While original IBM PCs indeed may not have had HDDs, it did become a standard for PC XT, as early as 1983. Only the cheapest version were without a HDD by the end of the 1980s.
My first PC, bought in late 1986, was a Leading Edge Model D, with two 360K floppy drives and no hard drive. I wrote a script to put COMMAND.COM and some other key files on a RAM disk on boot so I didn't have to keep the DOS floppy in the A: drive all the time. IIRC they had come out with a model that had a 20 MB hard drive but it was more than I could afford.
MIT, where I was at school then, had some IBM PC XTs with 10 MB hard drives, but most of their computer resources were time-sharing DEC VAX machines. You could go to one of several computer labs to get on a terminal, or even dial into them--I did the latter from my PC (the one above) using a 2400 baud modem, which was fast for the time.
Reminds me of a silly thing that happened when I was a freshman in high school, ca. 1992.
We had a dumb "computer literacy" class taught in an computer lab full of PS/2 Model 25s with no hard drives, and were each issued a bootable floppy disk containing both Microsoft Works and our assignment files (word processing documents, spreadsheets, etc.), which we turned in at the end of class for grading.
We started Works in the usual way, by typing "works" at the MS-DOS prompt.
One day, out of boredom, I added "PROMPT Password:" to AUTOEXEC.BAT on my disk, changing the DOS prompt from "A:\>" to "Password:" when booted from my disk.
Two days later, I got called into the dean's office, where the instructor demanded to know how I used my disk to "hack the network" — a network that, up until this point, I didn't even know existed, as the lab computers weren't connected to anything but power — and "lock me out of my computer", and threatened suspension unless and until I revealed the password.
After a few minutes trying to explain that no password existed to a "computer literacy" instructor who clearly had no idea what either AUTOEXEC.BAT or the DOS prompt was, nor why booting a networked computer from a potentially untrustworthy floppy disk was a terrible idea, I finally gave in.
Those 10mb full-height mfm drives were so slow... you could literally turn the computer on... go make yourself something to drink, finish your first cup, pour a second and you'd be getting the to DOS prompt right around the time it finished booting.
The irony, it was actually faster doublespaced/stacked.
Keep in mind that a lot of this depends on the location.
In Russia, we had class full of IBM PCs without hard drives in school - you had to juggle floppies - and that was early 90s. And that was a fancy school.
I have not read the linguist's essay, just the article, but I am almost certain the claims are preposterous.
The article already mentions that the structure is definitely germanic in origin. Next are the words. Some are adopted from other languages, but many more have roots in Germanic and Latin. The reason is that Romans invaded Britain some 2000 years ago. Afterwards, Latin was spoken in learned circles until the renaissance and even later.
When French became the language of diplomacy, IIRC at the time of Napoleon, only that's when French became a language of note. That's when the "sofisticated" words like veal, venison etc. enter the English language.
But, even all that aside, my native language is Slavic. I speak both English and German, and a very little bit of French. In my limited personal view, German and English have much more in common than French and English.
Reply to self: it seems I was wrong and veal, venison, etc. have roots in Old French, which has influenced Old English through Normandic invasion.
Still, I stand by my assessment: while it's clear that influences are there to some of the words, it's clearly more germanic. Just as we say today that French is a romanic language and English is germanic. I see no evidence here to counter this common classification.
Trouble is, I don't think they'll just get it and then set about to changing the processes. Besides, the process doesn't come from the middle management, it originates from the top, usually the CTO.
Unless you're at a very small company, CTOs set technical vision, choose high level tooling strategy and outline engineering culture in broad strokes, but the nitty gritty of process will be from an engineering director or other role below the CTO. The CTO will probably provide feedback if needed, but they're not in the weeds and won't be able to see problems unless they're raised.
You are correct, my post was more for the situation where the CTO is also the engineering director but in larger orgs that is not usually so.
I do think, however, that the coding CTO is not the way to go about to change the process. If it's too cumbersome, the CTO should talk with engineering director to find a way to make it less so, not just bypass the process.
Surely there is room for both. Most people don't found companies because they want to sit around on their ass. They're typically driven and do'ers. If things are not working as they want, and folks are not being responsive enough... they'll do it themselves and that is ok. After all THEY founded the company.
> If things are not working as they want, and folks are not being responsive enough... they'll do it themselves and that is ok.
If the CTO has rank then why not work to solve the unresponsiveness or undesirable things?
If someone--even a founder--can act as a loose cannon then there is a risk that they'll introduce problems like instability, security vulnerabilities, or unnecessary conflict or resentment. Compliance programs like SOC and PCI don't look fondly on staff bypassing SDLC processes because of those risks.
A: I have a program that will format your hard drive. I just need your IP.
B: Ok, it's 127.0.0.1
A: Ahahaha, it 56% now! Lol.
A left the chat. Connection reset by peer.
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