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Flashback to the early 1980s, when this programmer pilot fish is writing code for IBM's newest and tiniest minicomputer: the System/23 Datamaster.
"It was the granddaddy of the IBM PC," fish says. "It was an all-in-one computer that would fit on a desk, but it weighed almost 100 lbs. and cost almost $10,000. My employer used it for inventory management.
"When the IT VP asked if we could get a word processor for it, I knew there was supposed to be an option like that -- hardware plus software -- that cost $1,000.
"But our IBM sales guy told me it wasn't available. Then he suggested we upgrade to a System/34. This was a significantly more expensive computing platform than what we already had -- about $100,000.
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