The Joy of Computer History Books

submited by

Style Pass

2023-04-01 22:00:18

When I was a child, growing up in the 80s, I read pretty much anything I could find about computers. There was not a lot translated to French. I even read the MS-DOS Version 5 Reference Guide. The cover was dry and the content was not very tasty either.

To be fair, history was still in the making and there was not much to write about. But the least I can say is that time has made it up to me. There are so many good books now. Reading them is a great source of joy.

To make it to my list of favorites, a book should have at least one of these attributes. Being well researched. The author will have gathered multiple sources to confirm events. Not fall into the cult of personality ("looks at this genius") trap. Dictated autobiographies make me cringe. Nobody is perfect and if the work genuinely mentions mistakes, it is a good sign. Allow me to live something I did not experience (e.g: Ultima Online which France internet prices forbade).

Before moving to PC. I had an Atari 520 STe. I completely missed the beautiful Amiga. Luckily this is a field particularly well covered.