September 1995 / 20th Anniversary

Message from the Editor in Chief BYTE's Illustrious Editorial Crew	This special report marks the culmination of BYTE's twentieth year of publishing. - by Raphael Needleman, Editor in Chief
Mile Markers During BYTE's 20-Year History Historical Highlights	We have indeed come a long way and have seen many changes both in the magazine and in the world during that time.
Weird Error Messages Weird Error Messages	Error messages weren't always instructional, informative, or helpful.
Top 20 Small Systems Five Peripherals the PC Revolution Couldn't Do Without Apple's 128k Mac It May Not Fly, But It Sure Took Off Osborne's Barely-There Monitor Clutter Could Be Apple III Sun's SPARCStation Radiant in '89 Compaq's Portable...Just The Lightweight TRS-80 100 An Overblown Calculator AT Architecture Lives On	From soldering irons to SparcStations, from MITS to Macintosh, personal computers have evolved from do-it-yourself kits for electronics hobbyists into machines that practically leap out of the box and set themselves up. What enabled them to get from there to here? Innovation and determination. Here are the top 20 systems that made that rapid evolution possible.
Most Important Software Products AutoCAD Brought Design to PCs VisiCalc Created Financial Frenzy The Original GUI Rising Above Other's Errors Too Little, Too Late CP/M Lives Tomorrow's Top Five Software Categories The 10 Most Important Programs of Today Award-Deserving Application Doom? Or just Doomed?	The 20-year story of personal computing often seems to be dominated by hardware. But it's the software that makes the hardware worth owning: Many early buyers of Apple IIs walked into stores and asked for the VisiCalc machine.
Most Important Chips A Calculator Microprocessor Run Amok The Chip That Launched 68000 Macintoshes From Humble Origins It didn't divide, but it conquered anyway	All the chips on this list, obscure as some are, had a significant influence on the evolution of personal computing. So what does it take to make a computer today? Mostly, it seems, acronyms: a CPU, some RAM, a handful of EPROMs, a DSP, and a PCI bus.
Most Important Networking Products & Standards U.B.: Hubba, Hubba, eh? Long before PCMCIA, Xircom was plugging portables into ethernet You'll Need a Princess to Find this Pea Irma Board: Made PCs Politically Correct Managing a Mess: HP's Openview Console Mosaic, the Fairy Godmother of the Internet Cool Today, Hot Tomorrow Zooming in the 90s	Twenty years ago, networks were three-letter corporations that owned television. Today, they are the fabric of our information society. Following are the products that form the woof and warp of this new world.
The Best Things On-Line Lycos Makes Searching the Internet Virtually Painless Shop the Internet for the Rare and Unusual You Don't Have to Go Out for Great Art Anymore Computerized Weather Forecasts	In 1975, the number of people going on-line was smaller than the membership of the Young Republicans for Captain Beefheart Fan Club. Now, those massive networks of computers and databases known as the on-line world have become an electronic extension of the traditional, off-line world.
Best Books & CD-ROMs Still Kiddering Around After All These Years Hackers What's In the Cuckoo's Nest? Now You Can Boldly Go An Old Highway Revisited	These are the books and CD-ROMs that have advanced the state of computing, that best chronicle the past two digital decades, and that manifest the innovative use of electronic publishing. Read on.
Remarkable Names of Real Computer Companies Slippery Disks Plaid Brothers Software Surfware, Inc.	Techie Founder Division PropellerHead Software Two Nerds and a Suit TechnoJock Software, Inc.
Most Important Companies Microsoft Rendered in Big Blue Lotus: Born of an Intellectual Stew Disney North Where Was That Again??	Which of the 5000 computer companies got us where we are today? Here are the top 20.
Top 20 Technologies P..C..Something-or-Another Parallel Processing No Stamp Required Collaboration Made Easier Next Computer: Next Step or Full Stop?	California garages again store cars and junk, not computer research labs as they did in the halcyon days of Woz and Jobs. Today, the myths may be tamer, but the pace of innovation hasn't changed. Here are the major technologies of the past 20 years.
Predictions for the Year 2000	On the "Killer App" "A `killer app' that takes over all of computerdom no longer exists, because computerdom is so big that even a large thing like the Web is still such a small pieceI think a killer application [today] is usually defined as something that takes a new configuration of hardware and makes it viable.
20 Worst Acronyms	A survey reveals the alphabetic combinations BYTE readers dread most. By far the most disliked is PCMCIA.
A Brief History of Programming Languages Her HindSight and ForeSight Were Both 20/20	We've come a long way from computers programmed with wires and punch cards. Maybe not as far as some would like, though. Here are the innovations in programming.
Notorious Bugs	Bugs in computer hardware and software are no more than the crystallization in silicon and plastic of the mental mistakes all people make. People are only human, after all, so computers can only reflect our own humanity.
Best Computer Shows From the Few Grew the Many	Of late, it seems many trade shows are more about chachkis than products or technologies. But that wasn't always the way
20 Contributions To Society Slow Business Is No Business Where Would Insider Trading Be Without Computers? Computerized Travel is Easier...Usually Computer s Can Help Military Spend More, Faster	Computers have changed our world. That's a tired cliche, but it's true. Perhaps no other instrument of the late twentieth century has had such a fundamental and pervasive impact on our everyday lives.
20 Most Important People This Father Deserves Respect Beyond LifeStyles of the Rich and Famous Steve's Still Working. What's Next?? The Original Plastic Surgeon Comprehensive Yet Simple The Reincarnation of Thomas Edison She'd Argue with St. Peter Himself A Renaissance Man A Salute to Major Postscript Has Come a Long Way from P.S. From Great Garage Guru to Philanthropist	Although computers are technology, they are created by people. And the people who create them are not just one-dimensional nerd s--in fact, their breadth fuels their innovation. These 20 people have made the greatest impact on microcomputing.
20 Spectacular Failures Only SuperMan Could Use This One Sad Lisa, Lisa. She's Down in the Dump. A New Chapter in Computing History Not Even Fresh Breath from This Bomb	Sometimes you get it; sometimes you don't. Why should computer companies be any different? There doesn't seem to be a single one that has the complete Midas touch.
Noted & Notorious Hacker Feats Not Even One Call Allowed No Harm Intended, No Foul?? A Joy for All Reasons	Hackerdom is divided into two parts: technologically adept and clever people, who could write a computer game in a night, and, sadly, irresponsible slimeballs, who hijack computer and phone systems for the heck of it. Here is a look at some of the amazing stunts that have been pulled by both hacker s and crackers.
Famous Vaporware Products	XANADU Ted Nelson Nelson first conceived his futuristic vision for hypertext way back in 1960; although his idea inspired countless products, Xanadu is still pending.
Top Garage Start-ups Celebrity Sights in Palo Alto	Some people store cars in garages, and some also store garden implements and the detritus of the past. Others start multimillion-dollar companies in them. Beats cleaning up oil stains.

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