Remember life before computers

I spent pretty much my entire working life "fixing" computers. Back in the '60's, it was mostly punched card machines. Then, large mainframes began to emerge...some of which occupied more space than a house. Then, by the time I retired, the size of those huge units was reduced to little more than a stack of PC's. Today, there are laptops that can process more data, and faster, than some of what I worked on.

If things have changed this much in the past 50 years, I can hardly imagine what will be available by the year 2100.
 
squatting dog said:

Remember life before computers?​

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Barely, LOL. Actually computers have been around all my life, and since my father was an electrical engineer who worked with them I did hear about computers a lot. However it was not until my 20s that I actually saw one... My first experience using one was with cards, don't see those much anymore.

Danny Dunn and the Homework Machine was a favorite book when I was a kid. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danny_Dunn_and_the_Homework_Machine
 
Tom 86 said:
I used pencils & the old non-electric typewriters when in school. They had something in the office that you could make many copies of by cranking that machine. I know the liquid would make you high if you breathed it too long.
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Yep. Me too. Do you remember what WPM meant?
 
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Tom 86 said:
I used pencils & the old non-electric typewriters when in school. They had something in the office that you could make many copies of by cranking that machine. I know the liquid would make you high if you breathed it too long.
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Yes that was one of my most tedious jobs as an office junior...

I remember in our office it was a Roneo machine , and I used to have to churn out hundreds of copies of papers.. and the smell of that ink..*ugh*...

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I worked for a Ford dealership when computers first came out. My boss was very wary of them and we did not change until Ford made us do it. My boss was still wary and made me keep two sets of books for 3 months. One was our old hand way and the other was the computer. At the end of the 3 months the difference was 10 cents! So finally we could do the computer for good. I was so happy with that!! Don't even ask me what we went through using a fax machine for the first week!!!
 
The company I worked for as an Office junior after leaving school, had One Computer ..... and it was so huge it took up the whole of one room...:ROFLMAO:

I worked as a junior for a punch card Operating room..similar to this but with 50 operators.. all going at once..

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I was a general dogsbody to them, and to the guys in the print room, and to the boss upstairs.. and I'd have to take over the telephone reception when our receptionist was at lunch...

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this was the same model and colour as the desktop switchboard I operated as a junior
 
Tom 86 said:
I used pencils & the old non-electric typewriters when in school. They had something in the office that you could make many copies of by cranking that machine. I know the liquid would make you high if you breathed it too long.
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In school I had a pencil box and sharpener, in the older grades I had a fountain pen. At home we just had a regular typewriter, Royal, I believe.
 


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