Computers (2nd Reading)

While reading the second part of this book, I felt immediately more interested since this section is getting closer to the present day "personal home computer".  I was very surprised to learn that the Altair computer would not come already assembled or with a keyboard or mouse, etc.  This information proved to me how different the idea of "home computers" must have been in the beginning stages as opposed to now.  We live in a world today where most schools, offices, businesses, etc. all contain computers and rely on them for hundreds of different reasons, whether it be for communication, a program to organize transactions or for educational purposes.  The fact that now computers have basically made the telephone an obsolete appliance, one can only imagine how many are manufactured and sold these days throughout the world.  The combination of IBM and Microsoft was the first step forward in allowing computers to become what they have in the world today and this was recognized by Time Magazine in 1982, when they selected the computer as their "man of the year".  Personally, I have an Apple computer and since buying mine when I started college, I don't think I could ever own a PC by choice again.  I enjoyed reading about Steve Jobs' experience with creating his operating system.  Knowing that Engelbart invented the mouse and gave the technology demonstration known as the "mother of all demos", it was interesting to see how his team left him even though he had these brilliant ideas to start PARC.  Since I am a biased computer owner, I find it funny that Steve Jobs was the only person who wanted to keep Engelbart's ideas alive...and it paid off.