I can't believe how quiet this conference has become!

In an attempt to kick of a thread (however shortlived, =o) I
am going to pose a question:  What is your first memory of
using a computer?  Although this is the "Micro Computer"
conference, I don't think we're likely to swamp it even if
we include mention of minicomputers or other things.

I'm pretty sure the first computer I ever programmed
(possibly the first one I ever saw) was an Acorn BBC. It was
very common in Britain because it was used as part of a
government programme to get computers into schools... even
the tiny village school I went to.  The first machine I ever
actually owned was a Sinclair ZX81 (1Kb RAM, 5 chips -
inluding the Voltage regulator! =o)  I think they were sold
in the U.S. as the 'Timex 1000'.

So, share your reminiscences in an attempt to awaken this
conference!

21 responses total.

I first programmed a Datatron ("mainframe", if such a term can
apply compared to what is a mainframe today). My first personal
desktop was an XT (which had more power than that "mainframe"). 

First experience was either with the mainframes at UM Physics (thanks to a
friend with a professor for a dad), or with friend's Apple ][s.  Both were
about the same time, I think (same friends, mostly).  

Wow, another person who remembers the BBC Micro! :-) We still had a couple of
those in our primary school classroom in New Zealand (in the early 90's), along
with an Apple ][ and a Mac Classic. We played games on them and did Logo and
BASIC (we had a word-processing/desktop-publishing kind of program called Fleet
Street too but no printer...).

At home we had a Mac 512k, which I think was my dad's first computer. He used
to carry it back and forth from work every day, until they gave him an LC.

The high school's brand new TRS-80 Model I level I with all of 4K of memory.
I overflowed that memory with the first program I tried writing for it. It
was later replaced with a Model III with 16K.

Programs were saved to cassette tape; and you saved a program several times
on the tape if you wanted a good chance of getting it back into the computer.
A couple of years later I got a Model III, it being the only thing I was
familiar with at the time. I thought it a good deal to find memory for it at
a buck a kilobyte and filled out the rest of the Z80 address space.

A couple of people I knew had programmable calculators; but I never had one
in my hands long enough to do any programming until I got a TI98C while in
college.

Lessee . . . "Mainframe" experience started in late '74 or early '75, when
I got a research account on Michigan Tech's machine to teach myself Fortran.
Although I was impressed by the ads in Scientific American in '76, I never
actually saw one of those machines.  The first micro I actually used was
a Radio Shack model with cassette tape, on which I played Moon Lander (or was
it "Lunar Lander").  I think that was in '79, after I had learned the macro
language of the Wang System 30 word-processor.

I don't even want to THINK about the first "computer" that I used.  Suffice
it to say that a Texas Instrument SR-10 (Four banger w/o memory) calculator
was about $100 after about four years in college.  One class I was in had
a Bomar Brain chained to a bench that we could do calculations on.

That's the one my parents gave me as a high-school graduation present.  I
finally threw it way about two years ago (it hadn't worked for I don't how
long before that).

Seems to me my first computer experience was in '74 or thereabouts, on
a tabletop Olivetti Programma 101, with magnetic card reader, at my
high school. I was fortunate enough to get special permission to not
only look at it and touch it, but to program it, and experiment. It had
its own cryptic programming language, reminiscent of that used by my
HP28S calculator. It probably wouldn't count as much more than a low-end
pocket calculator nowadays, but at least it was programmable and could
save its programs to those cards.

Shortly after that, due to the help of my high school mathematics
teacher, I had the opportunity to test some BASIC code on the console
of what I suppose now was a mini (from what I could see of it--it was
an industrial computer that had been given by a corporation to a nearby
community college).  I'm happy to say that the program I wrote on a
piece of paper, without ever seeing the computer, ran sucessfully.  They
let me play a Lunar Lander game, so of course I was happy as all get
out.  Then it was off to college where I had the opportunity to deal
with teletypes and paper tape, punch cards, mainframes and VAX clusters.

The first computer that was mine all mine was my Apple IIe.  That was
somewhere around 1983.

