Kids React to Old Computer

Mr. Analog · June 20, 2014, 09:48:53 AM

Haha, the reactions!
http://youtu.be/PF7EpEnglgk

I remember writing BASIC programs on the old Apple ][ in elementary school, even now looking back and seeing all the hoops again seems absurd

Tom · June 20, 2014, 10:05:50 AM

"I don't get this... I also don't get the 1970s"

I don't think anyone does....

"the whole thing is boring"

I'm not sure I can disagree...

Mr. Analog · June 20, 2014, 10:09:40 AM

Quote from: Tom on June 20, 2014, 10:05:50 AM
"I don't get this... I also don't get the 1970s"

I don't think anyone does....

Hahaha

Tom · June 20, 2014, 10:11:49 AM

That was great

Those kids are actually pretty smart.

Mr. Analog · June 20, 2014, 10:16:13 AM

Quote from: Tom on June 20, 2014, 10:11:49 AM
That was great Those kids are actually pretty smart.

I watched the one with the cassette player recently as well, that was good too.

Having a kid look at a cassette and not know what it is made me flinch a bit haha

Tom · June 20, 2014, 10:18:02 AM

Quote from: Mr. Analog on June 20, 2014, 10:16:13 AM
Quote from: Tom on June 20, 2014, 10:11:49 AM
That was great Those kids are actually pretty smart.

I watched the one with the cassette player recently as well, that was good too.

Having a kid look at a cassette and not know what it is made me flinch a bit haha

Hand them a reel next

Mr. Analog · June 20, 2014, 10:27:07 AM

Oddly enough I think a 1/4" reel might be easier to figure out since there's only one possible way to thread it

...then again if you don't know what it's supposed to do it would be harder.

Darren Dirt · June 20, 2014, 02:25:51 PM

Quote from: Mr. Analog on June 20, 2014, 09:48:53 AM
Haha, the reactions!
http://youtu.be/PF7EpEnglgk

I remember writing BASIC programs on the old Apple ][ in elementary school, even now looking back and seeing all the hoops again seems absurd

Makes me think of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LoadingReadyRun

And also typing in stuff character-by-character from Compute! Magazine

I miss "Mindbusters" (and other stuff that once me and my brother typed it in we actually HAD FUN PLAYING for like a whole weekend -- FOR FREE!)

...whereas the ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE code (like "Demons of Osiris*", yeah I remember that specific game too) was WAY less fun typing THAT stuff in; sometimes the games were worth it though.

* Frightening Flashback mixed with modern-day awareness: LINE 17 thru LINE 50 = Hory Clap, kinda impressive way for THE CODE ITSELF to have its own built-in delay while it waited for the rest of the data to load into the machine's MEMORY!

Mr. Analog · June 20, 2014, 02:56:10 PM

I remember my A drive had AppleWorks in it almost all the time and the B drive was strictly document storage, one o' them SUPER FANCY 3?-inch drives WooOOooOOooh!

I loved AppleWorks... the Word Processor had Database support (which may explain a few things actually :? )

It's funny too because when I graduated to the Mac Powerbook in 1990 I never really looked back at APPLE BASIC and never became versed in DOS until 1997 (for networking class hah!!). ClarisWorks was AMAZING too, being able to integrate the database with spreadsheets was like some kind of magical thing. I think I still have printouts of comic / card checklists I used to store... it's funny to think I was writing queries to keep track of my collections without really understanding what a database was or how a query actually worked. I just trial and error'd it until I got what I wanted.

Oddly it wasn't until I became a professional programmer that I got really heavy into scripting .BAT files and things like that, it's funny how you go full circle sometimes. I kind of like a hybrid GUI that lets me jump into an input window and get what I want from Windows without jumping through a bunch of GUI...

Mr. Analog · June 20, 2014, 02:58:26 PM

ALSO NOT TO NERD OUT but remember word processor character combinations that instructed the printer to indent/tab or line feed etc?

There was no actual visible "tab" in the wp content and you had to add something like .:t and it would tab in the printed output

HOW DID WE SURVIVE!?

Lazybones · June 20, 2014, 03:33:34 PM

Quote from: Mr. Analog on June 20, 2014, 02:58:26 PM
ALSO NOT TO NERD OUT but remember word processor character combinations that instructed the printer to indent/tab or line feed etc?

There was no actual visible "tab" in the wp content and you had to add something like .:t and it would tab in the printed output

HOW DID WE SURVIVE!?

How about that big sheet of commands everyone had over the F keys to run word perfect?

Mr. Analog · June 20, 2014, 03:36:28 PM

OH MAN yes!

One thing I liked about getting into computers when I did was you got a lot of material that helped you understand how to use the application in the context it was used in.

Mind you this was back in the day when function / option keys weren't multi-layered between apps and OS haha