John Hall wrote on 19/11/23 7:55 pm:
> In message <an3ilitnlcet80mq984nuk8402o61jcjd0@4ax.com>, Char
> Jackson <none@none.invalid> writes
>> On Sat, 18 Nov 2023 10:13:35 +0000, John Hall
>> <john_nospam@jhall.co.uk> wrote:
>>> In message <uj9sj0$38ddd$1@dont-email.me>, Daniel65
>>> <daniel47@nomail.afraid.org> writes
>>>> J. P. Gilliver wrote on 18/11/23 5:04 am:
>>>>> In message <sxN5N.46596$AqO5.22600@fx11.iad> at Fri, 17 Nov
>>>>> 2023 11:37:28, Mark Lloyd <not.email@all.invalid> writes []
>>>>>> 38 days until the winter celebration (Monday, December 25,
>>>>>> 2023 12:00 AM for 1 day).
>>>>> [] Is "12:00 AM" syntactically valid?
>>>>
>>>> Surely one of the '12:00' would be 'AM' .... but whether that
>>>> is 'Midnight' or 'Midday' ..... Pass!
>>>
>>> I often see references to 12 AM and 12 PM, and I'm sometimes left
>>> uncertain as to whether noon or midnight was meant. Use of the
>>> 24-hour clock (or simply using the words "noon" and "midnight")
>>> avoids any ambiguity.
>>
>> I don't think I've ever met anyone (until now?) who found 12 AM
>> and 12 PM to be ambiguous. Interesting.
>
> AM stands for "ante meridiem" and PM for "post meridiem", i.e.
> before and after midday respectively. But 12 noon is neither before
> nor after, so logically it should be 12 M.

Don't you just hate it when someone applies LOGIC to an argument?? ;-P

> Midnight is both 12 hours before and 12 hours post, but I suppose it
> would be more logical to call it 12 PM (or maybe 0 AM).
--
Daniel

In message <ujcte7$3q1t4$1@dont-email.me> at Sun, 19 Nov 2023 23:01:11,
Daniel65 <daniel47@nomail.afraid.org> writes
>John Hall wrote on 19/11/23 7:55 pm:
>> In message <an3ilitnlcet80mq984nuk8402o61jcjd0@4ax.com>, Char
>> Jackson <none@none.invalid> writes
[]
>>>> I often see references to 12 AM and 12 PM, and I'm sometimes left
>>>> uncertain as to whether noon or midnight was meant. Use of the
>>>> 24-hour clock (or simply using the words "noon" and "midnight")
>>>> avoids any ambiguity.
>>> I don't think I've ever met anyone (until now?) who found 12 AM
>>> and 12 PM to be ambiguous. Interesting.
>> AM stands for "ante meridiem" and PM for "post meridiem", i.e.
>> before and after midday respectively. But 12 noon is neither before
>> nor after, so logically it should be 12 M.
>
>Don't you just hate it when someone applies LOGIC to an argument?? ;-P

I love "12 M"! At least, for those who insist on using AM/PM anyway,
it's an excellent solution. (But ...
>
>> Midnight is both 12 hours before and 12 hours post, but I suppose it
>> would be more logical to call it 12 PM (or maybe 0 AM).

.... that is a problem. When AM/PM was/were "invented", maybe people
weren't up at midnight so much. [What's Latin for midnight? Let me try
Google translate ... hmm, it just says media nocte, not a single word. I
suppose 12 MN would work ...])
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Back then, many radio sets were still in black and white. - Eddie Mair, radio
presenter, on "PM" programme reaching 40; in Radio Times, 3-9 April 2010

In message <ll7jlih5m4l1pim3betjdr5f30470rku6f@4ax.com> at Sun, 19 Nov
2023 07:41:18, Steve Hayes <hayesstw@telkomsa.net> writes
[]
>>Based on my experience, I would recommend you put the extra work
>>into finding just the right laptop setup.
>>
>>While VMs are fun, you sound like someone who actually
>>needs this stuff to work. You would be much more productive
>>without the VM.

That was my feeling. Things may be different where you are (or from the
situation as it was in January this year); although it took me _some_
digging, I did find a W7-32 laptop then without _too_ much difficulty.
Let me have a quick look at ebay ... hmm, I wasn't expecting as many to
come up! And from 29.99 pounds plus postage! Obviously some of these
will be underpowered, which would be a pain to use (probably upgraded
from XP) - that bottom one is 2G/160G, and just says "AMD CPU". There
are quite a few "Toughbooks" - for example "Panasonic Toughbook Cf-19 MK
5 Core i5 Win 7 Or Win 10 32-bit 5 Year Warranty", "174.99 to 314.99";
it's one of those listings with drop-down select, but 4G/500G/W7-32
shows 239.99 pounds; an i5 should be more than adequate (I'm using an i3
and am quite happy with it). So I'm very surprised at how many machines
are available. Obviously that's UK, but hopefully you _can_ manage to
find something. (At worst, finding one in UK and paying through the nose
for shipping. I suspect many UK suppliers would be a bit nervous about
shipping to SA, though I may be wrong. You may not want UK keyboard
etc., too.)
>
><snip>
>
>>Summary: I don't think you need a new hobby, you need something that
>> works, and that is physical hardware with Win7 on it.
>> Skylake is the last processor that officially supports Win7.

Does "Skylake" translate into a number (something like i312345)? (Mine -
in Control Panel | System - shows as "i3-2350M", and I haven't had any
problems with it.)

>> I don't really know how "close" the later processors get to working.
>>
>> The W10 x32 might work, but then, it would be W10.
>> Refurbs might have W10 x64, but you could download a W10 x32
>> and do a clean install of that (write down the key you find in
>> the x64, as the same key will install x32 or x64). If you were
>> going to do that, download the W10 x32 ISO first, so you can be
>> assured of having media for the job.
>
>Thanks very much for that -- best advice I've seen so far.

