Scripting News: Friday, June 20, 2025
I read through the QuickDraw API summary from 1985. For me it was like someone who built applications of electricity, going back to see Edison's workbench before there was an industry. It was so seminal. It would never work in today's architectures, almost everything was global. There were five color constants, white, black, gray, ltGray, dkGray. You could see the whole archtecture in just a few pages. It wasn't bloated yet. And the best thing was there was the screen memory. Not hidden. If you didn't like the way QuickDraw worked, you could go around it. It was an idea I only ever used on the Apple II, it was imho Woz's big contribution, for me coming from Unix it was incredible to have so much power. On the Mac it showed up as a variable in a high level language, on the Apple II, you had to know the physical address, but in both cases, when you stored a bit in the memory it showed up on the screen. We never saw anything like that on the previous generation of machines, IBM mainframes and Digital minis. Someday someone will go through all this and see how it evolved. These pages are a tiny but hugely significant slice. Maybe with next year's ChatGPT. #I had an experience like the one Paul Simon described on Colbert last night. I was at the Apple Store on 14th St in NYC to pick up a new phone I had pre-ordered, lined up with some much younger folks who asked if I knew what was new on the phone. I said I wasn't sure, so I asked if they knew. They all agreed the coolest thing was called "pod casting." They said it slowly to be sure I could understand. They said it was great, it was like radio, but you could get it from the web, and there was always lots of new stuff. "What will they think of next," said the old man, impressed, nodding with respect. #
As you get older and see your friends of 30, 40, even 50 years -- you realize how silly this all is. I see them and I see an old person, but I know who they are inside. The old "don't judge a book by its cover" adage probably wasn't coined by a younger person. 😄#
Linkblog items for the day
ICE believes it will never face accountability again. doomsdayscenario.co
As a member of ICE, you may be wondering: How are the people we thrust into our vans supposed to know that we are, in fact, acting under color of law and not just kidnapping them? theatlantic.com
Dr. Demento, DJ Who Launched Weird Al's Career, Reveals He's Retiring. rollingstone.com
Harvard: Federal judge indefinitely blocks Trump administration from cutting off school's ability to host foreign students. cnn.com
He Was Born in Philly and They Tried to Deport Him to Jamaica. bet.com
Clyburn Endorses Cuomo, Helping Him Broaden His Appeal to Black Voters. nytimes.com
U.S. Digital Service Origins. usdigitalserviceorigins.org
I asked ChatGPT for 250 words on what the Democratic Party stands for. daveverse.org
Washington cherry growers struggle to find pickers. spokesman.com
The Subway Is Not Scary. hamiltonnolan.com
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