[Elecraft] re K3 timekeeping

[Guy Olinger K2AV]

On Fri, Nov 28, 2014 at 10:02 AM, Barry <w2up at comcast.net> wrote:

> Not its main purpose, but if it's there, it should be accurate.
>

Who gets to decide "should be" and what "accurate" means? I'll give those
responsibilities to whoever is doing the work and laying out the cash. Too
easy to spend someone else's time and money. Tell Elecraft how much you'd
be willing to pay for the feature.


> From some
> of the comments above, it's not expensive nor difficult to implement.
> Firmware could be implemented to simply update the time when the radio is
> turned on, similar to the way Windows does periodic internet time updates
>

Going to add internet protocols to the K3 firmware? What happened to
"simple"?


> for a similarly inaccurate timekeeper.
>

Well, your complaint is a predictable intuitive assessment for sure. But
after more than four decades of being beaten to a pulp in systems design
and programming for installs, hardware, planning systems, and statistical
systems running on everything from mainframes to PC's:

  If it looks simple, it isn't.

  If you think you understand, you don't.

  If it looks really complicated, and you are convinced that it contains
some awful problem beyond your current skill set, it's probably twice as
complicated as it looks.  But at least you are on the same planet as
reality.

  The actual cost and time to provide actual fully debugged software is
almost always more than the developing company can afford. Perfect code is
never profitable.

  Nature could give a rat's a** whether her laws and behavior can be
programmed with short, sweet, inexpensive code. She does not care whether
you can feed your family on a programmer's salary. This is why hardware is
such a b*tch to code for. She doesn't like you, and would just as soon
smack you down.

  As soon as you fix one bug, the customer will find another and complain
all the louder. Over a lifetime, programmers don't even get a percent of
the praise they deserve.

  Software and firmware are reserved by the human race as a default
container to receive complaints. Anyone who does not complain about
software and firmware is presumed mentally deficient. Software and firmware
that work perfectly are resented, never acknowledged and presumed
programmed by snooty people that look down their noses at regular folk.

  The human race is completely confused by the idea that an SMT chip 1/2
inch by 1/2 inch could contain firmware that cost 500 bux to make in one
afternoon by a single programmer, or could contain firmware that cost
billions of dollars and tens of thousands of employees to develop over
decades, and the only visual clue is a different unreadable number printed
on the chip surface. Hams in particular will expect to pay the former price
for the latter content, based on the size of the chip.

This vein goes on for miles and miles, but you get the drift.

73, Guy K2AV