And check that the drivers for the various bits of its hardware are
available in 32-bit form (display, sound, network [ethernet], wifi, USB,
....)
>
>I'll print it out, show it to my local computer shop, and ask if he
>can give me a quote for replacement, including a new copy of an O/S
>for a Virtual Machine it a replacement for the original can't be got,
>and pass it on to the insurance, but it may prove that the old machine

Try also (for something to show them)
https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p4432023.m570.l1311&_
nkw=windows+7+32+bit+laptop&_sacat=0 - that's ebay.co.uk with "windows 7
32 bit laptop" in the search box.

>is irreplaceable, which has some very nasty implications for all the
>people who have been advocating the digitisation of archival records
>and destruction of the originals to save space.
>
>
If it's scanning to digital image, then I think the JPEG, GIF, and
probably PNG formats will now survive indefinitely. (I know JPEG is in
theory inherently lossy, but - and I do genealogy as a hobby - I can
honestly say I've never encountered an image of an ancient document
where JPEG artefacts have been a problem, or even visible. It's the
ancient handwriting - of a presumably underpaid cleric, trying to save
paper too - that's usually the problem!) Yes, I would agree, if
"digitisation" is into some database format, then periodic refurbishment
_is_ advisable, but the first stage of most digitisation is - or should
be - into image.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Back then, many radio sets were still in black and white. - Eddie Mair, radio
presenter, on "PM" programme reaching 40; in Radio Times, 3-9 April 2010

On 17/11/2023 13:02, Steve Hayes wrote:
>
> Someone stole my laptop computer, and I'm beginning to be concerned
> that it may be irreplaceable.
>
> It was running Windows 7, 32-bit, and it seems that most, if not all,
> laptops sold nowadays with Windows installed are 64-bit, which means
> they won't run a lot of my software, and that means that they won't
> allow me to access a lot of the research data I have collected over
> the last 30 years.
>
> People have told me that it is possible to run a virtual machine on a
> Win 64-bit computer that will emulate a 32-bit OS, but before I spend
> money on a computer that might not work for me, I'd like to hear from
> someone who has had experience in running such things, to find out how
> well they work.
>
> The nearest thing I have found to that was OS/2, now more than 25
> years old, which had built in emulators that ran MS-Windows better
> than Windows, and MS-Dos better than DOS. But there the emulators were
> integrated, so they worked well.
>
> Do today's third-party emulators work as well as the OS/2 ones, or do
> they have hidden disadvantages? Is there anyone here who has had
> experience of using them who would be willing to answer a few
> questions?

I'm late into this discussion, but from a skim through just now, I don't
think the following has been asked:

Have you any disk-image style back-up of your previous system that was
stolen - eg an image made by Ghost, Clonezilla, etc?

If you have, using that as the source to make a working Virtual Machine
(VM, and I'm using the term generically rather than implying any brand)
should be easier than trying to re-install your original system and all
its software from scratch, even supposing that you actually have every
single installation media involved and that they all still work.

Anyone else here tried to use 20-year old floppies recently? No, I
thought not, most won't even have access to a floppy drive any more! I
can't remember details now, but a few months ago I was trying to create
a W98 boot USB stick for running imaging software, and for some obscure
reason now forgotten needed to perform a 'sys' command to do it, and
*none* of the many W98 boot floppies I had still worked! Eventually I
found just one floppy disk that still worked well enough to allow an old
floppy boot image to be written to it, so that I could boot from it and
run the 'sys' command.

Home-made CDs & DVDs tend to degrade over time too.

Some of your other questions seem to have been answered, but
particularly I can confirm that through the VM you can access USB and
network hardware, etc, and areas of the host hard disk outside of the
VM, though you may have to alter some settings from their defaults to do
so. However, I only ever used a VM to test my website on old browsers,
which is hardly going to test the sort of functionality that you need,
so I'll stop around here.

Note Paul's point though, that if you want to use the in-built Microsoft
VM functionality, you need to be running a Pro version of W10 or W11,
not a Home version.

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

On 11/18/2023 11:43 PM, Steve Hayes wrote:

>
> Yes, that is one of the things I want to know.
>
> If I can find a 32-bit Win7 or Win-10 machine, that would be my
> preference, but if I can't, I want to know what a Virtual Box can and
> cannot do, preferably from someone who had used or is using one.

The VirtualBox BIOS support is pretty basic, and is intended to be
a "facade of sufficient quality to fool most OSes". The legacy BIOS
boot support, I would rate as "good", while booting UEFI OSes,
the bios in VirtualBox in that case is EFI and can have issues.

VirtualBox cannot boot from an emulated USB stick or a passthru USB stick.
It can boot from CD or ISO or emulated HDD (container).

The graphics support isn't exactly something you would want.
I don't game in VirtualBox, and I would not even try that.

There were two additional graphics support mechanisms, which have
either been removed or relabeled. There was passthru video, where
an entire video card was passed to the Guest, but then you'd need
a monitor for the Guest to use. There was also "Experimental DirectX support"
where DirectX commands of some sort were passed to the Host. This
only works (if you can wedge the driver in), on Windows Guest OSes.

> My wife's Win-11 64-bit laptop is far slower than my Win7 laptop was,
> and my Win 7 laptop was in turn far slower than my Win-XP 32-bit
> desktop (on which I'm typing this). I blame that on bloatware.
>
> I might ask her if I can try out one of these virtual box things on
> her computer, but I don't know if that would mean repartitioning her
> hard drive or something of the sort, which might make things even
> worse.

Modern hardware uses closed loop feedback, to control clock multiplier,
VCore setting, thermal limits (throttle so CPU doesn't go over 90C or
99C or whatever), power limits (Vcore never provides more than X watts).

Yet, additional cruft can be added, to make things worse. Windows has
its own scheduler design, but other things can mess with that.

https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/windows-10-cpu-throttling.264008/

In the old days, everything ran open-loop. Furmark used to be able
to burn a video card. That's no longer possible, for multiple
reasons. (First reason was a driver limiter, then later the hardware
closed loop control also prevents it.) Even the fan control on a
graphics card has advanced. There was a time, where a "bad" driver,
could stop the fan entirely, causing the GPU to overheat and be
damaged. I would bet a lot of modern cards cannot be damaged that
way either. My 1050TI, the fan hardly ever spins on it, so it
does not appear to have that protection on it. There might be
hardware fan control there, but it's not possible to tell by
looking at it.

