Re: future computers

["Richard S. Westmoreland" <sagalore@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Oh and just to note, I know that it's fiction.  ;0)  Where I work, customers
bring in these 700mhz systems, that lock up or crash constantly and run
slower than the stable 200mhz system sitting next to it.

> Anybody here a fan of Star Trek?
>
> I know this question sounds silly, if not juvenile.  How do you think the
Enterprises (or Voyagers) computer system processes?  Is it trillions of
MISC type optical processors, or it is one giant Pentium XVII?  Has there
ever been an episode where the captain says "hail them", and at a push of
the console the view screen gets a fatal protection fault and the whole ship
self destructs?
>
> I think that is a legitimate, however comical question.  The ship's
computer core is no larger than some of the super computers we have today,
everything else is just terminals, subsystems, and storage.  Maybe in a few
decades Forth will not reign supreme, maybe another language that is even
faster and smaller... but the minimal approach is not a limitation - it's
powerful.
>
>