Advent of Computing

We've all played the Oregon Trail, but what do you know about it's origins? First developed as a mainframe program all the way back in 1971, the Oregon Trail was intended as an educational game first ...

20 Sep 202058min

The creation of FORTRAN and early compilers set the stage to change computing forever. However, they were just the start of a much longer process. Just like a spoken language, programming languages ha...

6 Sep 202054min

Is there a more iconic duo than the IBM PC and MS-DOS? Microsoft's Disk Operating System would be the final success that turned the company into what we know today. But here's a dirty little secret: D...

23 Aug 202046min

The IBM PC and MS-DOS, the iconic duo of the early 80s. The two are so interconnected that it's hard to mention one without the other. But in 1980 DOS wasn't IBM's first choice for their soon-to-be fl...

9 Aug 202052min

A lot of the technology we associate with the modern day started on anachronistic machines. I'm not talking about mainframes, I'm talking older. Today we are looking at George Julius's Automatic Total...

26 Jul 202048min

In 1974 Intel released the 8080 processor, a chip long in the making. It was the first microprocessor that had the right combination of power and price to make personal computers viable. But that same...

12 Jul 202046min

I recently got the chance to sit down and talk with Microsoft alumni Brad Chase. He was the product manager for Microsoft Works on the Macintosh, DOS 5, DOS 6, and the marketing lead for Windows 95 as...

5 Jul 202026min

Portable computing is now totally ubiquitous. There's a good chance you are listening to this episode on a tiny portable computer right now. But where did it all come from? As it turns out the first p...

28 Jun 202051min