>>> People have told me that it is possible to run a virtual machine on a
>>> Win 64-bit computer that will emulate a 32-bit OS, but before I spend
>>> money on a computer that might not work for me, I'd like to hear from
>>> someone who has had experience in running such things, to find out how
>>> well they work.

You can run 64-bit Guests on 32-bit Hosts. I used to do that in WinXP (Host)
and various Guest OSes. That is possible, because the CPU supports 64-bit
instructions, and the Guest 64-bit is passing 64-bit instructions to the
CPU directly. VirtualBox as normally used, is homogenous x86-on-x86 so
a lot of instructions are passed without interpretation, right to the CPU.
If you do an RDTSC (privileged instruction?), maybe that is handled manually
by the VirtualBox software.

You can also run a 64-bit Host OS and run 32-bit Guest OSes.

In other words, you are absolutely limited on homogenous, if the CPU is 32-bit
instructions only (AthlonXP 3200). if the CPU is 64-bit, just about all
combinations are supported.

Heterogenous, like x86-on-Sparc at work, runs at 0.1 to 0.01 of normal speed.
It allows just about anything, subject to the software developer coding support
for it. Whereas VirtualBox (x86-on-x86) runs at 0.9 or 90% of normal speed (or so).

[Picture] Win7 x32 Enterprise (a Microsoft-prepped VM!) on Win11 x64 Host
VirtualBox 6.1.44

https://i.postimg.cc/Dz03wmP4/w7-x32-on-w11-x64-speed-test.gif

>>
>> As others have said, it's not an emulation of the OS, it's an emulation
>> of a complete system - on which you can install whatever OS you like,
>> including of course W7-32. You'll need a valid licence to do so - as far
>> as MS are concerned, you're running two computers - though I believe the
>> activation servers for 7 are getting fairly lax in their checking now.
>
> And then the question is: how well does that complete system interact
> with the host system?
>
> Is it possible to have the programs on the emulator and the data on
> the host system? Can one copy and paste between them?
>

Once the Guest OS has the "VirtualBox Additions" file executed, that
adds Copy/Paste integration, as well as Drag&Drop file copying. The cursor
will have a (+) symbol which indicates you are over something where
a file drop will work. If the "stop sign" is on the cursor, it means
the Drag&Drop subsystem is currently disabled for some reason.

The VirtualBox Additions also provides a graphics driver for the emulated
graphics. While there is "experimental graphics acceleration", where
the graphics card in the Host provides some help with the graphics,
you will get used to the thing not having acceleration after a while.
That's when having a faster CPU helps with the experience.

OpenGL: renderer: llvmpipe (LLVM 12.0.0 128 bits) v: 4.5 Mesa 21.2.6 # unaccelerated
OpenGL: renderer: SVGA3D; build v: 2.1 Mesa 21.2.6 # VBox Additions for Linux guest

GLXGears 300 frames per second animation # unaccelerated (CPU driven by Windows)
GLXGears 400 frames epr second animation # Vbox Additions in Guest (CPU driven...)
GLXGears 9000 frames per second animation # Ubuntu with NVidia driver, native test,
# showing how fast graphics would have been with good support

>> Does what you want to do involve accessing external hardware, or just
>> old data (presumably on an external drive, CD, DVD, or memory stick)?
>
> I used to copy my main data files (the ones I was working on every
> day) between by desktop and laptop using a USB flash drive, and a
> batch file, or rather set of batch files that copied everything with
> one command -- dsk2flsh, flsh2lap, lap2flsh, flsh2dsk.
>
> One advantage of that is that our electricity supplier has periodic
> load shedding when demand exceeds supply and they would turn off the
> power to certain areas in rotation, and when that happened I could
> just transfer the files to the laptop and carry on working.

Our outages here are "one second or one week", and a computer UPS handles
the former and not the latter :-) It takes quite a bit of battery
in a UPS, to hide load-shedding at a power company. Whole house
batteries are around $10K a pop, and a configuration of two of them
is recommended by the maker. Poorly constructed whole house
power, is either in charging mode (giving no house power) or in run mode
(house power, but cannot incorporate solar PV output). Typical inverter
capability never seems to pass the 3kW to 6kW range (some have "short
term burst" and that's how they hit the 6kW operating point). You can
run small electric motors with a little luck :-) The burst mode helps spin
up the motor. Maybe it will run 6kW output for ten seconds.

Paul

On 11/19/23 06:58, J. P. Gilliver wrote:

[snip]

> I love "12 M"! At least, for those who insist on using AM/PM anyway,
> it's an excellent solution. (But ...

That would be confusing. Is there a missing 'A' or a missing 'P'?

--
36 days until the winter celebration (Monday, December 25, 2023 12:00 AM
for 1 day).

Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"One does well to put on gloves when reading the New Testament. The
proximity of so much uncleanliness almost forces one to do this."
[Fredrich Nietzsche]

On 11/18/23 14:00, Zaidy036 wrote:

> that is why a military time is  0000 - 2400 and no need for AM/PM

That does have advantages, including no M (AM/PM) and using 0. 2400 is
not normally necessary, as that is 0000 the next day.

--
36 days until the winter celebration (Monday, December 25, 2023 12:00 AM
for 1 day).

Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"One does well to put on gloves when reading the New Testament. The
proximity of so much uncleanliness almost forces one to do this."
[Fredrich Nietzsche]

On 11/18/23 22:12, Steve Hayes wrote:
> On Fri, 17 Nov 2023 11:37:28 -0600, Mark Lloyd <not.email@all.invalid>
> wrote:
>
>> On 11/17/23 07:06, Marco Moock wrote:
>>
>> [snip]
>>
>>> Current machines have hardware that doesn't have Windows 7 drivers
>>> support.
>>
>> Are these programs compatible with Windows 10 32-bit?
>
> I don't know, I've never tried it, but I assume that if they ran OK
> under Windows 7 32-bit they would run OK under Windows 10 32-bit.

