Re: [9fans] gcc not an option for Plan9

[erik quanstrom <quanstro@quanstro.net>]

> I remember when I started to work in a surveyor office. There was
> microstation, back in early 90s, that ran on a DOS extender with a 
> perfect graphical performance (you were able to work flawlessly, 
> zooming, panning or whatever). You were never waiting for the
> application or the display; it worked faster than your input.
> 
> Once Windows "improved" came, it took several years for the computers to
> give the very same user experience, by an order of magnitude increase in
> power for the "PC". It had to recover from Windows improvements first...

yes.  this is a big problem.  incremental improvement often fails.
and we see this today with newer phones performing poorly with
"new and improved" software.

the way to get out of this trap is to provide real improvement
by doing something new.  (the term of art is "disruptive"—a
rather annoying term. :-)) obviously the new approach isn't going
to be as polished as the old approach.  but if the new thing
is a real improvement, folks will put up with the regressions
in unimportant areas.

there was an old way to say this, "you can't make an omlette
without breaking a few eggs".  :-)

- erik