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Mathcad Collab closing

PhilipOakley
5-Regular Member

Mathcad Collab closing

Mona Zeftel Posted in the old Mathsoft forums:

We will be closing these forums [the Collaboratory] in the next 30 days.

You should post your questions, issues, and discussions to the new Mathcad Community website.

If there are worksheets in these forums that you want to save, either copy them to the new Mathcad Community, or send a message to - [my emphasis].

It's worth having a wander around the old worksheets for the many gems....

Philip

6 REPLIES 6

Philip Oakley wrote:

Mona Zeftel Posted in the old Mathsoft forums:

We will be closing these forums [the Collaboratory] in the next 30 days.

You should post your questions, issues, and discussions to the new Mathcad Community website.

If there are worksheets in these forums that you want to save, either copy them to the new Mathcad Community, or send a message to - [my emphasis].

It's worth having a wander around the old worksheets for the many gems....

Philip

I thought the Collab had been transferred in its entirety? Were the worksheets not included? If not, why not? It's not as though storage is a problem these days - a couple TiB should more than cope and it's so cheap you'll probably spend more discussing it!

Stuart

PhilipOakley
5-Regular Member
(To:StuartBruff)

Stuart_Bruff wrote:

I thought the Collab had been transferred in its entirety? Were the worksheets not included? If not, why not? It's not as though storage is a problem these days - a couple TiB should more than cope and it's so cheap you'll probably spend more discussing it!

Stuart

They only did a partial transfer. Some of the older files weren't copied, and not all the text of the threads came over. I understand the effort available was limited, and they balnced completeness and tidyness so as to get neither completely correct.

Some of the units threads were a bit long

I was looking back at some of the older Quaternion sheets - often it is easier to search the forum than my own hard drive (loss of context!)

RichardJ
19-Tanzanite
(To:StuartBruff)

I thought the Collab had been transferred in its entirety? Were the worksheets not included? If not, why not?

You might find this astonishing. I did.

Despite the fact that PTC is a software company with a small army of programmers, apparently they transferred everything by hand! Not surprisingly, this was a huge effort! So they transferred all the text of the posts. Well, almost all of the text. There are a number of threads where some posts or parts pf posts are missing, and other threads where the order of the posts is all mixed up. As far as the attached files go though, they gave up on anything more than five years old, which includes a lot of very valuable worksheets. Other effects of the copy and paste procedure are that all the embedded images are no longer embedded, even if they are still attached to the post, and all the hyperlinks between threads are broken.

I have no idea how long this took them, but probably at least one order of magnitude longer than it would have taken a competent programmer to write something that would have moved everything over, complete with all attachments, embedded images, and fixed hyperlinks.

StuartBruff
23-Emerald II
(To:RichardJ)

Richard Jackson wrote:

I thought the Collab had been transferred in its entirety? Were the worksheets not included? If not, why not?

You might find this astonishing. I did.

Despite the fact that PTC is a software company with a small army of programmers, apparently they transferred everything by hand! Not surprisingly, this was a huge effort! So they transferred all the text of the posts. Well, almost all of the text. There are a number of threads where some posts or parts pf posts are missing, and other threads where the order of the posts is all mixed up. As far as the attached files go though, they gave up on anything more than five years old, which includes a lot of very valuable worksheets. Other effects of the copy and paste procedure are that all the embedded images are no longer embedded, even if they are still attached to the post, and all the hyperlinks between threads are broken.

I have no idea how long this took them, but probably at least one order of magnitude longer than it would have taken a competent programmer to write something that would have moved everything over, complete will all attachments, embedded images, and fixed hyperlinks.

Astonishing, Richard? I think Incredible is nearer the mark? Maybe they need to hire a few more clever-lazy people - they'd soooon find a way of avoiding work. I would have thought it's the kind of job one could give a summer intern - there's plenty of them around the area. It wouldn't surprise if there isn't already some software out there that can do it.

At the very least, why can't the worksheets (and data) be transferred to a drive and then let users be able to see that drive through the Community pages? Perhaps divide it in years to make it more manageable. I could do that in Mathcad!

Stuart

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General Kurt von Hammerstein-Equord in Truppenführung, 1933: "I divide my officers into four classes; the clever, the lazy, the industrious, and the stupid. Each officer possesses at least two of these qualities. Those who are clever and industrious are fitted for the highest staff appointments. Use can be made of those who are stupid and lazy. The man who is clever and lazy however is for the very highest command; he has the temperament and nerves to deal with all situations. But whoever is stupid and industrious is a menace and must be removed immediately!"[6]

or a slightly different version: "I divide my officers into four groups. There are clever, diligent, stupid, and lazy officers. Usually two characteristics are combined. Some are clever and diligent -- their place is the General Staff. The next lot are stupid and lazy -- they make up 90 percent of every army and are suited to routine duties. Anyone who is both clever and lazy is qualified for the highest leadership duties, because he possesses the intellectual clarity and the composure necessary for difficult decisions. One must beware of anyone who is stupid and diligent -- he must not be entrusted with any responsibility because he will always cause only mischief."

RichardJ
19-Tanzanite
(To:StuartBruff)

At the very least, why can't the worksheets (and data) be transferred to a drive and then let users be able to see that drive through the Community pages?

Why can't they just leave the current server running, with the forums locked?

PhilipOakley
5-Regular Member
(To:RichardJ)

Richard Jackson wrote:

At the very least, why can't the worksheets (and data) be transferred to a drive and then let users be able to see that drive through the Community pages?

Why can't they just leave the current server running, with the forums locked?

They could at least 'update' the web address if they wanted to 'loose' the old mathsoft one! (plus a re-direct)

I thought that I saw a blog thread related to the S-Math group that said that one of them had a full copy they had gathered over the years - couldn't find it though.

P.

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