Windows 10 is likely to have drivers for modern machines, that 7 doesn't.

--
36 days until the winter celebration (Monday, December 25, 2023 12:00 AM
for 1 day).

Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"One does well to put on gloves when reading the New Testament. The
proximity of so much uncleanliness almost forces one to do this."
[Fredrich Nietzsche]

On 19/11/2023 08:17, Paul wrote:
>
> I discovered, while trying to figure out a solution for you, that archive.org
> seems to have placed a 2GB file limit on downloads. If I try to download
> a virtual machine file which is archived on the site (some of those are 5GB),
> the download stops at 2GB. I tried about three different files, and the
> response was the same. I used aria2c downloader (which has restart capability),
> and if you try to restart a download at the 2GB mark, archive.org refuses to
> respond.

I always hesitate to disagree with you, Paul, but IME today the above is
NOT true. I set the download service on my QNAP NAS to download ...

https://archive.org/download/digital_river/x17-58996.iso

.... and it downloaded successfully. In particular, I watched it roll
over the 2GB downloaded mark with no perceptible glitch, the resulting
file size is the advertised 2.39 GB, the ISO opens successfully in
7-zip, and its SHA1 agrees with that given for it on the parent
directory/page.

I think you must have a different problem somewhere?

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

On Sun, 19 Nov 2023 13:59:56 +0000, Java Jive wrote:

> Anyone else here tried to use 20-year old floppies recently? No, I
> thought not, most won't even have access to a floppy drive any more!

Two months ago I booted a new VMware virtual machine from a virtual
floppy, to install a new OS. Booting from a virtual floppy (mapped
to a *.flp file on the host) is not much different to booting from
a virtual CD (mapped to a *.iso file on the host).

--
Kind regards
Ralph Fox
🦊

On 11/19/2023 11:57 AM, Java Jive wrote:
> On 19/11/2023 08:17, Paul wrote:
>>
>> I discovered, while trying to figure out a solution for you, that archive.org
>> seems to have placed a 2GB file limit on downloads. If I try to download
>> a virtual machine file which is archived on the site (some of those are 5GB),
>> the download stops at 2GB. I tried about three different files, and the
>> response was the same. I used aria2c downloader (which has restart capability),
>> and if you try to restart a download at the 2GB mark, archive.org refuses to
>> respond.
>
> I always hesitate to disagree with you, Paul, but IME today the above is NOT true.  I set the download service on my QNAP NAS to download ...
>
>     https://archive.org/download/digital_river/x17-58996.iso
>
> ... and it downloaded successfully.  In particular, I watched it roll over the 2GB downloaded mark with no perceptible glitch, the resulting file size is the advertised 2.39 GB, the ISO opens successfully in 7-zip, and its SHA1 agrees with that given for it on the parent directory/page.
>
> I think you must have a different problem somewhere?
>

I tried two different tools.

Web browser.

Aria2c (since it supports reliable transfer).

And no, there is no FAT32 on the machine or the like.
No obvious excuses for the behavior.

I haven't had this problem in the past. This is new-to-me behavior.

Paul

On 11/19/2023 11:57 AM, Java Jive wrote:
> On 19/11/2023 08:17, Paul wrote:
>>
>> I discovered, while trying to figure out a solution for you, that archive.org
>> seems to have placed a 2GB file limit on downloads. If I try to download
>> a virtual machine file which is archived on the site (some of those are 5GB),
>> the download stops at 2GB. I tried about three different files, and the
>> response was the same. I used aria2c downloader (which has restart capability),
>> and if you try to restart a download at the 2GB mark, archive.org refuses to
>> respond.
>
> I always hesitate to disagree with you, Paul, but IME today the above is NOT true.  I set the download service on my QNAP NAS to download ...
>
>     https://archive.org/download/digital_river/x17-58996.iso
>
> ... and it downloaded successfully.  In particular, I watched it roll over the 2GB downloaded mark with no perceptible glitch, the resulting file size is the advertised 2.39 GB, the ISO opens successfully in 7-zip, and its SHA1 agrees with that given for it on the parent directory/page.
>
> I think you must have a different problem somewhere?
>

I have a theory.

It's possible that archive.org , archived some of the downloads
when the Microsoft servers had the "download bug". There was a
period of time, where Microsoft servers were truncating downloads.
A symptom, is both parties to the download are satisfied the download
is complete. But the file can be short, by up to a gigabyte.

I've just started downloading a digitalriver sample, like yourself,
and when I get back, we'll see whether this one is "regular size".

The damage then, could actually be recorded on the server that way.

If you believe the left column is size-in-bytes here, then this
list is anomalous as well, and may be stored (incorrectly) on the
server like that. Maybe these weren't DigitalRiver, but were
TechBench or similar. The collection may be "digital_river", but
that does not mean Archive.org crawled digitalriver.com itself. Some
user uploaded these as far as I know.

https://ia801300.us.archive.org/30/items/digital_river/xxx17index_file.txt

So rather than a protocol error, the content on the server may
simply be damaged, and I've misinterpreted this as a protocol problem.

Paul

Steve Hayes <hayesstw@telkomsa.net> wrote:
> On 17 Nov 2023 16:16:59 GMT, Frank Slootweg <this@ddress.is.invalid>
> wrote:
>
> >Steve Hayes <hayesstw@telkomsa.net> wrote:
> >> Someone stole my laptop computer, and I'm beginning to be concerned
> >> that it may be irreplaceable.
> >>
> >> It was running Windows 7, 32-bit, and it seems that most, if not all,
> >> laptops sold nowadays with Windows installed are 64-bit, which means
> >> they won't run a lot of my software, and that means that they won't
> >> allow me to access a lot of the research data I have collected over
> >> the last 30 years.
> >
> > 64-bit Windows systems can run 32-bit software/programs just fine, so
> >I think you mean you (also) have *16-bit* software/programs which you
> >need to run. Correct?
>
> Yes, and 8-bit ones too. 32-bit Windows runs those just fine, at least
> all the ones I use regularly. There are some it doesn't, but that's a
> hardware rather than an O/S problem, something to do with clock speed.
> Programs written in TurboPascal, for example, won't run on faster
> machines.

