Well-meaning folk often want to make things easier and better for others. The Steam train started that way and a hundred years of improvements changed everything. Steel tracks circumnavigated the world, and, with ships, the modern global network was born. For the first hundred years of its life Britain was the network chief, and for the past hundred the USA.
The USA then took the lead in computing and charted the course for the industry. Folks my age, whose first school used chalk on a blackboard and easel, found computing stimulating and exciting. From slide rules and log tables to mobile computing phones and artificial Intelligence in sixty years is fantastic but, as with all technology, it is great until it goes wrong.
Someone once said that the Steam Engine was the last item of technology that could be fully understood by one man on his own. Not so with computers and software. So, when I noticed my hard drive had become noisier I went to a computer shop in Newent.
The young lady quickly cloned the contents of my old hard drive on to a Solid-State Disc (SSD) and my machine now starts more quickly and is quieter. All went well until I decided to change the password for Windows. Readers will know it as the one you type in before Windows opens and gives access to your programmes.
When I bought my computer it had Windows XP and Windows Ten had not yet come into the vocabulary; so, when I was asked by the machine to prove who I was before I could change the password I was discombobulated for a moment.
It required answers to, 1. the city in which I was born. (It was a tiny village) 2. The first school I attended, and 3. the name of my eldest cousin. All straightforward enough.
I know where I was born and my first school but which of my cousins is the eldest? I guessed at Keith but wasn’t sure if it was Ann. Neither could I remember whether I had put in the village name or the district name. Nor did I know if I had used spaces between certain words, however I was sure about capital letters. None of my attempts matched what the machine wanted and so it locked me out. Horror!
I rang the Newent lady, but she was out, I tried the BT gurus In Inverness, but they needed me to be on-line and so could not help. I went on-line on Marie’s computer but the young men eager to help seemed a bit too keen. My local Dymock Guru has solved the problem on his own machines but is sensibly wary of taking on someone else’s.
An hour had passed, and I tried again. I entered my old password and Hey-Presto it worked. I shall not however try to change the password again. Who was it said that, “A slap on the wrist as a penalty does not work as a deterrent”?
In the garden: A bag of Javelin earlies awaits planting; however, the garlic is planted, and various seed trays are in the Poly tunnel. A few self-seeding tomatoes and a nasturtium will get planted out soon. Last season’s beetroot is in vinegar, the carrots have been eaten and the rhubarb is up a few inches. The hens layed well this winter and the last pair of unsold Christmas birds are now also cheerfully laying.
But talking of passwords and the clever wordplay that can go into them reminds me of the hymn, ‘Keep Thou My Way’ by Fanny Crosby.
A thoughtful hymn although some choir members mischievously mix up words in the final verse Gladly the Cross I’ll bear, to sing instead
Gladly the Cross-eyed Bear.
View from the Pew 