How our society can change in a year

[lparsons21]

I'm far from being a college student, but I can understand why they would be underwhelmed by the current state of textbooks as ebooks. The very few I've seen are just not good enough compared to a real book. Switching around to the index, TOC and other spots in the book on the fly just isn't quite there yet.

And the publishers are wanting better control over those books also. I've dealt with them in the past with different projects to bring school books to the computer. In general, they were very resistive to the idea for lots of reasons.

 

[avg1joe]

ipads are popular with older people only because they are easier to use.

The idea that an ipad is nothing more than a "large print edition" ipod touch for senior citizens is really cracking me up. I wonder why they don't have commercials pointing this out more clearly to the general public.

The fact that you can buy cases for ipads that stand the screen up and have a built in keyboard really cracks me up too. Imagine. For the price of an ipad plus this case you can have something with a keyboard that sits on your lap and the screen sticks up behind the keyboard at a convenient angle. What will they think of next.

As usual apple advertising is brilliant. As much as I mock the ipad I wish I had one and have no idea why I want one other than I am supposed to want one. I have never seen one outside a display in a store. I heard that a friend of a friend bought one. Not much market saturation around here, I'd say.

 

[mdonnelly]

I started going to a new clinic last year, and that's the first place I saw the iPad in action. The medical office uses iPads instead of paper charts. I had digital x-rays taken, went to the exam room, and the doctor came in 5 minutes later with his iPad, looking at the x-rays over the office wireless connection. He brought up a form to enter the exam details, and it all went into the office database (and probably directly to billing).

Since then my granddaughter got an iPad as a perk from her orthodontist (braces). She's in high school and uses the pad for research and entertainment. I think it's cool technology, but then I've been working with computers since the IBM 360, the TRS-80 and the PDP-11.

 

[navychop]

I had fun programming the 360. It was so much simpler than programming a Z80, which was no brain teaser.

So how much are we going to change in the next year?

 

[diogen]

I've been working with computers since the IBM 360...

Weren't those times great?
JCL (Job Control Language) - my favorite part...

Diogen.

 

[rockymtnhigh]

Ya think. I don't know. I can drop my books, what happens when i drop a pad.

Agreed.

 

[bhelms]

OK - I'm a once wannabe geek with some programming experience going back to the 70s. I remember countless "fun" hours spent in the "computer labs" waltzing with a keypunch while trying to make Smith charts plot correctly clear across campus. I had a chance to play with the first Imsai 8080 in these parts and had a blast with my little Sinclair Z80 for the short time I had it. I also spent a fair amount of time programming "ladder logic" in the 5TI-series of electronic controllers that became the backbone of a generation of process equipment we designed/built in-house in that era. But I never made a "career" of programming, IT, or computer tech. I confess I had a TI-4A, but that was primarily for games. I've owned a room full of PCs and laptops since the first x86s hit the market, even had a Tandy 1000 for a couple of years prior to that. Now I'm limited to the little bit of macro work I do in Excel using the native VB, tho' I spend 3/4 of every work day on a 'puter of one form or another. For that reason, I was glad to leave them behind when I left work...and a reason why you never saw me in these forums outside of "business hours".

I was never intrigued by Apple - the company or its products. Then along came the iPad. It has changed my life. And my investment portfolio! Like the Visa card I used to buy it (and since cut up, but that's a topic for another thread), I "don't leave home without it." It has its shortcomings, but...dang!...what it can do seems to be exactly what I need or want to do at the moment! It has enhanced my ability to "be connected" and enjoy vast amounts of media like no other product this senior citizen has ever experienced!

I'm an early adopter and don't see widespread penetration of any tablets yet in these parts, but I agree the writing is on the wall...or on a high-res. tablet screen near you...!

 

[TheForce]

My first exposure to computers was ( beyond a tour of the IBM 360 as a kid ) in college. I was one of the few chem engineering students who took BASIC on the Dartmouth computer using punch tape on a teletype machine. I also took FORTRAN. I later bought a RS Model 1 and began to learn machine language which convinced me I was not one to program computers. I did learn Visicalc and became quite good at it. Later upgraded to a Model 4 with a graphics card and I wrote a Cave mapping program. Enter in underwater survey data and it plotted a 3D stick map on the screen. I did a presentation to the National Speleological Society of this new mapping tool. Pretty crude by today's 3D mapping stuff. MY last great venture into programming was with SQL. I wrote a complete chemical plant management package, inventory, formulation, packaging tracking, invoicing and accounting package. That took me almost a year to develop. It was my last real programming project.