"8-bit ones" sounds a bit strange, because all (IBM-like) PCs have
always been 16-bit. But perhaps you mean byte-level interpretive code or
some such. Can you give some more details about these "8-bit ones"?

Anyway, about this software, has it been written for Windows 1.x, 2.x,
3.0, 3.1, etc. and was running on 32-bit Windows 7? If so, WineVDM
mentioned by Ralph Fox may be a solution. Like Ralph, I have no
experience with WineVDM, but looking at the documentation, it seems that
it might fit the bill.

Another question: Are these really windows programs, i.e. GUI programs
which actually use windows and run in windows (note: lower case 'w',
i.e. the technology, not the (Microsoft) prodoct) or are they programs
which may use graphics, but run in a Command Prompt window?

If the latter, then I think these will run on 64-bit Windows as well.
I have no such graphics programs, but my non-graphics programs just run
(in a Command Prompt window) on my 64-bit Windows 11 system as they did
on my 32-bit XP and Vista systems (and 32-bit 8.1 system)

[Rest left for completeness:]

> > If so, tell us a bit what kind of software/programs those are, so
> >maybe 'we' can suggest other methods than setting up a Windows 7 (or 8?
> >or 10?) virtual machine.
>
> InMagic and askSam text databases are the main ones, XyWrite word
> processor, which I use, inter alia, for converting files from other
> old word processing programs, and for reporting from the text
> databases.
>
> It's not easily possible to print reports from the text database
> programs to Windows printers, but one can easily design reports that
> include XyWrite formatting commands, import the report into XyWrite,
> export it as RTF, and load it into a Windows word processor to produce
> formatted reports, though short reports can juse be copy/pasted.
> XyWrite formatting commands work in the same way as HTML ones, though
> the commands themselves are not the same.
>
> Just to give an example of copy/pasting, here:
>
> Best books read in 2023, sorted by rating:
>
> 87 Lewis, C.S. 1965 [1952] The voyage of the Dawn Treader.
>
> 85 Cooper, Susan. 2010 [1965] Over sea, under stone.
>
> 84 Carlisle, Clare. 2020. Philosopher of the Heart.
>
> 83 Tudor, C.J. 2017. The Chalk Man.
>
> 82 Hughes, Richard. 1964. The Fox in the Attic.
>
> 82 Robotham, Michael. 2009. Shatter.
>
> 82 Shaik, Moe. 2020. The ANC Spy Bible: Surviving across Enemy
> Lines.
>
> 81 Barrows, Annie. 2015. Magic in the Mix.
>
> 81 Erlings, Fridrik. 2006. Benjamin Dove.
>
> 81 Greene, Graham. 1975 [1938] Brighton Rock.
>
> 78 King, Stephen. 2000. On writing: a memoir.

On 11/19/2023 12:55 AM, John Hall wrote:
> In message <an3ilitnlcet80mq984nuk8402o61jcjd0@4ax.com>, Char Jackson
> <none@none.invalid> writes
>> On Sat, 18 Nov 2023 10:13:35 +0000, John Hall
>> <john_nospam@jhall.co.uk> wrote:
>>
>>> In message <uj9sj0$38ddd$1@dont-email.me>, Daniel65
>>> <daniel47@nomail.afraid.org> writes
>>>> J. P. Gilliver wrote on 18/11/23 5:04 am:
>>>>> In message <sxN5N.46596$AqO5.22600@fx11.iad> at Fri, 17 Nov 2023
>>>>> 11:37:28, Mark Lloyd <not.email@all.invalid> writes []
>>>>>> 38 days until the winter celebration (Monday, December 25, 2023
>>>>>> 12:00 AM for 1 day).
>>>>> [] Is "12:00 AM" syntactically valid?
>>>>
>>>> Surely one of the '12:00' would be 'AM' .... but whether that is
>>>> 'Midnight' or 'Midday' ..... Pass!
>>>
>>> I often see references to 12 AM and 12 PM, and I'm sometimes left
>>> uncertain as to whether noon or midnight was meant. Use of the 24-hour
>>> clock (or simply using the words "noon" and "midnight") avoids any
>>> ambiguity.
>>
>> I don't think I've ever met anyone (until now?) who found 12 AM and 12
>> PM to be
>> ambiguous. Interesting.
>>
>
> AM stands for "ante meridiem" and PM for "post meridiem", i.e. before
> and after midday respectively. But 12 noon is neither before nor after,
> so logically it should be 12 M. Midnight is both 12 hours before and 12
> hours post, but I suppose it would be more logical to call it 12 PM (or
> maybe 0 AM).

So how is that affected by daylight savings time?

On 19.11.23 19:21, Ralph Fox wrote:
> On Sun, 19 Nov 2023 13:59:56 +0000, Java Jive wrote:
>
>> Anyone else here tried to use 20-year old floppies recently? No, I
>> thought not, most won't even have access to a floppy drive any more!
>
> Two months ago I booted a new VMware virtual machine from a virtual
> floppy, to install a new OS. Booting from a virtual floppy (mapped
> to a *.flp file on the host) is not much different to booting from
> a virtual CD (mapped to a *.iso file on the host).
>
>
I did yesterday.
Had to repeat the test a few times, I think the floppy
reader heads were not very clean or the repeated read
cleared away some dust.
3'rth try succeeded (win 98 boot floppy).
Also tested a floppy floppy (the larger ones), worked fine.

