In 1976, the technical genius of Steve Wozniak, coupled with the packaging and marketing vision of Steve Jobs, created the bare-bones 6502-based Apple I. Dr. Dobb's Journal of Computer Calisthenics and Orthodontia -- Running Light Without Overbyte published its first issue. The first microcomputer conference convened (it was for Altair users, and it was held in New Mexico). Shugart announced the 5.25" "Minifloppy; you could buy one for just $390.
Within the pages of BYTE, expensive memory made "How To Save Bytes" a hot topic. The magazine attempted social commentary with "Could A Computer Take Over?" Technologies that still are considered state-of-the-art today where just coming alive then, as in "The Time Has Come To Talk," an early discussion of speech synthesis. But BYTE was mostly about very hard-core homebrewing, as exemplified by articles such as "Coincident Current Ferrite Core Memories."
1977 In 1977, the original Star Wars movie opened; Elvis died; and Voyager 2 was launched on a "Grand Tour" of the outer solar system.
Byte carried the world's first coverage of the Commodore PET, and Steve Wozniak wrote a feature article describing the Apple I. Tiny BASIC was hot, and the first computer game coverage appeared (NIM, Othello), but it was still a hardware-centric magazine with articles such as "Build the 'Coffee Can Special' EPROM Eraser." The Apple II and the TRS-80 soon arrived; Ohio Scientific Instruments offered the first microcomputer with Microsoft floating-point BASIC in ROM; Gary Kildall developed CP/M, the OS the will drive the first generation of true PCs; and Heathkit started selling an 8080-based computer kit that you operated via an octal front-panel keypad. (User friendly, not.)
Extending Enterprise Value with Web 2.0 In this webcast we will talk about how to simply build and quickly remix Web 2.0 applications and the role of the IT department and how they support mashups. We will discuss how IBM can help IT teams adapt existing enterprise systems as well as develop unique ones that can support end user driven mashups in a reliable, scalable and secure way. We will highlight a simple scenario adapting an enterprise information source for mashups and how to test it. We will also cover how IBM can help you build agile, fast and simple web applications based on dynamic scripting languages that dramatically reduces development time. Wednesday, September 24, 2008 - 12pm PT / 3pm ET
2008 International Mathematica Conference Dr. Dobb's interviews Wolfram Research's Theo Gray, co-founder and Director of User Interfaces, and Roger Germundsson, Director of Research and Development, about the upcoming 2008 International
Mathematica Conference.
In this volume of Best of BYTE, we explore the emergence of some heuristic algorithms. Although we have only scratched the surface of this intriguing subject, we hope we've suggested the potential of the synthesis of heuristics and algorithms.
