - the latest elves & Henry VIII I am one as
> well.... I'll get caught up shortly.
>
> ... Bruce (diving back into the books)

Our DEC manuals were multiple volumes of 3-ring binders in the early
1990's, today they would be delivered in a semi-trailer, or two CD's.

I printed out the manual for my printer, a Canon MP780, from the HTML
manual - about 200 single-sided pages - which may explain why manuals
aren't getting bigger, they are digitized and put on CD so you can lose
them easier.

"If you can not start your computer, follow the troubleshooting
instructions found in the online manual"

--
Point Keeper starting 1-4-2005

I'm glad my Mom named me Aaron,
That's what everybody calls me.

Hemidemisemideity of Anonymous Eponymity
Patron Saint of Hair Color Changing
Currently: Very short, colored hair,
Color = Deep Golden Blonde
Nice N Easy # 105
Holder of a provisional pedant licens/ce
(limited to the area of physical sciens/ce)
Member of ABMLNCSC - Base singer, very base
"Mommy, make daddy stop singing".

I dye my hair so much my driver's license
has a color wheel. Nancy Mura
 >> Stay informed about: Cards are mailed 

"m_thomas[movies_in_LoTR]" <"m_thomas[movies_in_LoTR]"@earthlink.net> writes:

> :> But I *did* buy
>a nice, fat, expensive book that day -- just not the Potter book.
>(Computer reference book. Darn things get fatter every year.)

Not in my experience. The price gets fatter, but if you look at the
size of books that are reissued when the underlying application is
updated each time a new version comes out, in all too many cases the
size of the book shrinks. Case in point: look at the Adobe Classroom
in a Book series for the current versions of its products (most of which
are now versioned as "CS2") and compare them with the books for the
earlier versions.

Incidentally, somewhat to my surprise I've found that the Microsoft
Press books (especially the "Step-by-Step" ones) are surprisingly good,
if (like all computer books) rather overpriced.

Joe Morris
 >> Stay informed about: Cards are mailed 

Aaron <kemtek.1.DeleteThis@gmail.com> writes:

>Our DEC manuals were multiple volumes of 3-ring binders in the early
>1990's, today they would be delivered in a semi-trailer, or two CD's.

Just the hardware documentation could be that large today. Back around
early 2001 I needed to chase some details about the Pentium chip and
located the folder where Intel had hidden the PDF file...and IIRC the
printout was somewhere around 800 pages. (I printed them 2-up duplex,
so that was "only" 200 pieces of dead tree.)

>I printed out the manual for my printer, a Canon MP780, from the HTML
>manual - about 200 single-sided pages - which may explain why manuals
>aren't getting bigger, they are digitized and put on CD so you can lose
>them easier.

Or they're not provided at all, and the manufacturer either doesn't
provide them, or assumes that you've got a high-speed Internet connection
with which you can download the file.

In honesty I should also point out that this does mean that low-usage
manuals can be made available. Last year I was trying to figure out
how to order an extra pair of hard disk caddies for a Dell laptop. Dell
shipped the tray but not the adapter that goes between the pins on the
hard disk itself and the edge connector inside the computer; the
Dell sales rep was clueless about how to fix the problem. I wound up
downloading every service manual I could find on Dell's web site, and
finally found one that named the adapter ("interposer" if you ever
need one). Armed with the name I was able to order them, but without
the downloadable manuals I would have been stuck.

>"If you can not start your computer, follow the troubleshooting
>instructions found in the online manual"

Recent, personal experience with Verizon's DSL support: "If you are
having trouble establishing a connection, you can find troubleshooting
information on Verizon's web site at www-dot-verizononline-dot-com."

Joe Morris
 >> Stay informed about: Cards are mailed