[vcf-midatlantic] Pick 34)-ish

[Douglas Crawford]

On 3/1/2016 9:10 PM, whitneys via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
> My two cents' worth. Flying Eagle cents, mind you.
>
> The History
> Micro-Computer Predecessors: The Terminal & The Calculator 
>     Datapoint 2200 aut al.    HP-85  eg.
> The Kit    Scelbi-8H    Mark-8
> The Altair/The S-100 aka Attack of the Clones    MITS Altair 8800 
>     IMSAI 8080
> The Single Board Computer    Apple 1    Other SBC/Trainer
> Heathkit    Heathkit H-8    H89/Z-100
> You Oughtta be in Cases/The '77 Trinity    Processor Tech SOL-20    
> Apple II
> The '77 Trinity/Follow-On    TRS-80 Model 1    CoCo or other TRS
> The '77 Trinity/Follow-On    Commodore PET    VIC-20/C64/C128 (space 
> avail.)
> The '77 Trinity/Return of the Clones    Apple II (see above) Franklin 
> Clone
> Atari! aka Is My Game Console a Computer?    Atari 800    ?
> The PC/Revenge of the Clones    IBM 5150 PC    Compaq Portable
> The PCjr/Son of the Clones    PC Jr.    Tandy 1000
> Now GUIer than ever    Apple Lisa    Apple Mac 128K/GEOS/GEM/HP 
> NewWave/Windows 1-3 etc.
>
> The Shape of Things to Come (see also You Oughtta be in Cases)
> The Suitcase Portable    IBM 5100    Osborne
> The Pocket/Handheld Computers    Tandy Model 100 eg.     Epson HX-20 eg.
> Lap-Top Computers    Grid Compass    Data General One eg.
>
> Somehow address foreign developments, which ran in parallel, but 
> dominated in Europe & Japan respectively
> International    MSX
> BLs    BBC Master/Sinclair ZX/Amstrad/non-BBC Acorn
> Toyotas    Hitachi MB/Fujitsu FM/NEC PC-88/NEC PC-98(APC III) also 
> Sony, Sharp systems
> Citroens    Thomson/Oric
>
> The Finale
> The Last Gasp of the Independents    Commodore Amiga/Atari ST/Acorn 
> Archimedes/Sharp X68000/Fujitsu FM Towns/NeXT/Sinclair QL
> Day of the Clones aka Clone World /The Survivor aka Once and Future 
> King    The Compaq '386    Late model Mac
>
>
> Some Notes:
> This list is not intended to strictly reflect VCFed possession (I'm 
> not sure what's in there), but also my estimation of significance to 
> the story of Microcomputer history.
> I probably missed some things too. Especially kits, foreign systems, 
> and foreign kit systems.
> I identified some themes, already implied by Evans' and others' 
> choices. Mabye they'd make OK info card headings.
> Word processor unit removed, as addressing that market should reflect 
> some diversity of the systems (Wang, Vydec, Sony etc). Also needs more 
> space.
> Have to trim anything that was merely sentimental, popular, or cool, 
> or just available in collection for:
> Technical Innovation, Market Significance, and Historical Narrative.
>
> For instance the Franklin has to go in-- it made ROM copyrightable, if 
> not on purpose.
> Compaq's 386, beating IBM to the punch, signified more than any other 
> system that the Clones had bested IBM, and would come to dominate.
> I think the PCjr line can go, but I wanted to make another silly 
> sequel reference.
> I believe first Fujitsu then the PC-88 were the real dominant market 
> players in Japan; BBC Master was the Apple II of England (fondly 
> remembered school computer), ZX and MSX the real international 
> players, France's never went EU wide.
> That's five international picks of what I feel should be six or eight. 
> Six would add up to 40 systems total picked above, which it seems is 
> the 20-rack goal, including both shelf levels.
>
> This eludes the history of the midrange/workstation, which gets 
> micro-ed on the inside and out beginning around 1981.
>
> I left two gaps, in as much as I used the Apple II twice and used one 
> Atari only.
> Systems separated by slashes meant to indicate either/or, as space 
> dictates.
> I tried to be as ruthless as possible-- I think no platform got more 
> than 2 machines. Despite my predilection for macs, I think you can 
> tell the story with just one (and the LISA) and not even a significant 
> one (the 128k). The early interface is too alike the LISA's to 
> demonstrate/differentiate well to the layman.
> I confess a soft spot for the Archimedes as we're all running way more 
> ARMs than any other processor these days.
>
> Kudos to anyone who appreciates my stupid Movie/Car refs/Old-Fashioned 
> Hyphen-ization.
> I hope I didn't do anything improper with the line breaks.

Nice.
Quite complete picture there of the progression of machines introduces.

Add IBM 5100 (which we have) in the early years.  (Evan is probably way 
ahead of me here)

I particularly like the point of the IBM PC emergence- the fight of the 
z80 / 8088,  CP/M vs DOS, and the machines
that straddled the two running both processors and both OSs. Which way 
is it going to go!?  Kildall or Gates?
Love the drama of that part.  We had a lot of that represented before in 
our business micro room.
I used to talk it up a lot in the museum tours.

Q: Will the "over and under" exhibits both be operable?

I find the early Unix experiments - particularly TRS-80 microsoft's 
attempt with  Xenix .
Not sure we have a Model 12 or 16 though.
Signficant cause Microsoft perhaps could have had the scene that Linux 
occupied if they if they stuck with it
and played it right.  Even the Mac ended up sitting on top of Unix.

Or is some application oriented history in order- sort of like exhibits 
at VCF- ie: what did desktop publishing look
like on C64, MAC, PC in their early incarnations? Show them.   Or cough 
cough ... early spreadsheets... :)