Are you up-to-date?

    As has been noted on other parts of this site, it usually is not necessary to have the latest and greatest piece of hardware or version of Windows to do what you need to do.

    However, it is worth mentioning how the technical industry works.   Usually, when a company is about to release a product, arbitrary deadlines are discussed.  The marketing departments like to try to stick to the deadlines, or release dates, so that they can sell as many copies of their products before they go bankrupt, or have a merger, are downsized, etc.  So there is always pressure on the programmers to "get it done," even if there a few flaws or bugs in the software.   The hope is that if many copies/units of the product can be sold, then hopefully the customer won't realize that there are bugs until they are already using the software or hardware.  Then the inconvenience of returning the product might help to keep it in the customer's possession.

    Then, at some point after the initial release date, a patch, service pack, fix, update, etc. suddenly becomes available on the companie's website.  This, of course, is there as a "band-aid" approach, to try to fix something that really should have been done before the product was released.  But that is the industry-standard for software.  "Sell now, finish later."

    Yes, programming can get very complicated.  I used to think I wanted to be a programmer, but my mind is more graphically oriented.  So when one section of code can adversly affect other sections of a program, or the stability of the entire program with something so simple as misplaced punctuation and commands, it can take a while to get things sorted out.  But overall, if you want your printer, scanner, video card, sound card, or Windows to operate as it was intended, be sure to go to the manufacturer/developer's website, and get the latest drivers or critical updates.   It's well worth the time in the end.

5/21/04

Zalmegra Studios