ABSTRACT
By the mid-1960s data-processing computers for business had become well established. Improved machines and software enabled more sophisticated applications and many primitive batch-processing systems became real time, but data processing still consisted of computing delivered to naive users by an elite group of systems analysts and software developers. The mode of computing is associated with computer time-sharing, the BASIC programming language, Unix, minicomputers, and new microelectronic devices. A time-sharing computer was one organized so that it could be used simultaneously by many users, each person having the illusion of being the sole user of the system—;;which, in effect, became his or her personal machine. The best known of the systems was the Dartmouth Time-Sharing System (DTSS). While International Business Machines (MIT's) CTSS was always a system for computer scientists—;;whatever the intentions of its designers—;;the one at Dartmouth College was intended for use by a much broader spectrum of users.