On 19/11/2023 19:21, Paul wrote:
> On 11/19/2023 11:57 AM, Java Jive wrote:
>> On 19/11/2023 08:17, Paul wrote:
>>>
>>> I discovered, while trying to figure out a solution for you, that archive.org
>>> seems to have placed a 2GB file limit on downloads. If I try to download
>>> a virtual machine file which is archived on the site (some of those are 5GB),
>>> the download stops at 2GB. I tried about three different files, and the
>>> response was the same. I used aria2c downloader (which has restart capability),
>>> and if you try to restart a download at the 2GB mark, archive.org refuses to
>>> respond.
>>
>> I always hesitate to disagree with you, Paul, but IME today the above is NOT true.  I set the download service on my QNAP NAS to download ...
>>
>>     https://archive.org/download/digital_river/x17-58996.iso
>>
>> ... and it downloaded successfully.  In particular, I watched it roll over the 2GB downloaded mark with no perceptible glitch, the resulting file size is the advertised 2.39 GB, the ISO opens successfully in 7-zip, and its SHA1 agrees with that given for it on the parent directory/page.
>>
>> I think you must have a different problem somewhere?
>
> I have a theory.
>
> It's possible that archive.org , archived some of the downloads
> when the Microsoft servers had the "download bug". There was a
> period of time, where Microsoft servers were truncating downloads.
> A symptom, is both parties to the download are satisfied the download
> is complete. But the file can be short, by up to a gigabyte.
>
> I've just started downloading a digitalriver sample, like yourself,
> and when I get back, we'll see whether this one is "regular size".
>
> The damage then, could actually be recorded on the server that way.
>
> If you believe the left column is size-in-bytes here, then this
> list is anomalous as well, and may be stored (incorrectly) on the
> server like that. Maybe these weren't DigitalRiver, but were
> TechBench or similar. The collection may be "digital_river", but
> that does not mean Archive.org crawled digitalriver.com itself. Some
> user uploaded these as far as I know.
>
> https://ia801300.us.archive.org/30/items/digital_river/xxx17index_file.txt

Yes, agreed so far ...

The number against the file I downloaded successfully - which, I
forgot to mention, is the one the OP would need to create a 32-bit W7 VM
from scratch: Windows 7 Home Premium x86 English SP1 - is
2,147,483,647, which is one byte less than 2 GB = 2,147,483,648, whereas
the actual file size should be 2.38 GB = 2,564,476,928 (I misread it
when I quoted 2.39 GB earlier)

> So rather than a protocol error, the content on the server may
> simply be damaged, and I've misinterpreted this as a protocol problem.

No, I don't think so, because what is supposedly the size is wrong for
the file I downloaded, yet I was able to download it in full, so either:

1) The index has the wrong sizes;

.... and ...

2) SOME of the files, but fortunately not the one the OP would need,
were uploaded incorrectly, and truncated thereby;

.... and these two things happened more or less independently of each
other, because my test earlier showed that there isn't a one-for-one
correspondence between the supposed incorrect sizes in the index and
whether the file downloads correctly, or ...

3) You have some other problem.

To move this forward, perhaps if you give here some of the exact links
you tried to download, I and others could try downloading them to see if
we get the same results?

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

John Hall <john_nospam@jhall.co.uk> writes:
> In message <87o7fqepj9.fsf@nosuchdomain.example.com>, Keith Thompson
> <Keith.S.Thompson+u@gmail.com> writes
>>"J. P. Gilliver" <G6JPG@255soft.uk> writes:
>>> In message <sxN5N.46596$AqO5.22600@fx11.iad> at Fri, 17 Nov 2023
>>> 11:37:28, Mark Lloyd <not.email@all.invalid> writes
>>> []
>>>>38 days until the winter celebration (Monday, December 25, 2023 12:00 AM
>>>>for 1 day).
>>> []
>>> Is "12:00 AM" syntactically valid?
>>
>>12:00 AM is one minute before 12:01 AM (midnight).
>>12:00 PM is one minute before 12:01 PM (noon).
>>
> You could equally argue:
> 12:00 AM is one minute after 11:59 AM (noon)
> 12:00 PM is one minute after 11:59 PM (midnight).
>
> That ambiguity is why I find it confusing.

The choice of whether 12am is midnight and 12pm is noon or vice versa is
fundamentally arbitrary. That choice has been made. There are probably
a number of official standards that address this (I'm too lazy to look
up any of them), and I believe they consistently say that 12am is
midnight and 12pm is noon.

I offer a rationale for that choice. All times from 12:00:00 to
12:59:59 are either all AM, or all PM. The transition from 11:NN:NN to
12:NN:NN happens at the same time as the transition from AM to PM or
vice versa. That makes more sense to me than having 12:00:00 AM
immediately followed by 12:00:01 PM.

If you still think it's ambiguous, treat my suggestion as a mnenomic.
The issue is settled, and the convention isn't going to change.

--
Keith Thompson (The_Other_Keith) Keith.S.Thompson+u@gmail.com
Will write code for food.
void Void(void) { Void(); } /* The recursive call of the void */

In message <ujdo3p$3u7fg$1@dont-email.me>, Bob F <bobnospam@gmail.com>
writes
>On 11/19/2023 12:55 AM, John Hall wrote:
>> In message <an3ilitnlcet80mq984nuk8402o61jcjd0@4ax.com>, Char Jackson
>><none@none.invalid> writes
>>> On Sat, 18 Nov 2023 10:13:35 +0000, John Hall
>>><john_nospam@jhall.co.uk> wrote:
>>>
>>>> In message <uj9sj0$38ddd$1@dont-email.me>, Daniel65
>>>> <daniel47@nomail.afraid.org> writes
>>>>> J. P. Gilliver wrote on 18/11/23 5:04 am:
>>>>>> In message <sxN5N.46596$AqO5.22600@fx11.iad> at Fri, 17 Nov 2023
>>>>>> 11:37:28, Mark Lloyd <not.email@all.invalid> writes []
>>>>>>> 38 days until the winter celebration (Monday, December 25, 2023
>>>>>>> 12:00 AM for 1 day).
>>>>>> [] Is "12:00 AM" syntactically valid?
>>>>>
>>>>> Surely one of the '12:00' would be 'AM' .... but whether that is
>>>>> 'Midnight' or 'Midday' ..... Pass!
>>>>
>>>> I often see references to 12 AM and 12 PM, and I'm sometimes left
>>>> uncertain as to whether noon or midnight was meant. Use of the 24-hour
>>>> clock (or simply using the words "noon" and "midnight") avoids any
>>>> ambiguity.
>>>
>>> I don't think I've ever met anyone (until now?) who found 12 AM and
>>>12 PM to be
>>> ambiguous. Interesting.
>>>
>> AM stands for "ante meridiem" and PM for "post meridiem", i.e.
>>before and after midday respectively. But 12 noon is neither before
>>nor after, so logically it should be 12 M. Midnight is both 12 hours
>>before and 12 hours post, but I suppose it would be more logical to
>>call it 12 PM (or maybe 0 AM).
>
>So how is that affected by daylight savings time?
>
>

