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From: Terry Lambert <terry@lambert.org>
Message-Id: <199608312012.NAA00378@phaeton.artisoft.com>
Subject: Re: Specs on a Hitachi CM2085me monitor anybody ??
To: nate@mt.sri.com (Nate Williams)
Date: Sat, 31 Aug 1996 13:12:26 -0700 (MST)
Cc: terry@lambert.org, sos@FreeBSD.org, durham@phaeton.artisoft.com,
        hackers@FreeBSD.org
In-Reply-To: <199608311803.MAA17618@rocky.mt.sri.com> from "Nate Williams" at Aug 31, 96 12:03:28 pm
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> [ Terry hit my hot button here ]
> > The data about the card is simply not well abstracted from the code
> > that implements the INT 10 interface.
> > 
> > And once again we discover why EE's should not be hired to write
> > video BIOS.
> 
> Cheap generalization.  I'll take on 95% of the CS grads. who graduated
> in 94 in a usability/readability contest.  Most EE's I'm awae of who
> program are pretty decent nowadays, and most CS types who graduates a
> few years back are just as bad as the EE's. :)

You're right, it's a cheap generalization.

I should have said "hired to design the card/driver interface".

Diamond scred this up.

ATI screwed this up.

Matrox screwed this up.

Everyone screwed this up.

I don't know one company who built the card so that the external data
references were usable without the external code entry points.

Well, except IBM ABIOS, and they cheated by making the BIOS callable
from protected mode.


					Terry Lambert
					terry@lambert.org
---
Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present
or previous employers.