(no subject)

[da]

I have gotten spoiled. I was nearly ready to be incensed that my new credit-card wasn't in the web payment system used by my regular bank, thereby requiring that I physically pay a monthly bill. Using a stamp and a check. Every month! Then I found the other name that the credit card was listed under, and set everything up automatically. Yay, integrated banking systems.

This evening I dropped d. off at choir, then headed over to Canadian Tire for a little Christmas shopping. Is that lame? I can't decide. I mean, Dan's mom asked for something that I found there; and I found something small that I think his dad will find useful, that I wouldn't have found elsewhere. So I'm happy.

In the Future, will all children roll around on shoe-skates all the time? I saw one kid zoom through the Canadian Tire parking lot, then he hit a big puddle and switched to walking/splashing through it, and back to skating when he got to the other side. Then at the grocery store, I saw another kid rolling around in the aisles. I do wonder whether these kids will grow up expecting to coast everywhere. I mean, really.

This last weekend, I hooked up my old zip-drive to my computer and restored about 4 disks worth of old stuff dating from University days, including some journals I had forgotten existed, which were in AmigaDos disk format (thankfully they were plain-text, so they are now raw data on my disk). And a pile of multimedia projects, which I'd like to keep but they are in SuperCard. This stuff really doesn't hold up well at all. The physical media are fine- but what the hell am I supposed to do with SuperCard?

And this data is only a decade old. What is going to happen in fifty years when our younger friends and family have to go dredging through our posessions when we die, to find the valuables and keepsakes? It won't be stock certificates stashed in books that they'll have to worry about-- it'll be bank codes and ssh keys and proprietry formats from ancient word-processors and photo-album programs. And zip disks.

Comments

[metalana.livejournal.com]

welcome to the "digital preservation" problem. Software rots, as my dad says, and it's driving archivists nuts. Paper degrades, but a lot slower. The best solution is for archivists to capture the data, software and hardware before they stop working, convert the data to one or more "universal" formats, and re-convert the data to the new "universal" formats every few years. A pain, but easier & cheaper than maintaining the equivalent quantity of data on paper, so long as you convert in time.

[earthling177.livejournal.com]

Is SuperCard anything like HyperCard from the Mac? Because if it is, I think you can still get SuperCard or equivalent (for Mac and/or Windows) from www.versiontracker.com. Good luck!

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

wow. Supercard is still available for mac. All I need to do is upgrade my home computer to a mac. :)