As soon as I read it I knew I had to post here. It really outlines the changes we have gone through. I actually did use Punch Cards in my first computer class in college. The next year though we had monitors.
I liked the “an analog childhood and a digital adulthood”
I feel sorry for kids that don’t get that analog childhood. Playing outside, knowing to come home before dark to dinner, exhausted but happy because of a day with friends and games that came from our imaginations
Ditto....
There's nothing more funny/tragic than watching a classmate running through the parking lot to get their assignment to the main frame before they closed and seeing them trip and the card deck scatter on the pavement... No way to get them gathered up and in the right order in time...
Sad.... but still funny...
P.S. I loved the sound of the next card sliding into position on the keypunch machine..
P.S.S If I recall my first program was an amortization schedule..