# Astounded by tech **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [January 19, 2018, 8:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/astounded-by-tech/806954 "2018-01-19T08:09:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2018, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/astounded-by-tech/806954/41 "2018-01-20T01:28:21Z")
My camera has several thousand very tiny artists inside it who paint what they see when the shutter opens. Thanks, Sir Terry and we all really miss you. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2018, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/astounded-by-tech/806954/42 "2018-01-20T01:29:42Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > So you agree that magnets are magic? I’m saying that it _doesn’t matter_ whether magnets are magic, as long as we can predict what they do. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2018, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/astounded-by-tech/806954/43 "2018-01-20T01:34:45Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > And every time the PCs get more memory or storage space, the damned programmers figure out how to use it all up. Back when I read comp.arch, some people there said that you could understand modern computer design as a fight between hardware people providing memory and software people using it up. Nothing new about that. Back in 1974 one of my fellow grad students modified our PDP-11/20 by adding more memory, which got it up to 28K IIRC, “enough for anybody.” Within five minutes I modified my Star Trek game (Pascal version of the one in Ahl’s book of BASIC games) and the program ran out of memory. No virtual memory on that thing. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2018, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/astounded-by-tech/806954/44 "2018-01-20T01:38:44Z")
Nature abhors an unused bit. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2018, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/astounded-by-tech/806954/45 "2018-01-20T02:11:48Z")
Well, and that is true, really. Modern memory management uses the lazy approach, where it keeps chewing away at untrodden memory even after large chunks of previously used memory have been released. Because, if you have it, you should not just leave it lie on the shelf – plus, the freed up memory will continue to be tagged with what it was used for, so that a process can be resurrected after quitting and have some of its key data still in memory. ---
**Author:** ![Fugazi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f08c70/32.png) [@Fugazi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fugazi)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2018, 10:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/astounded-by-tech/806954/46 "2018-01-20T10:31:19Z")
Just think, 10 - 15 years from now we can come back to this thread and say “Tee hee. Remember when we thought that crap was the shit?” ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2018, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/astounded-by-tech/806954/47 "2018-01-20T14:20:35Z")
> [@Sunspace](#): > > I’m saying that it _doesn’t matter_ whether magnets are magic, as long as we can predict what they do. 🙂 OK, I get, you’re saying you’re sure that they’re magic. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/astounded-by-tech/806954.md?page=2)