[geeks] new lists? 8-)

[Joshua D Boyd]

On Thu, Dec 13, 2001 at 02:31:27PM -0500, Dave McGuire wrote:
> > http://www.vikingrange.com/professional/professional.html
> 
>   Hoooboy.  I don't know the first thing about that type of equipment,
> but that thing even looks impressive to a layperson!

I figure a good kitchen is like a good computer network.  They both need 
infrastructure.

The common person might just buy a few PCs, run cable between them, and call 
them a network, while each machine effectively is still standing alone.

For instance, if I want to prevent the spread of monitors through the house, 
one needs to use serial consoles, and if you want to avoid having dozens of 
cheap failure prone 4 port hubs, one needs a real switch.

But to use those things one is also going to need a boot server.  And most 
high end machines require FEPs.  Then there are the handy niceties like 
routers, caches, and bottomless NFS pits, all of which require an 
infrastruture.

Like wise in kitchens, the common cook could use instant dinners like Hamburger
helper, and premade sauces like Ragu (BTW, their Alfredo sauce sucks.  I didn't
feel like cooking last night, so I tried buying a bottle).

If you want to have really good food though, you are going need to a more 
sophisticated environment.  To start with, you are going to need to keep 
ingredients on hand.  And not just things like flour and sugar, but things that
actually take work, like an assortment of stocks (chicken, beef, vegatable) and
sourdough starters, and if your are really fancy, custom vinegers, oils, and 
perhaps even your own wines and beers, which take time to prepare (just like 
the boot server took time to prepare).

Also, you will find that maybe four burners isn't enough, or one oven isn't 
enough, or your burners are wrong (since maybe what you really need is a 
grill).  You could install a second stand alone oven, or another stand alone
stovetop, and maybe purchase one of those george forman like grills, or you can
go for a more flexible and powerfull piece of machinery, the viking (or better
yet some brand that is just as good or better that looks even meaner and harder
to use).  But this also requires supporting equipment, like new cleaning 
supplies, more kitchen area, a massive amount of airflow, etc, kinda like 
getting a Cray or CM2 installed.

So, that is my overstretched analogie comparing cooking to computing.

BTW, SOAR is pretty cool, although there are some real idiots with recipies
posted to it.  Oh well.  The Joy of Cooking is also really good.

-- 
Joshua D. Boyd