Not art all, since we are dealing with time as shown on the clock. Even
when daylight savings time isn't in force, noon on the clock rarely
precisely corresponds to when the sun is due south. And of course if you
went by "sun time", places on different longitudes that are currently
within the same time zone would be setting their clocks to different
times, as happened prior to the middle of the 19th century.
--
John Hall
"Acting is merely the art of keeping a large group of people
from coughing."
Sir Ralph Richardson (1902-83)

On 11/19/2023 4:22 PM, Java Jive wrote:
> On 19/11/2023 19:21, Paul wrote:
>> On 11/19/2023 11:57 AM, Java Jive wrote:
>>> On 19/11/2023 08:17, Paul wrote:
>>>>
>>>> I discovered, while trying to figure out a solution for you, that archive.org
>>>> seems to have placed a 2GB file limit on downloads. If I try to download
>>>> a virtual machine file which is archived on the site (some of those are 5GB),
>>>> the download stops at 2GB. I tried about three different files, and the
>>>> response was the same. I used aria2c downloader (which has restart capability),
>>>> and if you try to restart a download at the 2GB mark, archive.org refuses to
>>>> respond.
>>>
>>> I always hesitate to disagree with you, Paul, but IME today the above is NOT true.  I set the download service on my QNAP NAS to download ...
>>>
>>>      https://archive.org/download/digital_river/x17-58996.iso
>>>
>>> ... and it downloaded successfully.  In particular, I watched it roll over the 2GB downloaded mark with no perceptible glitch, the resulting file size is the advertised 2.39 GB, the ISO opens successfully in 7-zip, and its SHA1 agrees with that given for it on the parent directory/page.
>>>
>>> I think you must have a different problem somewhere?
>>
>> I have a theory.
>>
>> It's possible that archive.org , archived some of the downloads
>> when the Microsoft servers had the "download bug". There was a
>> period of time, where Microsoft servers were truncating downloads.
>> A symptom, is both parties to the download are satisfied the download
>> is complete. But the file can be short, by up to a gigabyte.
>>
>> I've just started downloading a digitalriver sample, like yourself,
>> and when I get back, we'll see whether this one is "regular size".
>>
>> The damage then, could actually be recorded on the server that way.
>>
>> If you believe the left column is size-in-bytes here, then this
>> list is anomalous as well, and may be stored (incorrectly) on the
>> server like that. Maybe these weren't DigitalRiver, but were
>> TechBench or similar. The collection may be "digital_river", but
>> that does not mean Archive.org crawled digitalriver.com itself. Some
>> user uploaded these as far as I know.
>>
>> https://ia801300.us.archive.org/30/items/digital_river/xxx17index_file.txt
>
> Yes, agreed so far ...
>
> The number against the file I downloaded successfully  -  which, I forgot to mention, is the one the OP would need to create a 32-bit W7 VM from scratch: Windows 7 Home Premium x86 English SP1  -  is 2,147,483,647, which is one byte less than 2 GB = 2,147,483,648, whereas the actual file size should be 2.38 GB = 2,564,476,928 (I misread it when I quoted 2.39 GB earlier)
>
>> So rather than a protocol error, the content on the server may
>> simply be damaged, and I've misinterpreted this as a protocol problem.
>
> No, I don't think so, because what is supposedly the size is wrong for the file I downloaded, yet I was able to download it in full, so either:
>
> 1)  The index has the wrong sizes;
>
> ... and ...
>
> 2)  SOME of the files, but fortunately not the one the OP would need, were uploaded incorrectly, and truncated thereby;
>
> ... and these two things happened more or less independently of each other, because my test earlier showed that there isn't a one-for-one correspondence between the supposed incorrect sizes in the index and whether the file downloads correctly, or ...
>
> 3)  You have some other problem.
>
> To move this forward, perhaps if you give here some of the exact links you tried to download, I and others could try downloading them to see if we get the same results?
>

This one seems to be more than 2GB, so is OK.

https://ia801300.us.archive.org/30/items/digital_river/x17-58997.iso

Name: x17-58997.iso
Size: 3320903680 bytes (3167 MiB)
SHA256: C10A9DA74A34E3AB57446CDDD7A0F825D526DA78D9796D442DB5022C33E3CB7F

*******

While these are in pairs, I think one of the links might redirect to the other,
and these could be some 2GB ones. I also tried with aria2c.exe but since I did
that in command prompt, there's no history. Powershell keeps a history.

https://web.archive.org/web/20191216124401/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/HyperV/IE11/IE11.Win7.HyperV.zip
https://web.archive.org/web/20191216124401if_/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/HyperV/IE11/IE11.Win7.HyperV.zip

https://web.archive.org/web/20190824211320/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/VirtualBox/IE11/IE11.Win7.VirtualBox.zip
https://web.archive.org/web/20190824211320if_/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/VirtualBox/IE11/IE11.Win7.VirtualBox.zip

The first would be, for running under Hyper-V, like on Win10 Pro Host.

The second would be, for Virtualbox. And that would give a Win7 x32 Enterprise running under some Windows or Linux host.

The benefit of the Enterprise one, is at the end of the grace period (30 days/90 days),
it switches to running for 30 minutes before it shuts down on you. This allows you
to do short conversion tasks, without a license. I was doing MinGW compiles that
way (keeping the MinGW tree off the main C: ).

