In 1983 I purchased my first personal computer, an Apple //e. By then we had an entire lab of Apples and Franklins, but I no longer needed to stay. The setup at home was more convenient, but the limitations imposed by the previous setup had a powerful focusing effect: hand-written programs, carefully reviewed and mentally simulated.
Fun times. Thank you, Steve, Woz, et al.
I'm curious what were you referring to here. Did Packard Bell make Apple 2 clones? I didn't find anything in a quick search.
There are a few stories about Oregon Trail, one of the most popular games that was originally written by a few Carleton students for the public schools on older computer hardware that was then rewritten for the Apple II. (It’s so iconic, Xennials in America are sometimes nicknamed the “Oregon Trail Generation” because of how pervasive the game was in schools to help teach about the westward migration in the mid-19th century.) Supposedly, Apple put in a bid at the last minute with the state and won the school contract, and they had a virtual monopoly in the public schools in Minnesota.
Dale LaFrenz, who was helping administer MECC, states [1] that Apple won the bid because they filed the only compliant bid. The board was leaning towards TRS-80, but Radio Shack didn't want to bother with the state's bureaucratic bid process.
[1] https://conservancy.umn.edu/items/7f6d8e9e-0560-43e0-9050-3a...
I remember playing oregon trail while studying the westward migration, I remember sitting in the classroom during lunch fiddling with turtle graphics. Either the district or the school had a turtle robot that you could hook up via serial and it would drive around on a piece of butcher paper on the floor and draw with a sharpie.
Woz is the kind of nerd I always aspired to be.
In some ways, it was a great time to be a kid.
An Apple II on a wheeled desk-cart was always popular in elementary school.
