What did computers without screens do?
Chuck Guzis
cclist at sydex.com
Wed Dec 16 12:24:24 CST 2015
On 12/15/2015 09:13 PM, Mouse wrote:
>> What would you do with a home no screen computer?
>
> Depends on what counts as a "screen". If any visible output counts,
> there isn't much - but I suspect you don't want to go that far.
>
> You can connect to it from other computers. I have six machines
> running right now with no screens on them (though four of them have
> the host-side hardware for a screen).
>
> You can talk to it with a terminal. If a video-display terminal
> counts as a screen, use a printing terminal.
It's also occurred to me that without screens, we might be better off
today (oh boy, am I going to get flack on this one).
We might be in the position of being more concise in our computer
output. A "screen" is an output device--really, ordinary human input
devices haven't changed much. The average web-surfing experience blasts
the user with tons of filigree and useless data, but very little useful
information.
Don't forget that the first games were text-only. Web sites that have
multi-megabyte splash screens that serve no purpose other than tell you
that you've arrived. It's like your local Walmart hiring a marching
band to greet every single customer individually. Data is cheap and
Parkinson's law applies.
--Chuck
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