The Datamaster system/23, with model number 5110, is designed by IBM engineers.

David J. Bradley, Dennis Gibbs a.o. wrote the operating system for it. System 23 had two 8 inch diskettes, a video screen, and a keyboard integrated into one single case. The experience gained with this project proved to be of great importance for the development of the PC in 1980.

Personal Software released VisiCalc for the Apple II and sells it for U$100.

Dan Bricklin and Bob Frankston (USA) develop the first commercial spreadsheet: 'VisiCalc'. The first "useful" (read business type) program for Personal Computers. Of which the next year 900.000 copies will be sold and distributed by Software Ants. Initially available only for Apple II, the program was an instant success.

This combination pushed the sales of the Apple II sky high. A perfect combination and though the Apple II was expensive, the software made it worthwhile.

frankston and bricklin

Dan Bricklin showing VisiCalc on the computer fair to a selected public

In May Sofware Arts demonstrated VisiCalc at the 4th Westcoast Computer Fair.

1979

Microsoft develops a database, an electronic file system

Oracle introduces the first commercial SQL relational database management system.

Texas Instruments introduces the TI 99/4 (not the 4A) for an initial price of US$ 1500.

picture: courtesy www.silicon.org (6)

It uses the TI 9940 16 bits processor. This is another example of a high tech innovation that is too expensive to become a success. But TI refuses to bring down the price, instead started to develop the 99/4A a cheaper model.

Motorola introduces the powerful 16bit 6800 chip which operates internally with 32bit registers.

This processor is used in graphical orientated computers.

Intel introduces the 8088 which uses a 8 bit data bus, but inside still operates on a 16 bit architecture.

picture courtesy Intel

The development makes the acceptance of the 8086/8087 easier because they can be used on the much cheaper 8bit versions. This chip will form the basis of the IBM PC.

Sinclair Research introduces the ZX80 on the market.

The machine has 1 Kb of memory, 3.25 MHz clock speed, weighs under 300 grams and sells for a relatively very low price. The system uses music cassettes to store data and memory can be expanded up to 16Kbyte. Equipped with an on board BASIC the computer can be directly connected to your television. The keyboard is made from foil contacts with a slightly rugged surface. By pressing the foil which covered the entire "keyboard" surface a contact is closed that is surface mounted right on the PCB. No mechanical parts are present. (1)
While te machine can not display images during calculating or storing / loading data the screen is blanked out during that process.

In this year two games are introduced: Space Invaders and Pacman.

space invaders & pacman

In the game Space Invaders the earth is under attack by aliens and you have to safe the planet. At first this game was only introduced in amusement arcades but later on it will become available at all kinds of computers even programmers will make this game available on mainframes.
In the game Pacman you have to eat as many dots as possible before you get caught by ghosts. Both games will last for decades in different versions, and gain eternal fame.

MicroPro, founded by Rob Barnaby and Seymon Rubenstein, develop the program WordStar.

This program will become the most widely spread word processor in this decade. It is written by Rob Barnaby and made available for Intel 8088, Z-80 base CP/M systems ( ported by Seymour Rubenstein)

Xerox, DEC and Intel introduced the "Ethernet" standard for local networks.

This network standard made use of a coax cable to send messages / signals between computers.   Ethernet shall be quickly adopted by almost every network manufacturer. Even Intel designed a special chip controller for this type of network.

CompuServe and The Source on-line services open.

The first Computerized Bulletin Board System (CBBS) opened to the public in Chicago.

Three students on two universities of North Carolina  (USA)  used the Unix to UNIX Copy Program (uucp) to put messages in a newsgroup. Usenet was born. By 1991 Usenet hosts more than 35,000 nodes. ⁽²⁵⁾

Magic Wand, a word processor program became a competitor for Word Star. ⁽²⁵⁾

Wayne Ratliff developed the Vulcan database program based on the concept of JPLDIS, a database program that ran on JPL computers.

The marketing will not bring the results expected and after a deal some years later on with George Tate (from Ashton-Tate) the package will be renamed into dBase II. (2) There was no dBase I but both tought it better to skip a nomination for marketing reasons. The Ashton-Tate company will blow new life into the marketing effort and the program will become a huge success. Mainly because the interfacing is so easy to understand and open ended. In its final version dBase II allows up to 65,000 records, and up to 32 fields of 1Kb each. ⁽²⁵⁾

Texas Instruments releases the first 16-bit processor on the market: 9900

The Ada programming language is developed by US Department of Defense.

A highly structured, modular language based on Pascal. Easy to learn, very readable but not very efficient. ⁽²⁵⁾

The first Atari microcomputers Atari 400 and 800 are introduced on the market.

Atari 400 Atari 800

They offer 8 Kb RAM (expandable to 48 Kb), a full Keyboard, Sound and Graphics chips that were designed by Jay Miner.

1979-82 Bjarne Stroustrup of Bell Laboratories in New Jersey introduces "C with Classes."

PROMPTII is adopted by the CCTA (the forerunner of the OGC), as the default method for all government information systems projects in the UK.(3)

April, Kevin McKenzie of Arpanet's MsgGroup poses the following suggestion:

15-Apr-79 12:05:26-PST,1142;000000000000
Mail-from: MIT-MC rcvd at 12-Apr-79 1740-PST
Date: 12 APR 1979 1736-PST
From: MACKENZIE at USC-ECL
Subject: MSGGROUP#1015 METHICS and the Fast Draw(cont'd)
To: ~drxal-hda at OFFICE-1
cc: msggroup at MIT-MC, malasky at PARC-MAXC

In regard to your message a few days ago concerning the loss
of meaning in this medium:

I am new here, and thus hesitate to comment, but I too have
suffered from the lack of tone, gestures, facial expressions
etc. May I suggest the beginning of a solution? Perhaps we could extend the set of punctuation we use, i.e:

If I wish to indicate that a particular sentence is meant
with tongue-in-cheek, I would write it so:

"Of course you know I agree with all the current
administration's policies -)."

The "-)" indicates tongue-in-cheek.

This idea is not mine, but stolen from a Reader's Digest article I read long ago on a completly different subject. I'm sure there are many other, better ways to improve our punctuation.

Any comments?

Kevin (5)

 

At first the so called emoticons are not readily accepted but a few decades later they will be the standard expression in Internet mail traffic