When I asked my mom about information technologies that had been important in her career, her first thought was of when her company started to use typewriters with memory to do work. This functioned mainly like a normal typewriter, but it made it possible to store small phrases in the typewriter's memory for future use. Since all of the documents that she had to make had to be typed on a typewriter before they could be submitted, this made it easy to just program a heading for multiple documents and use it over and over instead of having to type the same phrase tediously on large numbers of letters and documents. It also prevented early mistakes that could have gone unnoticed and required that the whole document be rewritten on the typewriter.
After my mom told me about the typewriter with memory that she used, she was quick to point out that it was even better when her office bought its first computer. However, the company only bought one computer and if she wanted to get time to use it she had to come in earlier than everyone else and start her work even earlier. She did note that this was worth it, and that she was thankful when there were more computers available to use. Unlike her typewriter, she was able to store large amount of information and easily transfer words, phrases, or headings without much effort. Computers also allowed for easy editing of documents. Unlike in the past when she would have to retype an entire document if there were errors, she was now able to simply go back to the document on the computer, quickly edit it, and reprint it for submission.
Listening to my mom's story was intriguing, to say the least. I had always known that she had used typewriters, but never typewriters with any sort of memory in them. I had never known before that there were typewriters that were able to store short phrases for use on multiple documents. I also was interested to hear how amazed she was at computer features that seem so simple to me, like the copy and paste functions. It was also relieving to know that I never had to endure the age of having to retype an entire document just because of a few simple mistakes that are easy to make while typing out a document.
2 comments:
Scott, that's really interesting. I didn't know that about typewriters either. It never occurred to me that they could have functions like that. I also have never heard anyone talk about that. That seems like that would be really helpful, and I can't imagine moving from a typewriter to a computer. I bet it was really nice to have more features and not have to worry about correcting your mistakes as much.
Scott,
I also thought this was interesting. I find typewriters really complicated. My mom, as well as my sisters, tried to explain there experience with it to me before and I just got lost in there words or I only understood the functions of the typewriter at a very basic level. I can also see how it can be a big struggle to move from using a typewriter to a computer, they are very different and a computer is able to do so much more. I would hate it if I had to learn how to use a typewriter after knowing how a computer works.
Post a Comment