There should be an app for that
Although I didn’t know the teacher well, the request seemed like a good task for my skill set. Could I write a script that would allow using the classroom computer to pick up email? Sure, but why? Seems that the original script had vanished…
I took a look; the 2400 baud rate of the modem seemed modern enough. There was software available, on a diskette, and it used the Hayes standard command set. Funny how a language becomes a standard. Anyhow, I checked to see if the software had its own scripting ability, before firing up the text processor.
AT?
ATDT 9,#######
… and so on, until I heard the familiar trilling as the modem contacted someone else’s machine to initiate handshake. And then I awoke.
A retro dream.
Actually, let’s move forward to this morning, when I was awake. A request came in, via text message, looking for a recommendation on a laptop purchase. Again, familiar territory. The kind of question that I answered, over and over again while in my cubicle. That’s been “gone” for two years, but the logic remains the same. Or as someone said, “There should be an app for that”.
After all, you can only buy what you can afford (especially when using school budget rules), and you can only buy what is available for sale. No standard answer, in an industry that changes regularly, but I do recommend that the buyer actually try the keyboard on any model that seems to fit. You can fix the software (slightly), but if you hate the key layout, that will stay until the machine is finally recycled.
