What Would Frank Wood Do
What Would Frank Wood Do
Frank Wood has left the building, I hear.
Frank was an engineer for the BBC, starting sometime in the mid sixties, I believe. He was known to wax eloquently and at length about the wonders of Kudelski's Nagra III, or Strand's Patt. 743 fresnels, and the necessity of proper balancing, isolation, and earthing of signal cables of all kinds. He was also wont to express bafflement concerning US electrical codes and configuration. That did not, however, stop him from offering insight and advice about such, even when it was frequently wrong (sometimes dangerously so), or off-topic.
I "met" Frank on Usenet, first on RATS (rec.arts.theatre.stagecraft) and then the SML (stagecraft mailing list). Frank had his own ideas about how the internet should work, and was famous for replying to digest posts, and refusing to properly trim replies, among other things.
Discussions about Frank's knowledge (and lack thereof) ranked high on the Persistent Recurring Thread list. Even Frank's most vociferous critics admitted the man knew quite a bit. They just wanted him to keep quiet when he didn't know something (including a marked inattention to what the actual topic of conversation was about). Frank could not care less.
Other Persistently Recurring Threads involved Beer & BBQ, of which he had little or no opinion. He was known to favor cigars, wine, and whisky. His doctor suggested he cut back. Frank asked if doing so would improve his health. The doctor said no. Frank said, "I propose to enjoy the years that remain to me, as best as I can. Cigars, beer, wine and whisky help me do that, as does my substantial library and The Times Crossword." He admitted to keeping "cooking" whisky by the keyboard of the computer, and the "better stuff" upstairs.
He was the epitome of a fussbudgetty Old School engineer, one of the Beeb's oldest and most experienced at the time he was made redundant and took early retirement (at least, according to him). He often lamented the loss of technological institutional memory at the BBC, and remarked that he would have been happiest to have been put in charge of a technology museum there.
When people mentioned problems with modern software (looking for solutions or workarounds), he would rattle on about editing AutoCAD files with a text editor, or building computers from scratch, before one could buy an Amstrad with 640 KB of memory. Not at all helpful, but entertaining, up to a point.
When that point was passed, certain list members would excoriate him in detail and great length, and then depart the list, or build a kill file.
Sometimes, Frank would disappear from view, even when folks would dangle bits of his favorite dead horses for him to beat... Folks would wonder if he had finally breathed his last, only to find out he had been wandering off to Italy, or France, places where computer access was simply Not Done.
In early May of this year, Frank Wood passed away, after a short illness. His widow said, "He enjoyed the list very much and I know he sometimes enjoyed being controversial."
I seem to remember that Frank got into a tussle with someone on the list (maybe bigclivedotcom?) who (incorrectly) addressed him as Frank Woods.
Frank replied: "Well, to start with, you could get my name right. I am singular, not plural."
The reply was: "Yes. How LUCKY we all are. :)"
Frank was, indeed, a singular individual. Those that met him in person were glad to have done so, I hear. He may have expressed his irascibility most completely on the Internet, not an uncommon thing, I suppose.
He will be missed.
Frank Wood has left the building, I hear.
Frank was an engineer for the BBC, starting sometime in the mid sixties, I believe. He was known to wax eloquently and at length about the wonders of Kudelski's Nagra III, or Strand's Patt. 743 fresnels, and the necessity of proper balancing, isolation, and earthing of signal cables of all kinds. He was also wont to express bafflement concerning US electrical codes and configuration. That did not, however, stop him from offering insight and advice about such, even when it was frequently wrong (sometimes dangerously so), or off-topic.
I "met" Frank on Usenet, first on RATS (rec.arts.theatre.stagecraft) and then the SML (stagecraft mailing list). Frank had his own ideas about how the internet should work, and was famous for replying to digest posts, and refusing to properly trim replies, among other things.
Discussions about Frank's knowledge (and lack thereof) ranked high on the Persistent Recurring Thread list. Even Frank's most vociferous critics admitted the man knew quite a bit. They just wanted him to keep quiet when he didn't know something (including a marked inattention to what the actual topic of conversation was about). Frank could not care less.
Other Persistently Recurring Threads involved Beer & BBQ, of which he had little or no opinion. He was known to favor cigars, wine, and whisky. His doctor suggested he cut back. Frank asked if doing so would improve his health. The doctor said no. Frank said, "I propose to enjoy the years that remain to me, as best as I can. Cigars, beer, wine and whisky help me do that, as does my substantial library and The Times Crossword." He admitted to keeping "cooking" whisky by the keyboard of the computer, and the "better stuff" upstairs.
He was the epitome of a fussbudgetty Old School engineer, one of the Beeb's oldest and most experienced at the time he was made redundant and took early retirement (at least, according to him). He often lamented the loss of technological institutional memory at the BBC, and remarked that he would have been happiest to have been put in charge of a technology museum there.
When people mentioned problems with modern software (looking for solutions or workarounds), he would rattle on about editing AutoCAD files with a text editor, or building computers from scratch, before one could buy an Amstrad with 640 KB of memory. Not at all helpful, but entertaining, up to a point.
When that point was passed, certain list members would excoriate him in detail and great length, and then depart the list, or build a kill file.
Sometimes, Frank would disappear from view, even when folks would dangle bits of his favorite dead horses for him to beat... Folks would wonder if he had finally breathed his last, only to find out he had been wandering off to Italy, or France, places where computer access was simply Not Done.
In early May of this year, Frank Wood passed away, after a short illness. His widow said, "He enjoyed the list very much and I know he sometimes enjoyed being controversial."
I seem to remember that Frank got into a tussle with someone on the list (maybe bigclivedotcom?) who (incorrectly) addressed him as Frank Woods.
Frank replied: "Well, to start with, you could get my name right. I am singular, not plural."
The reply was: "Yes. How LUCKY we all are. :)"
Frank was, indeed, a singular individual. Those that met him in person were glad to have done so, I hear. He may have expressed his irascibility most completely on the Internet, not an uncommon thing, I suppose.
He will be missed.
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