Groovy hepcat Ant was jivin' in comp.sys.apple2 on Fri, 24 Sep 2021
02:59 pm. It's a cool scene! Dig it.
During my days, they were required during middle/junior high schools.
I had an awesome teacher (Mr. Mangel -- no idea if he is still alive
today since I couldn't find him online) in sixth and junior
high/middle school days with his Apple 2s. He taught classes on how to
use computers, softwares, hardwares, LOGO (even used a wired robot
turtle that plotted on giant floor papers), edutainments, etc.
My loving folks bought a family Apple //c. I bought and used the newer
LOGO versions, Dazzle Draw, programmed in BASIC, played too many games
and edutainment (was I really learning? :P), etc.
What about the rest of you? Thank you for reading and hopefully
answering. :)
My first foray into the world of computers was in the early '80s in
science class at school. The lab had TRS-80s. I can't recall which
model - probably I or II. In year 7 (grade 7 to you North American
types) we weren't allowed to touch them, but in year 8 some of us were
lucky enough to be plonked in front of a computer with a lame, crappy
tutorial program that failed to properly explain how BASIC worked.
Still, I knew then that I was destined to be a compunerd forever!
A year or two later I changed schools. The new school had a
Micromation with 4 dumb terminals and two 8' floppy drives, some Apple
IIes and the maths teacher's IBM PC (WOWEE!) Only the very lucky few
(ie. not me :( ) got access to the PC. I always seemed to be stuck on
the Micromation. This machine had an irksome (for me) little quirk.
Some of the trouble making students on the other terminals would send irritating messages to my terminal, interrupting my work. I was there
to learn about computers and junk. They were only there to piss-fart
around, thinking computer class was just a goof-off session.
Unfortunately, no matter how I begged, my parents wouldn't buy me a
computer. And saving for one would've taken me 350 years on the piddly allowance they gave me. I would've been pickled tink with any brand,
any model, anything. Just so I could learn to program. But no dice!
Thanks for nothing, Mum & Dad!
In the late '80s I did buy my first computer with my first dole
cheque. It was a Sharp PC-1248 pocket computer. This thing has no known
uses! It can only be programmed in BASIC (which, by this stage, I had
come to truly hate), and a rather lame and pissy version of BASIC at
that.
In the '90s Mum had an Apple IIc for when she brought work home. When
she got a PC a year or so later, she gave me the Apple for Xmas or
B'day (I don't remember which). I'm still learning on that Apple (as
well as a host of other machines). Cool! And now I'd kill for that ol' Micromation. :)
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