Paul

On 19/11/2023 22:56, Paul wrote:
>
> https://web.archive.org/web/20191216124401/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/HyperV/IE11/IE11.Win7.HyperV.zip
> https://web.archive.org/web/20191216124401if_/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/HyperV/IE11/IE11.Win7.HyperV.zip
>
> https://web.archive.org/web/20190824211320/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/VirtualBox/IE11/IE11.Win7.VirtualBox.zip
> https://web.archive.org/web/20190824211320if_/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/VirtualBox/IE11/IE11.Win7.VirtualBox.zip

I've left them going on my NAS, will report back to-morrow.

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

In message <875y1xe7su.fsf@nosuchdomain.example.com>, Keith Thompson
<Keith.S.Thompson+u@gmail.com> writes
>The choice of whether 12am is midnight and 12pm is noon or vice versa
>is fundamentally arbitrary. That choice has been made. There are
>probably a number of official standards that address this (I'm too lazy
>to look up any of them), and I believe they consistently say that 12am
>is midnight and 12pm is noon.
>
>I offer a rationale for that choice. All times from 12:00:00 to
>12:59:59 are either all AM, or all PM. The transition from 11:NN:NN to
>12:NN:NN happens at the same time as the transition from AM to PM or
>vice versa. That makes more sense to me than having 12:00:00 AM
>immediately followed by 12:00:01 PM.
>
>If you still think it's ambiguous, treat my suggestion as a mnenomic.
>The issue is settled, and the convention isn't going to change.

Thanks. Your mnemonic will work for me, I think.
--
John Hall
"Acting is merely the art of keeping a large group of people
from coughing."
Sir Ralph Richardson (1902-83)

John Hall wrote on 20/11/23 8:38 am:
> In message <ujdo3p$3u7fg$1@dont-email.me>, Bob F
> <bobnospam@gmail.com> writes

<Snip>

>> So how is that affected by daylight savings time?
>
> Not art all, since we are dealing with time as shown on the clock.
> Even when daylight savings time isn't in force, noon on the clock
> rarely precisely corresponds to when the sun is due south.

Bloody Hell!! I'd be in real trouble if the sun were anything like 'due
south' at Noon!! ;-P

> And of course if you went by "sun time", places on different
> longitudes that are currently within the same time zone would be
> setting their clocks to different times, as happened prior to the
> middle of the 19th century.

And, going the other way, isn't all of Russia (and, possibly, all of PR
of China) all on one Time setting??
--
Daniel

In message <ujf9j4$8v0s$1@dont-email.me> at Mon, 20 Nov 2023 20:40:52,
Daniel65 <daniel47@nomail.afraid.org> writes
>John Hall wrote on 20/11/23 8:38 am:
>> In message <ujdo3p$3u7fg$1@dont-email.me>, Bob F
>><bobnospam@gmail.com> writes
>
><Snip>
>
>>> So how is that affected by daylight savings time?
>> Not art all, since we are dealing with time as shown on the clock.
>>Even when daylight savings time isn't in force, noon on the clock
>>rarely precisely corresponds to when the sun is due south.
>
>Bloody Hell!! I'd be in real trouble if the sun were anything like 'due
>south' at Noon!! ;-P
>
>> And of course if you went by "sun time", places on different
>> longitudes that are currently within the same time zone would be
>> setting their clocks to different times, as happened prior to the
>> middle of the 19th century.
>
>And, going the other way, isn't all of Russia (and, possibly, all of PR
>of China) all on one Time setting??

I could see justification for the whole planet to use the same clock;
it'll never happen, though, as for any one suggestion, there will be far
more people/places/whatever who would have to change than not. To a
small extent, GMT (or UCT I think) _is_ that, and is used in scientific
circles.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Anybody can garble quotations like that -- even with the Bible... Er... "And he
went and hanged himself (Matthew 27:5). Go, and do thou likewise (Luke 10:37)."

On 19/11/2023 23:59, Java Jive wrote:
>
> On 19/11/2023 22:56, Paul wrote:
>>
>> https://web.archive.org/web/20191216124401/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/HyperV/IE11/IE11.Win7.HyperV.zip
>>
>> https://web.archive.org/web/20191216124401if_/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/HyperV/IE11/IE11.Win7.HyperV.zip
>>
>>
>> https://web.archive.org/web/20190824211320/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/VirtualBox/IE11/IE11.Win7.VirtualBox.zip
>>
>> https://web.archive.org/web/20190824211320if_/https://az792536.vo.msecnd.net/vms/VMBuild_20180102/VirtualBox/IE11/IE11.Win7.VirtualBox.zip
>
> I've left them going on my NAS, will report back to-morrow.

All failed, at least one I checked was indeed around the 2GB mark.

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

J. P. Gilliver wrote on 20/11/23 9:07 pm:
> In message <ujf9j4$8v0s$1@dont-email.me> at Mon, 20 Nov 2023
> 20:40:52, Daniel65 <daniel47@nomail.afraid.org> writes
>> John Hall wrote on 20/11/23 8:38 am:
>>> In message <ujdo3p$3u7fg$1@dont-email.me>, Bob F
>>> <bobnospam@gmail.com> writes
>>
>> <Snip>
>>
>>>> So how is that affected by daylight savings time?
>>> Not art all, since we are dealing with time as shown on the
>>> clock. Even when daylight savings time isn't in force, noon on
>>> the clock rarely precisely corresponds to when the sun is due
>>> south.
>>
>> Bloody Hell!! I'd be in real trouble if the sun were anything like
>> 'due south' at Noon!! ;-P
>>
>>> And of course if you went by "sun time", places on different
>>> longitudes that are currently within the same time zone would be
>>> setting their clocks to different times, as happened prior to
>>> the middle of the 19th century.
>>
>> And, going the other way, isn't all of Russia (and, possibly, all
>> of PR of China) all on one Time setting??
>
> I could see justification for the whole planet to use the same clock;
> it'll never happen, though, as for any one suggestion, there will be
> far more people/places/whatever who would have to change than not. To
> a small extent, GMT (or UCT I think) _is_ that, and is used in
> scientific circles.

GMT used in Communications cycles as well ..... and renamed to Zulu for
Military Communications as well!!
--
Daniel