Computer book required

10 March 2014

I don’t read enough. I bought 3 novels a few months ago with the intention of making time. Of course it didn’t work! To help speed things along I’m thinking of narrowing my focus somewhat - to something I’m certain can start this process off. At the dawn of the UK’s home computer revolution I bought a book about computers.

A key phrase from it still resonates: something like “computers are fast rule following idiots”, then the obligatory “garbage in equals garbage out.” It seems that those words are both truer than ever and at the same time subject to disproval based on what we see every day. But that’s a topic for another time…

I’d like to re-acquire a copy of the book.

A quick trawl through the histories of various computers and computer companies from that era indicates a publishing date after 1977, and before 1982. It’s a fairly big window given the massive progress being made at that time, so how can I be sure?

Well, 1977 as I’m certain the Tandy TRS-80 was mentioned in the book, as was the Apple ][. 1982 because when my first computer (a 1K RAM Sinclair ZX81) arrived my focus narrowed from the previous theoretical ‘what if’ to the more practical ‘eeek, what now?!’

I wonder, can you help me find it?

Some help:

• It’s heavily slanted towards the U.S., relating to both that country’s computing history and its then-contemporary devices. That’s not surprising.
• It has a picture or a photo of a computer on the front.
• The colour beige or orange features predominantly on the cover.
• it’s the same size as a thick novel.
• Er… I know it’s not much help!

So, how about it? Have you got what this quest needs?