by Steven Noble

from the February 1997 issue of Australian MacUser magazine

Apple computer has bought NeXT Software, and is going to use that company’s high-perfor­mance operating system (OS) NeXTstep as the basis of the next major revision of the Mac OS - code-named Rhapsody. This is good news, because NeXTstep has many of the fea­tures that bring speed, stability and strength to next-generation operating systems, including protected memory, preemptive multitasking, and a modern vir­tual memory system.

from the June 1, 1987 issue of MacWEEK

by John Markoff

Apple Computer Inc.’s next generation of computers may be based on a radically new microprocessor architecture that could improve performance dramatically over today’s Macintosh designs.

Such computers would be built around microprocessors combining elements of both Reduced Instruction Set Computer (RISC) and multiprocessor design onto a single silicon chip. Apple’s advanced development team is now at work using its Cray XMP supercomputer to simulate the design of the new chips.

from the May/June 1984 issue of Two/Sisteen magazine

by Bro. Gary Eck, S.M.

Since its introduction, very little has been published to describe the use of ARCNET in concrete situations. This article describes the experiences of one ARCNET installation.

A giant of a computer system lies hidden in the Radio Shack product line. Based on the Model II and Model 12 workhorse computers, the ARCNET system allows for the linkingof many computers into a powerful, effective local area network system. Actually, ARCNET provides an efficient way of linking many more computers than XENIX.

by Howard Baldwin

RUNS BEOS ON INTEL AS NEW APPS ARE UNVEILED

from the November 1997 issue of MacWorld magazine

As Apple celebrates strong sales of Mac OS 8, Be (650/462-4100, www.be.com), developer of one of the oter operating systems for PowerPC CPUs, continues to bop along with new releases of its software.

In July, the company shipped its BeOS Preview Release for PowerPC, followed by an update that adds AppleTalk printing and improves video drivers and IDE support. Hedging its processor bets, Be also demonstrated its BeOS running on a dual-Pentium II PC at an August developer conference held on the eve of Macworld Expo in Boston.

from the July 1985 issue of Unix World magazine

by David Spencer

Current third-generation languages such as C and FORTRAN will have to move aside at some point for a new family of fourth-generation languages.

At 30 years old, FORTRAN is graying at the temples; third-generation programming languages are in their heyday. So you are probably wondering how we will speak to computers during the next decade. If current projections hold true, computers will seem (and talk) more like us fairly soon. In order for that to happen, however, current third-generation computer languages (such as C and fortran) will have to move aside for a new family of fourth-generation languages.

by Judy Getts

from the June 1987 issue of Computer Language

Chuck Duff is the kind of man you’d expect to run into early in the morning in a university coffee shop, styrofoam cup in hand, talking Hegel with a student.

You’d expect to see him in an art gallery rambling between the neoclassicists and linear chromatists, keen-eyed and at home, or even face-to-face in a folk-jazz cafe if you motioned the waitress aside and asked who is the James Beard behind the watercress crepes.

by Dixon P. Otto

from the April 1983 issue of TODAY magazine

“I had no intention of doing anything with computers again,” says Neale Bartter of Wooster, Ohio, reflecting on the time in 1974 when he gave up a computer career for farming.

“Now I spend most of my time in here with the computer,” he says from the office of his turn-of-the-century home. He nodded towards the micro sitting on the desk next to him. Another sets on the dining room table in the next room, looking a bit incongruous amid the early American furniture. Others now run the farm while he concentrates on a new business: Creating computers systems and software for farmers.

by David A. Bright

from the July 1983 issue of Mini-Micro Systems magazine

Franklin Computer Corp., once considered just another Apple Computer Inc. clone, is being closely monitored by the personal computer industry as it begins to move away from Apple’s shadow. With the hiring last spring of several key research and development personnel, Franklin has indicated that it intends to become a major independent personal computer supplier.

Franklin’s first big move was hiring Avram Miller, former manager of Digital Equipment Corp.’s Professional computer program, as executive vice president of manufacturing and engineering. A month after Miller arrived, he lured William L. Sydnes away from his position as development manager for the Personal Computer at IBM Corp. Sydnes was rumored to be working on the low-end Peanut model. He assumes the post of vice president of engineering at Franklin. Miller is confident that Sydnes will build an engineering organization at Franklin that will be “second to none." He says Sydnes has a proven track record in developing superior products on tight schedules.

Notes from the underground

by Doug Merritt with Ken Arnold and Bob Toxen

from the January 1985 issue of Unix Review magazine

It was 2 am and I was lying face down on the floor in Cory Hall, the EECS building on the UC Berkeley campus, waiting for Bob to finish installing our bootleg copy of the UNIX kernel. If successful, new and improved terminal drivers we had written would soon be up and running.

from the December 1962 issue of Computers and Automation

A thoughtful and interesting look into the role of computers in the literature of fantasy and science fiction.

Marcia Ascher
Asst. Prof. of Math. and Physics
Ithaca College
Ithaca, N. Y.

An editorial in a local newspaper (1) stated: “We are just at the beginning of the computer age. Who (but a science fiction writer) would venture to predict what lies ahead?” Although science fiction does provide fictitious views of computers of the future, its greater value lies in its concern for the social and moral aspects of technological innovations. It frequently functions as “a means of dramatizing social inquiry, as providing a fictional mode in which cultural tendencies can be isolated and judged.” (2) An examination is undertaken here of the science fiction stories that concern computers; and the themes of these stories are identified and discussed.