From: not.my.real@email.address   
      
   Simon wrote:   
      
   > On 2024-04-26, J.O. Aho  wrote:   
   >> On 26/04/2024 08.57, Simon wrote:   
   [snip]   
   >>> I used to pick and choose magazines to buy by the distro that was   
   >>> included that month. I tried all sorts, with varying degrees of   
   >>> success, it was nice to try them all.   
   >>   
   >> I only bought those without the CDs, as they were a lot cheaper and I   
   >> did have a flat cost internet so I could download everything myself.   
   >>   
   >> Sadly most places who had Linux magazines mainly just sold the with CD   
   >> version, so it was always going around the different stores and see if   
   >> they happen to have the CD free version that was almost half the price.   
   >   
   > This was back in the mid 90s, so not only was internet slow and   
   > downloads unreliable, it made the phone unusable which was not ideal   
   > either.   
      
   Indeed. I was the first person in my neighborhood to order high-speed   
   (cable) internet in 1999; the ISP took a few weeks to get the infrastructure   
   installed, which was frankly blazingly fast for them. My phone line was old   
   (installed around 1950, so... old) and could only support 28.8k, if I was   
   lucky. (My cell phone had no data plan; it was the size of an eyeglass case   
   but only had a tiny text screen, and it cost an arm and a leg.) I downloaded   
   Slackware 12 over dial-up in 2007 and it took me weeks; I can't imagine   
   trying to do it 8 years earlier on 50-year-old wires, especially before I   
   discovered wget.   
      
   But that's neither here nor there; the book was bought in another state,   
   while the magazine was purchased overseas.   
      
   --   
   Why should the solution start off with   
   "learn to program if you don't already know how"?   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)