Fullscreen HTML5Med Res (??MB)HTML4

SILICON SILIC CHIP www.siliconchip.com.au Publisher/Editor Nicholas Vinen Technical Editor John Clarke, B.E.(Elec.) Technical Staff Jim Rowe, B.A., B.Sc. Bao Smith, B.Sc. Tim Blythman, B.E., B.Sc. Nicolas Hannekum, Dip. Elec. Tech. Technical Contributor Duraid Madina, B.Sc, M.Sc, PhD Reader Services Rhonda Blythman, BSc, LLB, GDLP Advertising Enquiries Glyn Smith Phone (02) 9939 3295 Mobile 0431 792 293 glyn<at>siliconchip.com.au Regular Contributors Dave Thompson David Maddison B.App.Sc. (Hons 1), PhD, Grad.Dip.Entr.Innov. Geoff Graham Associate Professor Graham Parslow Ian Batty Cartoonist Brendan Akhurst Founding Editor (retired) Leo Simpson, B.Bus., FAICD Staff (retired) Ross Tester Ann Morris Greg Swain, B. Sc. (Hons.) Silicon Chip is published 12 times a year by Silicon Chip Publications Pty Ltd. ACN 626 922 870. ABN 20 880 526 923. All material is copyright ©. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the written consent of the publisher. Subscription rates (Australia only): 12 issues (1 year): $105, post paid 24 issues (2 years): $202, post paid For overseas rates, see our website or email silicon<at>siliconchip.com.au Recommended & maximum price only. Editorial office: Unit 1 (up ramp), 234 Harbord Rd, Brookvale, NSW 2100. Postal address: PO Box 139, Collaroy Beach, NSW 2097. Phone (02) 9939 3295. ISSN 1030-2662 Editorial Viewpoint Software: too many bugs, too many updates I can’t be the only person who is sick and tired of the barrage of constant software updates. Between Windows updates, Android updates, Adobe updates, Mozilla updates, App updates, and all the other software packages I use, I spend way too much time dealing with them every day. With some software packages I use only intermittently, they bother me about updating virtually every time I open up a file! And that’s the worst time to do it; I’d much rather they ask me whether I want to update when closing the software than opening it. I’m opening it because I have a task to complete, and I don’t want to stop that task to install another *$(!&#<at> update! It wouldn’t be so bad if these updates fixed bugs, but so often, not only do they fix nothing, but they introduce new bugs. Windows updates are the worst. Some of our staff suffered for weeks from constant ‘blue screens’ and reboots when printing files caused by a Windows update that initially they didn’t even realise had been installed. It cost us a lot of lost productivity until one smart guy figured it out and managed to uninstall that update on the affected machines (one of which was brand new; we thought it might be defective). Microsoft apparently knew about this bug and quickly released a patch to fix it, but the fix didn’t work! I hate to be negative and sound like I’m complaining, but this situation is just ridiculous. One of my pet peeves is how software companies – including the largest, richest ones in the world – prioritise adding features to their software rather than fixing bugs. This sometimes results in serious bugs that cause frequent crashes or otherwise break the software persisting for years, while they are busy adding useless new doo-dads that we don’t need. They are also far more interested in adding bells and whistles than addressing severe performance problems, making the software virtually unusable. For example, I have some software that can take literally hours to perform certain functions, depending on the complexity of the files I am working with. I have developed workarounds to accomplish these tasks in a reasonable timeframe, such as manually splitting the job into smaller chunks, then reassembling it later. I shouldn’t have to do that. I believe these operations could be completed in seconds (or faster) if the algorithms the software used were implemented in an even vaguely intelligent manner. I don’t know the solution to this, but I believe whether through user pressure, legislation or otherwise, the behaviour of software companies has to change. If you bought a car and it broke down several times a day, frequently slowed down to unusable speeds and needed to be brought back to the dealer for modifications every week to keep it roadworthy, you would ask for your money back. Yet we pay hundreds or thousands of dollars for a piece of software and then accept that it behaves in the same manner. That is totally unreasonable. Perhaps the open-source software movement will save us from this life of misery. In some areas, there are already excellent free pieces of software that provide most functions of their commercial equivalents, and they are often less buggy. If the commercial vendors don’t get their collective acts together, they might find themselves losing a lot of business to those alternatives. Printing and Distribution: by Nicholas Vinen 24-26 Lilian Fowler Pl, Marrickville 2204 2 Silicon Chip Australia’s electronics magazine siliconchip.com.au