My first programming experience was in a high-school programming class, around
1967.  Our actual on-line access was about 3 weeks' dialup access on a
timesharing system of some kind.  We could punch paper tapes while someone
else was using the dialup.  (The school had had a mini, rented, something like
a PDP-8 I think.  Some administrator said "Why are we paying rental on this
thing during the summer?  Send it back!", not realizing that we couldn't
instantly get it back at the beginning of the school year.  This was rectified
by the *next* year.)

Re #3: I just had a look through an Acorn BBC user guide
  (downloaded in RTF) and it's clear that even Acorn's 8-bit
  machines were years ahead of their time.

Re #8: Were the mag cards about the same size as common IBM
  style punched cards?

I'm enjoying reading about everyone's early experiences,
they're certainly diverse!!

In 1972 they had an IBM System 3 at Hillsdale College.  It was as big as a
mainframe (I guess it sort of *was* :-) but it mainly ran a BASIC interpreter.
It had a keyboard and a wide (line printer paper) dot matrix printer as its
console.  It became known as "The Red Baron" (but it was all gray! :-)
It had a 1000-line limit for BASIC programs.  I wrote some pretty groovy (and 
sphagetti) programs for it, at the tender age of 15, such as a randomized
football game and a basketball game.  I kept some of our high school sports
teams' stats in it.  Man, those were the days!  :-)  I even programmed an
"auto movie trailer" program, straight out of MAD magazine.

*sigh* I seem to have missed out on a lot of computing history. I was born
in '82, so i don't remember computers before 86. I think the BBC was filling
up my first school, but can't remember... - the first computer i used alot
was a friend's Amiga, but we didn't program on that. The first computer i had
was a 286. I ust've got that in year 5? (9/10 yrs old... about '91?). I
started coding in PASCAL at the age of 12. I don't know what made me keep at
it. What's the fun in programming no graphics apps, that do almost nothing??!
I was definately a freaky kid :-) - i didn't know anyone else who programmed.
Although we all seemed to complete SQ1 at the same time :) My 286 died when
i was using MS Flight Sim 4 :-) - i don't think it could handle it... anyway
- i know that my reminices is fairly "modern" compared to those of u who used
"IBM System 3" whatever that is. + I feel i missed out with the ZX81 or
whatever... i'm making it up in Electronics - coding a 6502 in machine code
MORE than makes up for that... :-) where would anyone get one of those old
computers from (eg the 81 etc?) - in 10 years time they'll probably be worth
more, as they become collectors items...
from Lionfish
,

Hey, Pascal is *still* the best language I ever programmed in!  :-)

I used to run Flight Sim 4 on an XT.  I couldn't believe the nice frame rate
the first time I ran it on a 286. ;>

(Interestingly, FS4's physics model was better than FS5's in many ways. 
Don't know how FS2000 compares.)

Fortran, punch cards, IBM 360 I think it was called, Rose Poly, 1968.

Like Dave, in 1967 our high school taught computer program (Fortran) without
owning a computer.  We would type our programs on punch tape and send them
to the other high school where th computer was (I never saw it).  The next
computer I used took a punch card (yes, ONE punch card).  A Wang, size of a
small toaster.  I met Mr. Wang because his daughter was in the summer class
that I helped teach (biochem).  At college, in chem lab, we got to write an
analysis program that used several punch cards.  At U of M (early 80s) we also
used punch cards at the computer center, handed in a stack of them (after
repunching any with errors) and waited a few hours for the program to run and
print out.  Pascal.  By 1985 I owned a computer (Zenith, 2 floppy, no slots)
which I upgraded two years ago.  It still ran all my software, slowly.  

You lived in Massachusetts, Sindi?

I grew up in Dorchester and went to Girls' Latin School and then moved to a
rich suburb where the school system owned a computer.

Cindy grew up in Canton and North Andover.  We met when I was recruiting
for the Marines in Lawrence.

Woohoo!  Someone gave me a Tandy MC-10 'Micro CoCo'! =o)

...and it works! =o)

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